Sentinel Of Khoth

Sentinel Of Khoth Page 14

by Brenda Trim

“Hear me, Sen­tinels of the East, I sum­mon the pow­ers of Air! Hear me, Sen­tinels of the South, I sum­mon the pow­ers of Fire! Hear me, Sen­tinels of the West, I sum­mon the pow­ers of Wa­ter! Hear me, Sen­tinels of the North, I sum­mon the pow­ers of Earth! As above, so be­low. As within, so with­out. Four stars in this place be, com­bined to call the fifth to me! So mote it be.”

  Talysia gasped at the same time Finn felt an in­crease in elec­tric­ity that made the hairs on his arms stand up. A sec­ond later light flared mak­ing their magic ev­i­dent.

  “Live and learn, learn and live. I en­deavor to re­ceive what life can give. Bring to me the lessons true. And knowl­edge of what to do. Amid the mess and chaos fierce. Shine a light to dark­ness pierce. Show the way to knowl­edge deep. Which to let go and which to keep. Clear the way so I might heed. The lessons that I truly need. Show me what I need to learn. As life’s pages I do turn. So mote it be,” Isis called out.

  The sis­ters’ hands were clasped and their mates held their shoul­ders. It was ob­vi­ous power and en­ergy were cours­ing through all four of them with the fe­males be­ing at the heart of it.

  The ground rum­bled and the walls shook. Talysia grabbed hold of Finn’s arms and her fin­ger nails dug into his skin. This spell must take shit loads more than any he’d wit­nessed so far. It never made the ground roll like it was at that mo­ment.

  Sud­denly, white light pulsed in­side the cir­cle and static elec­tric­ity coursed through the on­look­ers. Finn watched the con­tainer of wa­ter. Mist formed above the liq­uid and sil­ver light shone from within. Pema stated some­thing in a for­eign lan­guage then blew her breath across the bowl. The mist cleared to re­veal the clear wa­ter.

  Pema and Isis re­leased each other’s hand and Pema turned to An­gus while Isis be­gan gath­er­ing their ac­cou­trement to­gether. “There are no spells at work in the wa­ter,” Pema an­nounced as she picked up the knife then cut through the salt mix­ture on the floor.

  “Then what the fuck is go­ing on?” An­gus de­manded. The ground rum­bled again, mak­ing Finn won­der if the cir­cle she cast was still ac­tive and chan­nel­ing power. He as­sumed she was can­cel­ing the cir­cle when she cut the salt.

  “Sire,” De­clan mur­mured as he glanced down at his comm.

  An­gus’s eyes were blaz­ing with his dragon fire when he cut them to his as­sis­tant. “What?”

  Be­side Finn, Talysia whim­pered and the witches backed away at the venom in the king’s tone.

  “I’m sorry to in­ter­rupt, Sire, but there is a prob­lem with Mt. Ba­tia,” De­clan con­tin­ued.

  All eyes snapped to the king’s as­sis­tant with the same dis­be­lief. An­gus pinched the bridge of his nose and took sev­eral breaths be­fore con­tin­u­ing. “What about Mt. Ba­tia?”

  De­clan cleared his throat as he shifted from foot to foot. There was no doubt that what­ever he had to say was not go­ing to be good news. The tim­ing couldn’t be worse, Finn thought. Af­ter as­sum­ing what­ever was af­fect­ing Talysia and the oth­ers was mag­i­cal in na­ture they were back to square one.

  Worse, Finn thought. There was no par­a­site in­fest­ing the ocean or the af­flicted. No one could ex­plain their symp­toms, or how to fix it.

  “The vol­cano is go­ing to erupt, Sire. The seis­mic ac­tiv­ity is clear, and the sci­en­tists aren’t able to dis­cover why,” De­clan ex­plained.

  “Fuck,” An­gus growled as he started pac­ing across the stone. “What time frame are we look­ing at?” The ground rum­bled, shak­ing things up at that sec­ond as if in an­swer to the king’s ques­tion.

  “Their read­ings in­di­cate an erup­tion is im­mi­nent.”

  An­gus stopped and shifted his fo­cus to Leg­ette. “Get me ev­ery avail­able Maa­hes in the cas­tle ready to leave im­me­di­ately. Call re­in­force­ments to re­port for duty here. We canna leave the grounds un­pro­tected in case Cyril is plan­ning to use this as an op­por­tu­nity to at­tack Tate­nen. I will need all knights to help me di­rect the lava.”

  While Leg­ette fol­lowed An­gus’s or­ders, Finn took the op­por­tu­nity to say good­bye to Talysia. He cupped her cheeks and kissed her gen­tly. “Stay here, Song­bird. Don’t leave Tate­nen. You will be safe here. I’ll be back be­fore you know it.”

