Chapter 38
THIRTY-EIGHT
KHARON
It should not be possible for Death to be so.
. . happy. I am a monster who has committed too many sins to ever be redeemed.
And yet. . . as I look across the table full of my family and then over to my side where my beloved Ksenia sits, her belly round with my child, I feel emotion well up thick in my throat.
The trip back to the castle was not as arduous as the earlier one.
For one, there was a chance break in the weather, and since she allowed me to run her the entire way, we made exceptional time.
She joined me in my rooms and has been getting to know my family more each day as she recovers from her father’s death and rests during the pregnancy, which has not been quite as easy as Hannah’s.
She’s been ill some and taking her time to recuperate.
When we can, we spend time in the bright fields, where she sits with her mother in the sunlight.
I do not believe in gods, yet I do not know what else to say except that they have been kind to me. Me who least deserved their kindness. I would crawl on my belly in supplication and thanks if I knew who to thank.
And so I show my thanksgiving every day to the woman who somehow has deigned to love me and swear to do my best to love, serve, and give her all that she needs all the days of her and our child’s existence.
I gaze at her with all the love in my heart.
Across from us, Remus shoves his plate away. “Well, this is truly sickening. All these lovey-dovey looks, everyone being so happy.”
Hannah laughs. “What else would we be? We’re all reunited. Layden has returned.”
I look at Layden across the table, his plate full. Abaddon is still less than comfortable with him, but Layden fits in more each day. Yes, he is very changed from when we last knew him.
Instead of the bright boy he used to be, white wings flashing, now he is shadowed.
Secretive. He still does not tell us all he did during his time away.
He knows many spells and keeps them to himself, not telling us how he came to such knowledge.
He lives a life on the internet, whatever that is.
He has tried to explain it—a world in his computer where everyone in the world is able to connect?
It sounds as much like magic as the rest he has somehow acquired during his time away, so I leave him to it and his room full of screens and flashing lights.
“And Kharon has a. . .” Hannah goes on, smiling widely as she pauses a little before finishing, “A person.”
We’ve been made aware that the word “consort” is out of date, apparently.
But I frown, not liking the idea that Ksenia is just my person. It does not feel like enough for as tied together as I now feel with her. We are family. I want to be with her as Abaddon and Hannah are.
I want to be husband and wife.
“How do the most obnoxious of my brothers have females and I do not?” Remus asks in indignation, standing up from the table.
“Remus,” Hannah objects, glaring his way. “You’re being ignorant and chauvinistic again.”
“How?” Remus looks at her as if surprised. “You are a most excellent prize. My brother does not deserve you. I’m by far the most superior brother.”
Hannah’s mouth has dropped open, her cheeks reddened. It’s rare to see her so angry and I must say, a not small part of me is enjoying the show. “I’m not just a prize! Women are more than trophies.”
Remus rolls his eyes and waves a hand. “You miss my point. I would prize any female I captured.”
“No females will be captured,” Abaddon says, standing up too.
Again Remus rolls his eyes. “Who died and made you ruler? Our Father? Oh wait, he didn’t actually die. Just because I’ve been chained up in a cellar for two hundred years and you’ve been on a power trip doesn’t mean you’re the leader, brother.”
“I’m eldest,” Abaddon growls. Baby Raven giggles and flies up from her chair, landing on her father’s shoulders and grabbing his horns, bouncing up and down like she wants him to take her for a ride.
Remus smirks. “Besides, you’ve got more pressing duties at the moment. Daddy.”
Abaddon softens his voice since his daughter is so close. “Never so pressing that I can’t take time out to put you in your place.”
“Boys, boys,” my Ksenia says, rubbing her temples. “Please keep the hysterics down. Some of us weak little females are doing actual work like growing people in our wombs. So if you could take your machismo down a notch, you’re giving me a headache.”
At her words, I immediately leap out of my seat. “I will take you to our rooms, beloved.”
