A Soul Like Glass (Kingdom of Betrayal #4)

Chapter 46

Chapter 46

W hen I reach the top of the tower, Erik is still fast asleep, and I don’t want to wake him.

Maybe I should rush away. There are people who need me. But Erik needs me, too. And I need him. The moon is high, and dawn is several hours away. I will stretch out these final moments with all my might.

I press my hand to the wall, closing the doorway once again. This tower answers my needs so I trust that Galeia and the others will be safe within it.

Slipping back to the rug, I nestle against Erik’s side and close my eyes.

He stirs, his upper arm sliding around my waist, pulling me closer, but his breathing remains deep.

I close my eyes and let myself dream about a life here with him. He and Galeia can hunt in the forest. I can use my power to create everything we need. In that dream world, the darkness wouldn’t exist, and nothing could tear us apart?—

“Asha.” Erik’s panicked whisper meets my ears a second before his arms clamp around me.

Only moments ago he was sleeping peacefully, but now he crushes me to his chest, one of his hands tangling in my hair.

His heart is pounding so hard I can feel it.

“Fucking nightmares,” he rasps before his lips press to mine. His other arm has slipped beneath me, and my body weight must be pinning it, but he doesn’t seem to care.

His eyes are wide open, and right now, he is pure wolf .

“Don’t go,” he snarls at me, a command that echoes with all the ferocity of the beast he used to be. “You’ve given enough. I’ve given enough.”

The pain in his voice is like a knife in my heart.

I want to tell him that I won’t leave him. That the darkness unleashed by the actions of those who came before me is not for me to banish. But I can’t lie to him…

Tears slip down my cheeks, and I don’t try to stop them.

He watches their downward path, his hands stroking my back, his fingers finding the gap between the bottom of my tunic and my waistband and tugging them apart, caressing the bare skin he exposes.

“Give me permission,” he says, more softly but no less intensely than before, “and I will make you want to stay.”

The pressure of his hands lightens, tantalizing strokes now swirling across my lower back, and I can’t deny the desire heating my body.

“You have my permission,” I whisper.

Slowly, he lifts himself and me into a sitting position, first pulling me up onto his chest, then using his stomach muscles to sit up before guiding my legs around his waist. His hands don’t stop kneading my back, easing the sore muscles across my shoulders, all the while tugging on the material of my tunic.

“This room needs a bath,” he says without taking his eyes off me, brushing his lips to mine.

I lean back toward the edge of the rug, taking my time to reach out with my left hand, my movement causing my back to arch and pushing my core against his hard length. My new position draws a growl to his lips, and I can’t stop my groan as pleasure spikes through me at the contact.

It takes everything in me to focus on my task and not rock against him.

Finding the edge of the rug, I press my palm to the hard floor, a vision of a big, white, claw-foot bath filling my mind. The rock forming the floor in the left-hand corner of the room ripples and extends upward until the bath that I imagined forms, complete with cloths to wash and dry ourselves with.

Erik barely glances at them. One of his hands continues supporting my arching back while his other slips around to my stomach, stroking upward between my breasts, stopping at the base of them, his fingers splayed but not stroking. It’s a promise of pleasure that only feeds the heat growing between my legs.

Before I can give in to my impulses and rock against him, he sweeps both of his arms around me, lifting me while my legs are wrapped around his hips.

When he carries me to the bath, I’m not surprised that it begins to fill at our approach, gentle steam floating up off the surface of the water.

He turns me to face the bath, remaining close behind me as he pulls up my tunic, taking his time to lift it over my head, his fingers stroking the skin across my back as he exposes every inch of it. Then stroking down my thighs as he pulls my pants to my feet, undressing me slowly, planting kisses against the backs of my legs on his way back to a standing position.

He breaks the contact between our bodies only for a moment to remove his own clothing, swiftly dispensing with his tunic and pants before closing the gap between us again. His kisses swirl against my left shoulder, stopping at the base of my neck where he pushes aside my hair so his mouth can travel higher, gently nuzzling my earlobe.

With every touch of his hands and tongue, shocks of pleasure strike through me, forces of energy that make my thighs clench and my breathing hitch. Especially when his hands brush across my stomach again, easing upward a little, then downward a little, caressing the base of my breasts and the top of my pelvis but refraining from traveling any higher or lower.

My nipples are hard, aching for his touch, and my core feels heavy with desire.

Slipping his hand around mine, he steps into the bath before reaching over to lift me into it. In the moment before his arms capture me, I take in the full nakedness of his body, all of his muscles, and the hard need that he must be keeping at bay.

Easing us both down into a sitting position, he maneuvers me so that I’m facing away from him and resting between his legs, at which he reaches for a cloth and begins washing me. Starting with my back, he runs the wet material around my neck and shoulders, trickling water down across my breasts, nudging me forward so he can rub my back before easing me back against his chest again.

With long, maddening strokes, he washes my arms before finally reaching down to clean my thighs, but only the outside of them, before he pulls my knees to my chest so he can reach my calves.

It is both thrilling and agonizing.

How slowly he touches me. How he avoids any part of me that might ease the intense burn that has built in my core. How he takes his time running his tongue from my ear to my shoulders, pressing me forward again so he can kiss my lower back.

Despite the water lapping at me, threatening to sweep my own wetness away, my core is only growing wetter.