  Tal nod­ded her head and lifted to her toes and placed a kiss on his lips. Finn wanted to lose him­self in what­ever was build­ing be­tween them, but he had a vol­cano to con­tain.

  “Be care­ful,” she whis­pered.

  “Al­ways, Song­bird,” he promised and headed out with An­gus and the other Maa­hes. Finn felt Talysia’s eyes on him and knew she was likely stand­ing in the door with Keira watch­ing as they took off.

  It was dif­fi­cult to keep his at­ten­tion fo­cused on shift­ing and tak­ing to the air when he wanted to look back at his siren. Prob­lem was, if he saw her star­ing at his form all of his blood would rush to his shaft. Blaine would never stop teas­ing him if he was sport­ing an erec­tion while they worked to stop Mt. Ba­tia.

  ‘Stop think­ing about Talysia and her sexy mouth.’ he ad­mon­ished him­self. Shak­ing his head, Finn shed his pants and shifted into his dragon. When he was in the air, he tilted his head and saw Talysia walk­ing to­ward the cas­tle with Keira. He watched them un­til they dis­ap­peared.

  Flap­ping his wings, Finn fo­cused all of his at­ten­tion on the mis­sion ahead. In the dis­tance, smoke was vis­i­ble at the top of the vol­cano. Finn couldn’t re­mem­ber a time in his three hun­dred twenty-six years that he’d ever seen smoke like that rise from Mt. Ba­tia.

  “How do we stop the vol­cano from erupt­ing?” Finn sent to An­gus us­ing dragon mind speech.

  “There is no way to stop it. Our fo­cus is not on halt­ing what has al­ready be­gun, but on chan­nel­ing the lava away from pop­u­lated ar­eas,” An­gus replied.

  “How do we do that? There are towns and cities through­out the is­land,” Blaine in­ter­jected as their group flew at top speed.

  “We will use con­tain­ment runes,” An­gus in­formed them. “I will place a pair of Maa­hes at var­i­ous stages from the ocean to the top of the moun­tain and around the lip of the vol­cano. Where we will be stacked three deep in or­der to get all of the magma.”

  An­gus veered to­ward the ocean and started pair­ing them off and sta­tion­ing the Maa­hes pairs in an odd zigzag pat­tern around and up the moun­tain. “Hover a hun­dred yards apart and re­main alert. It’s pos­si­ble Cyril might at­tack while we are busy. Cast your runes and be ready to at­tack,” An­gus com­manded be­fore he moved on.

  Adren­a­line flooded Finn’s sys­tem as he fol­lowed the king wait­ing for his as­sign­ment. Be­neath them en­ergy em­anated from the vol­cano, heat­ing Finn’s blood. It called his dragon fire forth and had em­bers at the ready in the back of his throat. In­stinct told him the Cuele­bre drag­ons were cre­ated from this vol­cano. Or, per­haps the same power that cre­ated them had a hand in Mt. Ba­tia.

  When they reached the top of the vol­cano, Finn was placed in the sky close to the edge. When he glanced down all he saw was earth. The trees in the bowl were with­er­ing un­der the bar­rage of steam es­cap­ing from var­i­ous holes. There was no sign of the bright or­ange magma.

  A loud rum­ble echoed be­fore dirt, trees and rocks shot into the air. Finn nearly ducked out of the way but caught him­self in time. “Cast con­tain­ment runes now,” An­gus shouted into their minds.

  With­out hes­i­ta­tion, Finn ex­haled the smoke that was at the ready and drew the shape into the mist. The spell ac­ti­vated with a bluish flash of light. The night sky flashed all around the moun­tain as the Maa­hes fol­lowed suit.

  When his rune was ac­tive, Finn dared to look around. They knights above him were scram­bling into place and cast­ing while a look be­low made him think of two blue snakes wind­ing them­selves around the moun
­tain.

  Some­thing smacked into Finn’s left wing, mak­ing him fal­ter. A screech left his throat when agony threat­ened to force him to the ground. With teeth grit­ted, he searched for the cul­prit, ex­pect­ing the wakati.

  He hadn’t thought about the de­bris that went into the air and the fact that it wasn’t within their con­tain­ment field. A tree cracked sev­eral bones in his wing, mak­ing it dif­fi­cult to stay aloft.

  There was no time to ask for re­lief as a sec­ond later red, hot magma flew into the sky. As it soared higher, Finn won­dered if their net was high enough. Re­lief made him sag as he watched the bright or­ange liq­uid splash against an in­vis­i­ble wall.

  “I’ve never seen any­thing so beau­ti­ful and ter­ri­fy­ing,” Blaine mum­bled in dragon mind speech.

