The Blood Crown (The Blood Folk #2)

36. Chapter 36

Chapter 36

V en's lips crushed hers, the calluses on his hands scraping against her legs as he sat up, hauling her against his body.

Darkness pooled around them like silk, whispering and caressing as Ven’s magick wrapped around her, the weightlessness of his shadows carrying them someplace quiet, dark.

His lips never left her skin, exploring the fluttering pulse at her throat and the heaving swells of her breasts as her fingers dug into the hard muscle of his arms. It was an effort to pull herself away, but she just wanted to drink him in—all of him—and savor the look that he gave her right now, dark with desire. Half feral.

Gods, he was beautiful.

He looked hewn from the very stone surrounding them. Carved and chiseled into an immortal warrior.

Glancing to their new surroundings, her eyes adjusted to the dark—but it was the smell that she recognized first. The scent of cold, damp stone and minerals. The same place where he’d taken her as she’d gone into stasis. She looked at him, brows creased with the unspoken question as he lifted a hand, brushing his thumb across her cheek.

“I wanted to bring you someplace where we wouldn’t be disturbed.” His eyes darkened as he placed a chaste kiss upon her lips. “Somewhere I wouldn’t have to be quiet.”

“Too many immortal ears?” she laughed against his mouth.

“Well, you know how Seth is,” he murmured, “terrible gossip.”

The cavern spanned high above them, soft mist rolling off the warm spring deep within the belly of the mountain. But there was something new here as well. Something whispering of life and soft new growth . . .

Where there had only been darkness, light perforated the topmost edge of the ceiling—but what caught her attention were the splashes of veridian and pale green.

Her memory of going into stasis had been fractured with the pain of coming into her power, but even so—she had no recollection of color in this place. Only the black, dark stone and the blinding white of her magick. And yet—there was life all around. Wild vines wrapping around the descending spirals of stalactites and saplings taking root into the black stone beneath their feet.

She let out a breath of disbelief as Ven wrapped his arms around her. “It happened after you went into stasis,” he said quietly, as if he couldn’t quite believe it himself.

But what did any of it mean?

The thought brought reality crashing down on her—the King of the Void would eventually hunt her here . . . and the Wraiths numbers were too small to fight back against an army. Ven—Karro, Embra, Asher . . . the thought of any of them falling to the same fate as Tanis was too much to bear.

Ven gripped her chin, his face filling her vision, eyes searching her expression and seeing the fear that bubbled to the surface. “Tonight is not for borrowing tomorrow’s troubles,” he whispered against her lips. “It is for this —for you and I, and nothing else.”

She placed her palm against his chest, feeling the steady beat of his heart under the hard, unforgiving muscle. Her hand slid to the golden skin of his throat, and he inhaled sharply as she lifted the heavy chain resting there.

Suspended between her fingertips was the small copper disk, imprinted with a crescent and seven interlinked circles. The same gift she had offered a misunderstood creature in a different lifetime.

There were no more secrets between them. Nothing left unsaid.

He reached for the white button-down shirt she wore, hands sliding up her waist. She trembled as his thumbs swept up, brushing the underside of her breasts through the thin fabric before gently tugging the shirt over her head and tossing it to the floor.

His fingertips trailed up the exposed skin of her back as she stood proud under his gaze, seeing the admiration in his eyes as they traced every muscled curve of her body. A body that was capable and strong, that had carried her through harsh stretches of the Shades and fought to help them escape Mountveil. One that was worthy of housing the power that prowled through her veins.

And Ven was looking at her as if he’d never seen anything more beautiful in his life.

Heat bloomed under her skin as she stepped forward, fingertips tracing the muscles down his chest, to the vee at his hips, relishing his growl of desire as she found the laces of his pants and tugged them loose.

Her stare was brazen as she took in every glorious inch of him.

Hers.

His hand threaded through her hair, roughly pulling her against him, the hard planes of his body melting against her soft curves. When he finally pulled away, his eyes were dark with the longing both of them had held back until this moment.

