13. Tempest
13
TEMPEST
A muffled groan made me stir, and I snapped awake as Vexxion staggered across the room, clutching his head.
As I sat up, Drask squawked from where he’d perched on the top of a nearby chair. Lifting off, he flew into the next room as I flitted to Vexxion and grabbed his arm, lying it across my shoulders and guiding him toward the bed.
“I’m fine, I’m fine.” He tried to step away from me, straightening.
Did he think his words and statement that everything was as it should be would actually convince me?
Grumbling, I latched onto his arm again and took him to the bed, where he dropped down, staring forward in a blank way that chilled me straight through my bones.
My teeth chattering, I swung his legs around so he could lie on the thick pile of flooferdar blankets. A solitary black rose tipped with silver nestled in a vase on the bedside table. I’d found it there earlier, and I’d clutched it to my chest, unable to catch a breath. Even when he was confident I’d hate him forever, he’d taken time to give me things I adored—including himself.
“Vexxion,” I said, stroking his forehead. “Tell me what I can do.”
He just groaned again.
So much pain on his face and seeping from his skin. Its bitterness tainted the air.
“He took too much,” I snarled, removing Vexxion’s boots and tossing them onto the floor. If I knew how, I’d remove his clothing with magic, but I hadn’t yet been able to master the spell. Silly me had enjoyed having him strip me and then flash away his own clothing himself.
I gently helped him out of his tunic and pants, throwing them onto a chair near the bed. Then I rolled him enough that I could tug the blankets out from beneath him and drag them up over his shivering frame.
I climbed into bed with him and nestled into his side, wrapping my arms around him. Holding him. This man was incredibly strong. A literal fortress all by himself. And now he lay broken.
“Take my power,” I whispered. “It’s yours. All of it if it’ll help you.”
“Can’t,” he growled.
“Won’t is more like it.”
“Can’t.”
“Claimed. Awakened. It’s time for you to utilize Access.” I kissed his shoulder. “Please. Take some. I have more than enough.”
“You’ll need all you’ve got and more.”
Not right now. I’m not carrying out our plan tonight.
You will soon. When I show you the last secret, you’ll know what you must do.
Now you’re offering to share?
His smile rose but only briefly, stifling off in another groan of pain. Stubborn. You forgot to mention that endearing part of your personality while I was sucking on your clit.
“I’ll remember next time.”
“Give me a second to recover, and you can use it now.”
“Vexxion,” I snapped. “You’re not going to climb all over me again tonight.” Tears welled in my eyes. It seemed like I was crying all the time lately, and I suspected I’d be crying a lot more in the future. Until this was over, I was going to be slammed with one horrible thing after another. I just knew it. Take some of my power.
“See? You do want me to climb all over you tonight.”
Take my power!
I can’t do it, he said softly. You know that.
Why not?
Because I love you.
I didn’t think I could cry any more, but here I was, sobbing. “You took forever to tell me that. I should be mad at you.”
He smiled again, so sweet and pure. “Are you?”
“Not too much.”
“I’m getting better fast.”
“Why won’t you let me help you? ”
He eased slowly onto his side to face me, and his fingertip stroked through my tears. “I told you why.”
“You do everything for me. You bring me roses, though I’ll point out once more that you still haven’t shared where you get them.”
“I will. Soon.”
I plucked at the covers. “You make sure I sleep with my favorite blankets.”
“Nothing but the best flooferdar should lie against your skin.”
“You made sure no one could poison me,” I sobbed.
“I just wanted to make sure you enjoyed your horig cakes.”
“You ate my cakes.”
“You noticed?” He cracked another smile. If he kept it up, I was going to melt, and there’d be nothing left for him to climb all over.
“You carved a dragon that looked like Seevar.” More sobs choked through my words.
“I carved him because I knew you’d love a wooden image of your friend.”
“You threw him toward the fire.”
“I knew you’d catch him, just like you catch me every day of my life.”
Vexxion.
Yes, love?
You’ve killed for me.
And I’ll do so again.
I won’t let you do it again unless you access some of my power this instant .
Tempest, he growled.
“I prefer Fury if you don’t mind. Someone at the fortress gave me the name Tempest, and it means nothing. You’ve named me Fury because you love me, and that’s the only name that matters.” Take my power. Please?
He cupped my face. I’m recovering. I always do. Why is this so important to you?
Because you give all the time. Loving someone means you also take. Let me give to you this time.
I’ll be no different from him if I take it.
Of course this is different. I’m offering it. You’re not stealing it.
Are you sure?