  “Look at the way it burns ev­ery­thing in its wake. How is An­gus able to man­age the erup­tion dur­ing the Tuya cer­e­mony?” Finn re­turned as he voiced his thoughts.

  The magma was de­stroy­ing all veg­e­ta­tion as it flowed down the moun­tain, but it was a stun­ning sight. An­gus had planned the po­si­tions per­fectly and the lava flowed along with­out reach­ing any of the pop­u­lated ar­eas. The smell of sul­fur filled the air, mak­ing Finn’s stom­ach churn.

  The two blue snakes turned into one mas­sive or­ange snake whose skin glowed blue. Sev­eral min­utes later the lava reached the ocean and steam ex­ploded into the air as it hit the wa­ter. The sight was stun­ning, de­spite the nox­ious odor fill­ing the air.

  Sev­eral of the Maa­hes close to the area turned their backs on the steam and started beat­ing their wings. It was the equiv­a­lent of fan­ning a hand in front of their faces. The heat from the erup­tion be­came sti­fling a mo­ment later, dis­tract­ing Finn from the ocean.

  “Sire,” Finn called out with his mind.

  “Aye,” An­gus replied.

  “How did Cyril cause Mt. Ba­tia to erupt? Do you think he has gained the fa­vor of the Gods?” With all of Cyril’s re­cent ac­tiv­ity, Finn’s con­cern had grown. It seemed that hit af­ter hit kept com­ing, and it made him won­der if they were fight­ing a los­ing bat­tle.

  “Nay. He has no’ gained the Gods’ fa­vor. He used Un­seelie magic. I can feel it un­der the heat and stench. ‘Tis the rea­son for the smell, as well. This will take round the clock cleans­ing to clear from the air.”

  It was a damn good thing Leg­ette had kept their ranks full. Dur­ing An­gus’s ab­sence, Leg­ette worked hard to re­place knights as quickly as they lost them. These events would have com­pletely crip­pled them with­out time to rest and re­cover.

  This at­tack could’ve been much worse if they hadn’t acted so quickly. Cyril was def­i­nitely plan­ning some­thing, but Finn no longer be­lieved it was one ma­jor act. In­stead, he was be­gin­ning to sus­pect the Un­seelie King was slowly chip­ping away at their foun­da­tion. He was wear­ing them down, hop­ing that each time they faced a dis­as­ter it would take out a few knights so even­tu­ally they would be weak­ened and fail to beat his forces.

  The thought was chill­ing and pissed him off. The Un­seelie piece of shit needed to die, and quick.

  * * *

  Chap­ter 15

  “How are you feel­ing, Song­bird?” Finn was hop­ing to come across as solely con­cerned for how Talysia was feel­ing but was afraid she saw right through him.

  “Hmmm,” she replied as she set her drink on the side ta­ble then climbed into his lap. “Much bet­ter af­ter that meal. How are your ribs? Do they hurt?” Her fin­gers traced the bruised flesh, but he didn’t feel any­thing ex­cept arousal.

  “My ribs aren’t what aches on me,” he mum­bled and brought his lips to hers. He pressed them over hers and licked at the seam of her mouth.

  Talysia moved her hips for­ward and back, rub­bing her core over his hard­en­ing shaft. “What do you need, Baby?”

  “Gods, I need you. All of you,” he replied as his hands brack­eted her hips. “But I want to make sure you feel okay.”

  “All I feel is you. I want your hands and mouth all over me while your cock sinks deep in­side. Noth­ing will stop this from fi­nally hap­pen­ing,” Talysia de­clared.

  Finn groaned. His siren was sexy as fuck and knew ex­actly what to say. Ev­ery cell in his body was tuned into Talysia as she bit her lower lip and gazed at him with open de­sire.

  Finn never con­sid­ered ro­man­tic el­e­ments when en­gag­ing in sex­ual re­la­tions with fe­males, but sud­denly he wished he’d asked his clean­ing staff to light can­dles and pro­cure the straw­ber­ries ev­ery­one in the realm seemed to crave. Some­thing to let her know she meant more to him than a ran­dom hookup.

  Finn sensed Talysia’s fa­tigue and gen­eral malaise but also her arousal. Her light, sweet, flo­ral scent filled the room, mak­ing it clear her symp­toms were not de­ter­ring her in the least. She was as ex­cited as he was. He wrapped his arms around her waist and hoisted her off her feet. Im­me­di­ately, her legs wrapped around his waist, mak­ing his erec­tion harder than stone.

  Feet car­ry­ing them down the hall, Finn’s lips trailed from her mouth, and along her jaw, while she squirmed in his arms. The driv­ing lust caused her to writhe in his arms and press her core against his hard shaft. A growl left his throat and he stopped sud­denly un­able to move an­other inch.