He knelt in front of her, pressing a kiss between her breasts as she traced the swirls of black ink winding across his shoulders, spiraling down the heavy muscles of his arms. His thumbs hooked under the waist of her pants, tugging them down. And then he scooped her up into his arms, leaving her breathless as he carried her toward the water's edge.

The intoxicating scent of him enveloped her, making her head swim with desire as he laid her at the edge of the spring. Pushing a hand against the plane of her stomach, his kisses seared a trail across her bare skin. “This is what I’ve dreamt of for months now,” he whispered against her, a dark warrior kneeling before his queen as his lips pressed lower. Lower still, until she was entirely at his mercy. “Let me worship you.”

The longing in his voice was enough to make her body feel like molten liquid as an aching need pounded through her, mingling with the humming energy of her magick. She gasped as something soft and cool as silk wrapped around her back.

Shadows puddled around her, cushioning the hard surface of the stone as the warm spring lapped at her. Ven's wisps of darkness caressed her neck, her arms. An extension of his gentle kisses as he settled between her thighs, sliding his hands up the backs of her legs and guiding them open.

His breath was hot against her. And the first stroke of his tongue had her entirely at his mercy, his movements languid and unhurried. The fervent demand from before was gone—as if he’d thought of this moment too many times to waste it.

The view of his muscled shoulders, the dark ink spiraling up his arm and swirling across his back as he buried his face in her, was nearly enough to make her shatter. And the heat of his tongue turned her into molten fire as he commanded her with every touch, coaxing and gentle.

He could have asked anything of her, and she would have given it willingly so long as he didn’t stop his delicious torture.

Heat flooded her core as her body spiraled higher, the lightning crackling just under the surface of her skin threatening to break through. Small white sparks leapt between her fingertips as she clawed into the shadows cushioning her, but Ven only splayed his hand wide on her belly, holding her in place. He was unrelenting as she finally fractured, and he gripped the backs of her thighs, drinking down every drop of pleasure as wave after wave crashed over her.

The cavern was bathed in a white haze as Ven lifted himself from the water, rising between her legs. Her fingertips traced the swells of his muscled abdomen, and she savored the shiver she elicited as his lashes fluttered shut. When he opened them again, the crimson of his irises had been swallowed whole—his eyes darkening with desire as she felt him against her.

She’d seen the considerable size of him—but feeling it was something else entirely.

He brushed a kiss across her lips, searching her face, something like disbelief in his expression. “I never thought—” he whispered, silver lining his dark lashes. “I never dared to dream of this.”

She pulled him closer, desperate to chase away that look in his eyes as she kissed him. “You are mine,” she whispered, “and I am yours.” Her fangs grazed his bottom lip, drawing a bead of blood and flaring her desire as she shifted forward.

“ Mine ,” he whispered reverently, hands gripping her hips as he finally slid into her in a wave of decadent pain. A guttural growl escaped him as his fingers dug into her skin. “ Mine ,” he murmured again.

Gone was the sadness that had lingered in his eyes, replaced by something possessive, something primal as he pushed into her completely. She bared her throat to him as his hand slid up her waist, a thumb brushing across the hard peak of her breast. And she nearly begged as she felt his hot breath against her neck, the sensation turning her to liquid.

The slight sting was nothing compared to the exquisite rapture as his fangs pierced her throat, the feel of his lips against her skin sending desire pulsing through her.

He thrust into her with every pull of her vein, the water lapping at the place where they joined, until her pleasure coiled tighter, nearly unbearable.

With every retreat, he pushed back in just as slowly—the look on his face enough to tell her that he was torturing himself as well. The pad of his thumb found the apex of her thighs, his feather-light touch making her body sing.

Lightning crackled beneath her skin, her magick wild and unruly under his ministrations—white sparks danced between her fingers, heat branding Ven’s skin where her hands gripped his arms. And a memory pushed into her thoughts of the last time they’d been in this cavern . . . The burns she’d left on his hands, his arms.

Panic ripped through the blissful haze and smothered the glow surrounding her as she struggled to shackle the power building in her veins. Ven glanced down at her, tendrils of midnight curling around her body as his shadows whispered to her magick.