My breathing is rapid by the time he growls, low and soft. “Move to the other end of the bath.”

I trust him completely, sliding through the water to the other side and turning to face him.

As soon as the contact between us breaks, he sets about cleaning himself, washing his hands, scrubbing at the hints of blood on his neck, even leaning forward to immerse his hair in the water.

But when he emerges, he stares ruefully at the water. “I should have told you to get out.”

It’s true.

He must have cleaned the worst of the blood off himself in the stream because I didn’t realize until now that there was still so much blood on him.

Now, it’s swirling through the water toward me.

Without fuss, I rise to my feet, lifting myself away from the evidence of his battles moments before the bloodied water can reach my pelvis. Now, only my calves are immersed.

“Better?” I ask softly, staying right there in full view.

The regret leaves his eyes and his heated gaze passes from my face all the way down my body to the water’s surface and then back up again. “Much.”

He, too, rises upward, shaking himself off like the wolf he is, standing opposite me, droplets of crimson water dripping off him.

As I take in the scars on his body and the moisture on his skin, my eyes widen.

In an instant, I’m transported back in time. I’m standing on the balcony outside my tower. He’s there with me, and we are enemies again. Him and me. Wolf and Blacksmith. Droplets of blood falling between us.

I’m suddenly sobbing.

I want to go back, even more desperately than ever. I need to go back to the moment when he found me unconscious in the snow. I want to have woken up. I want to have seen him.

I want to have run away with him, choosing a different future and leaving all the darkness behind.

“Asha.” His voice is broken.

I’m crying too hard to see past my tears, but I hear the water swoosh as he gets out of the bath.

He reaches for me, lifting me up and out so smoothly that I wish he could pull me from my future so easily.

My legs wrap around his waist, and my arms close around his chest.

“Why can’t I let the world burn?” I cry against his neck.

“You can,” he snarls, the intense pain in his voice reaching me through my grief. His lips press to my forehead, then my cheeks. “Let it all burn, Asha.”

The need within me bursts back to life. Using my muscles to raise myself up, I demand his kiss, pressing my lips to his, seeking his tongue, tasting every part of his mouth, hungry for his body, needing him, heart and soul.

He responds with the touch I crave, turning and lowering me back onto the rug where he can kneel between my legs and reach every inch of my body.

He balances on one hand, while his lips close over my breasts, one at a time, drawing each nipple into his mouth, his free hand stroking my other breast as I arch into his touch. Cries leave my lips as the heady ache in my center eases and builds with every demanding stroke of his hands and tongue, and a world of pleasure bursts alive within me.

He moves closer to my pelvis, his kisses heading lower, but I take hold of his shoulders.

The wetness between my legs is already intense. His own needs must be beyond his limits.

“Fuck me,” I groan. “Don’t make me wait.”

I need the connection with his body. I need to believe that nothing can ever separate us.

He pauses for only a moment before he positions himself at my center.

His deep, gray, wolfish eyes meet mine as he says, “Stay with me.”

In this moment, I convince myself I’m speaking the truth. “Always.”

The first thrust sends me over the edge.

I scream with pleasure as my world spirals and my body strains to contain the release, to deny the crash as long as I can.

He doesn’t take it slow, thrusting into me with a hard rhythm that my body welcomes, every muscle in my core accommodating him, every sensitive inch of me burning with desire.

I reach my arms back to the rug, gripping it, bracing, pushing myself against him as firmly as he’s thrusting into me.

Pleasure explodes within me, long, long moments of an orgasm that extends beyond anything I thought possible. My mind lifts with it, filling with every memory of him.

All the times he pushed me away. All the times he commanded me. All the times I defied him and challenged him and fought to keep him alive when he was ready to let me go.

All the pain and all the love.

I will hold onto him for as long as I can, and I will never, ever, forget him.

The crash takes him, and both of his hands hit the rug, his command thrumming through me. “Stay with me.”

I gasp for breath, trying to speak through the ripples of pleasure still raging through me. “ Always .”

I pull him to my chest, wrapping my arms and legs around him, needing his weight like an anchor, refusing to let go.

He rolls us over so he’s lying on his back, and I’m resting down on him, my head resting against his heart.

Thud-thud . It’s rapid, like his breathing, and I close my eyes, memorizing the beat.

“I will love you forever, Erik Vandawolf.”

His response is a growl. “It took a dragon to keep you from me when I made your hammer.”

I remember it.

I struggled against Graviter’s hold so hard, trying to get to Erik, to stop him from giving his life for me.

Now, he’s warning me that he won’t let me go easily. The strength of his arms around me only emphasizes his words.

“Then we’ll have to find a dragon on the way.” My voice is a bare whisper, and my heart aches so badly I can’t force myself to move.

For long minutes neither of us moves or speaks.

Then, finally, the thumping of his heart eases, and I know that if I don’t move now, I will never do it.

Pushing up off him, I disconnect our bodies and slip from his arms, heading straight to the side of the room where a tap of my hand against the wall provides me with a bathroom.

My movements are wooden as I wash up.

My body doesn’t feel like it belongs to me.

For a moment, I lean forward, gripping the edge of the sink, my eyes closed, my jaw clenching.

The hurt… I can’t stop it.

I have no choice but to throw myself into a future that requires my own destruction.