She shoots me a grateful glance as I help her to her feet.
I’m amazed that though it’s only been a few months, already her belly is rounded.
As we leave the dining room, I hear Abaddon and Remus continuing to argue about how no one will be capturing anyone.
Remus then reminds Abaddon of how he himself came to acquire his own consort-wife, which is when Hannah jumps in to defend her husband.
The last thing I catch out the corner of my eye before turning onto the stairs is the baby leaping off her father’s shoulders, circling around the table in a whir and landing on the soup right in front of Remus, spilling it all down his front, giggling wildly the whole time.
I heft my woman into my many arms and carry her up the stairs. “Oof,” she exclaims, but doesn’t protest as I swiftly leap up the stairs and to our rooms, gently settling her on the bed.
“I am sorry for my brothers,” I say, moving to massage her calves and feet.
“Oh they aren’t that bad,” she sighs and smiles down at me.
“They remind me of how my family was once upon a time.” Her smile turns a little sad before brightening again.
“I don’t think I’ve told you how happy I am to be here.
” She reaches down to grasp one of my upper hands with hers, squeezing. “With you. It’s been very…”
She sucks in a deep breath before releasing it and laying her head back on the pillow. “… healing.”
She has no idea what it means to me to hear her say that. Me, a healer? Death? I bow my head at her feet. And then kiss them. She has changed everything. She has changed my whole existence. I will worship at her feet for all time.
“I’m afraid I’m going to be a terrible mother,” she says suddenly, hands low on her belly.
“What?” I ask, surprised, looking up. “You are going to be amazing.”
“That’s what Mom says every time I visit.
Which is,” she breathes out, “just absolutely wild that I get to spend so much time with her. But still, she won’t be here to help.
She was a good mother. I’m just… me. I’m nothing like Hannah.
She’s a natural at it. Her pregnancy was easy, you told me so.
But my body knows I’m no good at this. I’m too cold inside. I’m a killer.”
I shake my head. “No. You give life now. We both do.”
My hand joins hers at her belly.
Tears crest in her eyes. “You really think so?”
“I know so,” I whisper. “Now close your eyes and stop worrying. For awhile, I don’t want you to think about anything except pleasure.”
I begin to kiss up her ankle towards her knee. She’s wearing a dress and I like that I have access. “So don’t come unless I say you can.”
Her leg quivers a little, but she closes her eyes obediently as she sucks in a breath of air. I rub the barest of my fingertips around her kneecaps. And I linger there. I’ve enjoyed spending my time discovering my Ksenia’s body. Slowly discovering. Luxuriously discovering.
One day I will ask her to be my wife, but after the baby is born, I think. She does not need more on her mind to worry about.
Right now all I want is to take her worries away. I massage a spot on the outside of her knees with one pair of hands, her calves with another, and caress my way up her inner pair of thighs with my uppers.
She inhales sharply and then out with a sigh as her hips shift above me and her legs widen.
I smile. Her skin is so soft. Touching her intimately like this brings me such peace even as my shaft hardens.
I caress higher up her thighs, the barest touch of my fingertips. Skimming higher. Higher still until I’m right against the line of her underclothes. I reach a little further, hook my fingertips overtop, and drag them down. She lifts her bottom so I can take them all the way off.
Immediately her scent hits my nostrils. My shaft leaps in response.
“I love you,” I whisper as I crawl between her legs, kissing and lifting the hem of her clothing with me as I go.
With the rest of my hands, I continue my torturous massage of her legs.
I grasp her legs at the apex of her thighs, teasing my thumbs against the petals of her sex.
She shudders beneath me in response and lets out needy little noises from above.
I withdraw my thumbs slightly as I hold her open to me, massaging just outside her sex in a way that still pulls her lips open and closed with my motions. Moisture gathers and her bud swells at my attentions. I lean down, blowing warm breath across her exposed sex.