I always have been. I’d wavered, but I never would again. We didn’t know how long either of us would be alive. I was determined to make sure every single moment mattered.
“Alright.” He closed his eyes and gently laid his fingertip on my forehead in the spot where he’d marked me as his inside the cave. Unlike the king, he stroked it gently. Even in this, he gave instead of taking.
That made more tears tumble from my eyes. I was going to drown us if I didn’t find a way to shut them off.
And then he drew on my power.
When I thought of this happening, I imagined it would be pure torture, that I’d cry out or lose touch with reality. Vexxion was a master. He used a light, almost teasing touch as his mind glided inside mine in an almost sensual way.
I felt the stroke of him deep within me, and it rocked through my core, making me wet. Making me crave him. He reached my well; I could almost picture his soul pausing at the side, peering down, down, down.
Before he leaned over and carefully sipped.
I moaned as heat spiraled inside me, a whirlwind sucking me down along with him.
The level in my well dropped only a fraction before he lifted his head and gave me a smile that made my heart roar. As he left me, he offered me a taste of his own magic. It was lightning blasting across the sky. The crash of thunder overhead. A symphony of two souls entwining together.
He opened his eyes and delved deeply within mine. Your magic thrums like an unseen heartbeat. It’s pure joy.
“ Vexxion ,” I croaked. “Do you feel better?”
“I feel amazing.”
My lips quirked up, and I swiped away my tears. “How amazing?”
You don’t realize how powerful you are. He moved closer, his arms tightening around me. “Let me show you how you made me feel.”
“I think, my wicked fae lord, I should show you.” I rose and nudged him down onto his back. You were horribly drained. You keep tasting my body yet you’re stingy.
I apologize for being stingy. His grin made everything inside me flip over. A profound ache pulsed through me with every heartbeat, radiating both joy and vulnerability, a tender soreness full of desire.
With a quick flit, he took us inside the bathing area. Like whenever I bathed at his family estate, candles flickered in the dark room, water steamed in the tub big enough for at least four people, and a solitary rose bloomed from a crystal vase on a low table near the tub.
“You mentioned you enjoy bathing with me,” he said with a smile.
“That wasn’t exactly what I said, but hmm . . .” My body hummed along with my voice as he stepped over the edge of the tub and sunk down into the water, gently placing me on his lap, facing him with my legs around his body.
“What were you saying about tasting?” he asked.
“This is your warning. Everything you have is mine.”
“I’m glad you agree.”
I snuggled closer, pressing my body against his, savoring how wonderful it was to be held by him. I thought I’d lost him. I thought he’d betrayed me. It was going to take a long moment to get used to the idea that we were not only back together again, but that our relationship was stronger than it had been before.
He lifted my chin, and our eyes met. So many tiny lights swirled through his sapphire eyes, stars veiled by twilight—elusive yet radiant, their beauty surpassed only by the depth of our feelings for each other.
“In this world of complete turmoil, you’re my heart's whisper,” he rasped. “The serene harbor my soul will eternally return to. There will never be anyone else for me but you, Fury.”
I stroked my palms across his chest and up to his shoulders to hold tight, speaking softly, reverently. “You’re the dawn that breaks through my endless night. ”
His fingertips traced up and down my spine, drawing my heat to the surface.
“There’s no line where you end and I start,” I said. “That doesn’t scare me anymore. Like you named me, what we have is imperfectly perfect, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Our intertwined souls blur at the edges. I feel like we’re wisps of fog drifting across the water in the early morning. We swirl together, and only then are we better. We’re different individuals, each unique and imperfect in our own way, but when we join?” I couldn’t hold back my smile. “Then, only then, are we perfect.”
He gave me a kiss that seared through me, remaking me into something new, something better than I was before I met him.
“I don’t want anyone but you,” I said. “And that’s how it’s going to be until the end of my life and beyond.”
He kissed me again, showing me with the heat of his mouth and his tight grip on my arms how desperate he was for me. Not just to be with me physically, but to build something new between us that was lasting.
I stroked my fingertips across his chest, pausing to trace them along the lines of his abdomen before I cupped his stiff cock. He’d shown me so much pleasure, from a trace of his knuckle across my cheek, to a quick kiss on my brow. Joining together sexually deepened our bond, but I felt as if it only took one look from him to fuse us into one.
He cupped my face, stroking my cheeks, groaning into my mouth as I traced my fingers up and down his length. I hadn’t been teasing when I said I wanted to taste him, something nearly impossible in the water. But I would. Oh, yes, I would. He gave to everyone but never took anything for himself. That nearly broke me.