  With swift move­ments, he pushed her up against the wall and bit down on her neck. A sud­den urge to claim her as his stole all ra­tio­nal thought. Noth­ing else mat­tered for the span of sev­eral rapid heart­beats. It took con­sid­er­able ef­fort to push that de­sire aside. He re­fused to ex­am­ine where it came from. He wanted noth­ing to ham­per the ex­pe­ri­ence.

  When Talysia arched her back on a gasp, it nearly un­did him, and he al­most blurted his de­sire to mate her. The idea was in­sane. They’d be­come close over the past few weeks and spent more time to­gether than apart when they weren’t work­ing. He as­sumed it was the fact that she was the first fe­male to take care of him aside from his mother.

  Re­gard­less, he re­fused to give it an­other thought as he grabbed both ass cheeks in his hands. He moved his hips and pulled her against his body while he once again claimed her lips. The kiss deep­ened and his tongue slid into her mouth to tan­gle hotly with hers.

  Break­ing the kiss, she trailed her mouth along his jaw. “You’d bet­ter watch it, Finn, or I will cum right here.”

  Like that was a de­ter­rent, he thought to him­self. He’d do any­thing to keep her on the edge of or­gasm and toss her over when she least ex­pected it. There was noth­ing sex­ier that Talysia in the throws of pas­sion. She was sul­try and sen­sual and the sounds she made were lit­er­ally mu­sic to his ears. He as­sumed it was her siren na­ture that made it sounds like an­gels singing.

  Shak­ing off the sappy thought, he wanted to roll his eyes at him­self. He was be­com­ing a fe­male with all the mushy thoughts run­ning through his head. Be­sides, an­gels didn’t sound melod­i­cal like that, he re­minded him­self. He’d met sev­eral dur­ing his time in the Tehrex Realm, and Ramiel vis­ited Izzy on Khoth fre­quently, but nei­ther Rami nor Ayil, Abraxos, or Ara­ton sounded mag­i­cal.

  “I want you to cum for me,” Finn ad­mit­ted. “And, it won’t be the last of the night.” His hand trailed up her side and cupped one breast through the ma­te­rial of her top.

  Talysia’s erotic en­ergy went off the charts and her hips in­creased their rhythm. Thrust­ing his hips, he ground his erec­tion against her core. She gripped his hair and buried her face in his neck as she moaned. The way she re­sponded lit the dragon fire in his belly. The em­bers threat­ened to con­sume him whole, and he was help­less to do any­thing but open his arms and wel­come the surge.

  “Finn,” Talysia cried out and tugged his hair. He hardly felt the sting in his scalp as she writhed and came apart in his arms. Be­fore her or­gasm waned, she shifted her body aw
ay from his. The in­stant con­cern she was un­happy with what just tran­spired died on his lips when her small palm gripped him through his clothes.

  His cock jerked against her, and he leaned back then pulled her shirt over her head. The teal blue bra Talysia was wear­ing was sheer and lacey, leav­ing noth­ing to the imag­i­na­tion. Her pert nip­ples poked against the fab­ric, beg­ging him for a kiss.

  His mouth low­ered and he sucked the tip into his mouth. His tongue cir­cled the nip­ple mak­ing her moan and shove more of her flesh into his mouth. The rich scent of her or­gasm was thick in the air, mak­ing it eas­ier to tease her. With some of her needs met, he could take some time and learn what she en­joyed.

  Prob­lem was, his need was higher than ever be­fore, and he strug­gled to main­tain con­trol. Test­ing the wa­ters, he bit down on her turgid peak harder than she ex­pected. Her mewls of de­light aroused him fur­ther. He wasn’t into bondage, but for some rea­son he wanted to push Talysia. See ex­actly what turned her on.

  Based on the heat and wet­ness Finn felt be­tween their bod­ies he knew she en­joyed the edge of pain. He would never hurt her. His new goal in life was to give her all the plea­sure she could han­dle. It was as im­por­tant as his role as sen­tinel of Khoth.

  “Ei­ther fuck me here or take me to your room,” Talysia panted. “I’m not sure how much more I can take.”

  Finn tuned into what her body was telling him to en­sure she wasn’t too fa­tigued. “Oh, Song­bird. I’m not done dis­cov­er­ing ev­ery­thing about you yet,” he de­clared as he pulled back and put space be­tween them while still hold­ing her against the wall. Talysia’s firm ass filled his hands. He shifted and wrapped an arm around her waist, hold­ing her up.

  With a squeeze, Talysia let go of his cock and wrapped her arms around his neck. While his free hand un­clasped her bra, Tal brought her lips crash­ing down on his. Seemed that he un­locked the in­ner wild­cat in his siren. Her mouth was rough and in­sis­tent and her tongue flicked against his, stroking with ur­gent mo­tions.

 

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