Her needy noises from above grow more intense and she squirms even more beneath the grip of my hands on her legs. “Please,” she finally begs. “Please, Kharon.”
Oh I do so like it when she begs, even still. I don’t think it will ever not please me.
“Please what?” I ask, my voice dark in a way it only gets when I pleasure her. “You want my tongue to lap up your honey?”
She shudders more beneath me.
“Beg me for what you want, baby.”
“Please, Kharon,” she whispers, voice weak with want. “Put your mouth on me. Eat me out.”
My shaft throbs against the bed. “I like it when you beg so pretty.”
Needy noises come from her throat and one of her hands comes to clench in my hair. The other is fisted in the sheets. I grin as I bow down and extend my tongue.
Still, though, I don’t give her what she wants immediately.
I turn my face to the side and lick her inner thigh, lowering my mouth until I’m suckling there. Just for a moment before I turn to the other thigh, closer to her sex but still not giving her what she wants.
Her hand in my hair tugs restlessly but I love to torture her. I’ve seen the releases that result from patience and that’s what I want for her today.
I lift a pair of hands to reach underneath her, grasp her luscious ass cheeks and pull her open wide for me, while I do the same with a pair of hands at the front of her thighs.
She clenches in anticipation.
With just the tip of my tongue, I lick her swollen bud.
She keens high, trying to lift her hips off the bed to get more friction with my tongue, but I hold her in place easily with my strong hands.
She whimpers as I come in for another lick, again putting the barest of pressure on her plumped clitoris.
“Kharon,” she cries. “Please.”
I still don’t give in. Instead, I lick down her delicious pussy towards her opening that’s wide to me. Then I bury my face in her and extend my strong tongue as far inside her as I can get it. Her body clenches around my tongue, wishing for so much more, I know.
But a tongue is a more delicate instrument than a cock, and mine is longer than mortal man’s.
For example, I know from experience that when I curve the very tip of my tongue at the end deep inside her and whip it back and forth in a come hither motion against a particular spot that feels like a smaller version of the outer nubbin—
Her whole body seizes below me. “Please, may I come?” she begs, voice high-pitched, calves wrapping around my torso tight in coiled pleasure ready to unleash.
I withdraw my tongue, licking all along her channel as I go. “When I next tongue inside you, you may come,” I say low, desperate to taste so deeply.
I shift a hand so that my thumb hovers over her glistening, fat swollen bud right below my nose, and then I dive deep, snuffling into her pussy like a pig seeking its favorite truffle.
I tongue her deep, closing my mouth down for added pressure, and then I eat her and suckle her and tongue her, the very tip pressing against her bud.
I’m a messy eater once I finally give in to what both of us want. I grab her ass and drag her pussy against my face as I eat her ravenously. Thumb working her clit, I tongue her so deep inside like the sweetest treat—because she is.
Finally I feel her begin to erupt. Even once I finally give her permission it always takes a few moments longer, like either she has to give herself permission, or she’s enjoying the at last unleashed pleasure that she refuses to give in for as long as possible.
But once she does, it’s always a magnificent event.
Her thighs clench around my head, allowing me even deeper access somehow.
My tongue slips a little further inside her so that I can really feel out that spongy inner ridge, and I lap and lap and lap against it, firm strokes with my tongue until she’s howling and screaming above me.
Her essence squirts into my mouth, which sends me over the edge. This only happens occasionally, when she is absolutely mad with the highest climax.
My cock gushes its release even though its not touching anything, even the bed for friction. Her pleasure is enough and I suckle and buck my face back and forth against her sex as I spurt the last of my gush.
At last I climb up her body, wiping my face on my bicep until I can embrace my beautiful one. For the first time all day, she seems at peace without a worry in the world.
She looks up at me with a lazy smile as she settles into my many arms. “Will you marry me?” she asks.
I laugh a great laugh and tug her close. “I would love nothing more than to be your husband.”
She settles into my many arms and sighs happily. My gift. My life. My future wife and all my happiness.