“You will never have to dim your power here," he growled. "You will never have to pretend to be anything less than what you are.”

“What if I can’t control it?” she panted, fear bleeding through her voice.

“I’m quite difficult to kill, Love," he whispered against her throat, "but I’d love to watch you try.” He slid into her again, stretching her to the cusp of pain, and with one final growl, he spilled into her—the sensation enough to take her over the edge with him.

White light poured from her, unrestrained and unbidden. From her fingertips—her eyes, until every part of her glowed pale gold against the black backdrop of his shadows, his dark power soothing and subduing the blinding swell of her magick.

"Control it, Ari." Ven's command threatened to snap the tether on her power as light washed over the cavern. "It is your power to wield—yours alone," his deep voice rumbled through the haze.

And darkness caressed her in answer. Shadows wrapping around her skin. Whisper soft as they murmured to her magick, lulling the blistering heat to a gentle flicker of warmth.

Bound.

Maybe she should have felt fear—some kind of hesitation at the knowledge that whatever happened to her now, her fate was linked with his. But only one thought emerged through the tempest of unknowns . . .

Home— this was home. He was home.

Ven held her in his arms, his chest pressed against her back as she curled into him. Shifting, he looked down to where they were still entangled in each other, to the faint wisps of shadow drifting across the floor.

His dark brows creased, eyes flicking to her as he murmured, “I didn’t summon those.”

Darkness wound around her body, shadows lingering as they seemed to whisper to the crackling energy of her lightning. But they didn't belong to Ven.

He shook his head, lifting her palm in his hand and running his thumb across her skin as if her power might reveal its secrets to him. But the sound of his voice still echoed through her thoughts.

He’d told her to control her magick . . . and she’d summoned shadows.

"In my father's throne room . . ." he paused, voice tinged with disbelief, "I thought maybe Karro had been the one to cover everything in shadow, but then I realized he'd still been shackled when the darkness fell."

She still remembered the visceral feeling as the weight of those cuffs left her wrists, her magick free and unbound . . . She'd only known that they needed a distraction, that they needed a way to escape. And there had been a rage that darkened her power, a hatred that made her want to make Ven's father and his court of monsters suffer and feel . . . terror. Utter terror.

And the shadows had answered her.

Ven's eyes lifted to hers. “Do it again,” he whispered, excitement edging his voice.

She sat up, turning her palms over. “I don’t—I don’t know how.”

“Close your eyes.”

She obeyed as Ven propped himself up behind her, head dropping over her shoulder, arms wrapped around hers.

He cradled her upturned hands in his own, murmuring, “Think of the dark, quiet corners of this cavern. The shadows pooling at the edges.”

She reached for her power—that familiar heat rising to the surface beneath her skin.

“No.” The command was firm, but gentle. “Every magick answers to a different call—you cannot summon shadow the same way you summon lightning.”

She’d only just begun to understand how to call her power, she'd never considered the nuance it would take to command two. And a pang of sadness settled in her chest that Ven’s patience—his relentlessness in helping her control her magick—had stemmed from having to learn to control his own.

Easing back against his warm chest, she focused once more, murmuring to the heat that rose at her call. She thought of the way Ven’s shadows felt when they wrapped around her. Smooth as satin. Caressing as the night air. The magick she reached for whispered like the grey pines. It smelled of damp earth, and citrus, and a chilled breeze—it smelled like . . .

Ven.

It felt like Ven.

Spreading her fingertips wide, she called to the quiet, to the dark. As familiar to her as her own blinding light. And she let out a soft gasp as something brushed against her skin.

When she finally opened her eyes, there was pride flashing in Ven’s gaze.

Translucent wisps of shadow curled around her hand, more gathering as they bled across the floor toward her. Nothing as menacing as what Ven could conjure, but they answered her .

Ven lifted his hand from beneath hers, his long, elegant fingers pulling deep black pools of night toward them, his shadows twisting and entwining with the pale gray wisps of hers—until they were indistinguishable from each other.