I tugged away only to send him a smile that dissolved into kisses along his strong jaw and down to his neck.
“When you bit me back at the estate, it meant something,” I whispered, touching the mark that still lingered on my skin.
“I should’ve asked you before biting.”
“I liked it. I don’t believe you can do anything I wouldn’t like.”
“I still should’ve asked.”
“Tell me what it meant.”
“I was marking you.”
I’d suspected that. “Because you’re a possessive, wicked fae man?”
He slid his hand across my cheek and lifted my face, his gaze meeting mine. “I am possessive, though I never have been with anyone but you. I knew from the moment I arrived at the fortress that you were there, waiting for me.”
How intriguing. “You sensed me?”
“I knew you in the searing kiss of fate across my soul. The awakening of a part of me that I never thought would unfold. At that instant, I was stunned. I had to find you, had to do all I could to show you that you were mine.”
“You came to the fence and watched me. I could almost feel your touch on my spine. The weight of you caging me to the ground while your body rose over mine. The heat I’d only find in your arms. I felt as if I’d waited forever just to meet you, to hold you and kiss you. ”
His lips curled up before smoothing. “And that’s why I marked you. I want everyone to know that I belong to you as much as you belong to me. Me being possessive?” He shrugged. “I guess that’s what it is, but know that while I may possess you, you own everything that makes me who I was and who I am today. You possess me .”
He kissed me again, and I was soon lost in his touch. He only had to look at me to make me come undone. I relished the feeling, savored how even his fingertips gliding up and down my spine could make me let go.
In no time, I was moaning and rubbing my body against his, surrendering to the pleasure of his lips and his tongue thrusting inside my mouth. I clung to him, guttural cries ripping up my throat as I rocked against his hand on my clit and his stiff cock waiting beyond.
His fingers glided to my breast, and he rolled one of my nipples, teasing it into a hard bud of throbbing need.
I stroked his cock, making it grow even stiffer. Then I broke away from his mouth again and gave him a sultry smile before sinking into the water. I’d done this in the river, and I needed to do it again.
I sucked the head of his cock into my mouth and hummed at how amazing it felt to do this simple thing for him.
He bucked against me, his groan shattering the water’s surface to sink around me.
After gathering another breath of humid air, I dropped back down and took him into my mouth again, running my tongue across the tip while stroking all of him with my hands.
His fingertips tightened on my arms, and he wrenched me above the surface, his feverish gaze meeting mine. His growl ripped out, and he lifted and turned me, bending me over the side of the tub with my ass presented to him like a gift from the fates themselves.
He stroked my back, each swirl of his hands moving deeper between my legs until his fingers slid inside me. His growl echoed around us again, and he leaned over me, nibbling on the wet skin by my ear.
When his threads glided across my clit, I nearly blasted across the sky, driven by the lightning I’d found only with this man.
“You’re wet for me, my fury,” he whispered, sliding his fingers inside me. “Your sweet pussy sucks on my fingers so nicely.” He plunged them in and pulled them out while his threads twirled across my clit.
I went feral, whimpering and shoving my body back to meet his hand. His threads.
“You take my cock even better.” He pulled his fingers out, and my body made a wet, sucking sound. He rose over me, bracing my hips with a tight grip while placing the head of his cock at my entrance. “Feel me.” A thrust, and he was seated all the way to the hilt.
I clung to the side of the tub, my eyes rolling back in my head at the pure, exquisite pleasure he gave me.
Pulling out, he drove back inside me again. “Know me.”
I bucked back to meet each of his plunges, releasing tiny shrieks that only drove him wilder. He was mine and I was his, and there was nothing else in this world that would make me feel complete .
“Take me,” he whispered by my ear. “I’m going to mark you again with my mouth, my fury. I’m going to bite you. Yes or no?”
In my soul, I know he wouldn’t do it if I told him not to. He wouldn’t do anything I didn’t agree with.
“Yes,” I cried, shoving back to meet his thrusts. At this point, I’d agree to anything as long as he didn’t stop, but I was clear enough still to realize this moment was special. “Mark me so the whole world will know.”
He jerked his hips forward, pushing me against the tub, and I spread my legs wider, welcoming his body’s fury.
When he bit down on my shoulder, my orgasm crashed through me in roaring waves, surging and plunging over and over again, driven by the tingles spreading from his mouth.
The skin encircling my wrist burned. I was too far gone in this moment, in the feel of his cock surging inside me and his tongue smoothing across the sting, to bother looking at my hand.
And when his guttural shout rang out in the room, I came again, drowning in everything that made this fae man mine.