Chapter 25
Twenty-Five
Midas had known fire in every form. It was in his veins, in his throat, in his heart. He had felt it in his belly before a hunt, in his chest before battle, in his wings as he soared above cruel human villages.
But nothing in the world had prepared him for the fire that curled low in his spine as Elowen’s fingers moved over his skin. She traced his back, pausing where each scale up his spine met his flesh. She studied it with her fingers, memorizing every groove and ridge.
She touched him as if he were sacred. Her hands were so small and delicate compared to him, and Midas often felt himself quietly drifting to sleep under her tender touches.
What cruelty it was, to put him under such a spell with nothing but a touch. It was unnatural for him to be so…soft; and yet he was for her.
Elowen heard the heavy rain from where they were lounging. It pounded against the cave mouth, and the wind howled as it snaked through the tunnels. A heavy gust reached them, but she simply hummed, content with the way none of it chilled her.
“You’re so warm,” she whispered against the top of Midas’ head. He was resting with it against her chest, his hands splayed against her back, and their legs tangled together. His tail flicked at her voice.
He grumbled back to her, pleased, and whispered against her sternum. “I will always keep you warm.”
She watched his tail move in a circular motion.
She had learned that it was not just a part of his body, but it was a form of expression, too.
It twitched when he was irritated, it swayed when he was relaxed, and it curled protectively around her like another arm whenever it could, like instinct more than conscious thought.
He sighed into her chest once more, then lifted his head to look at her.
Something inside of him compelled him to kiss her, and so he pressed his lips to the underside of her chin.
He wasn’t sure what he was feeling. He didn’t have the human words for it, but he knew that she made him feel it.
His fingers left the underside of her and flipped them so he was the one now on his back.
She made a soft sound of surprise at the movement, but settled quickly on top of him, looking at him as if he had hung the stars in the sky for her. He caressed her cheek with the backside of his hand. Her lips found his palm.
What they were sharing was not passion the way the humans defined it. It was everything he didn’t know he was craving after all those years of loneliness.
But Elowen had given it to him. She had always given him nothing but the best, most beautiful parts of her.
Her lips found the line of his jaw, the corner of his mouth, and then settled over his.
Midas kissed her with open eyes. He watched the way hers fluttered shut.
He watched the flush rise to her cheeks.
He felt her relax, bit by bit, as if laying down burdens he never knew she carried, trusting him to carry them for her.
When she pulled back, breathless and blinking, her smile was so gentle he thought he might die from it.
“You are beauty,” he said to her.
“Beautiful?” she asked, correcting his usage of the word.
“No. You are beauty. You are all of beauty in this wretched world. My most precious treasure. My Elowen.”
His hands moved, tentative against the curve of her hip, then the dip of her waist, then where her dress pulled taught against her chest. She sighed and moved slightly. Midas froze, worried he had hurt her.
“No,” she murmured quickly. “It’s okay. You can keep going.”
He did.
His hands moved upward, exploring the shape of her back, her shoulders, her neck. He memorized every sound she made. The way she gasped when his fingers ran along the base of her skull and the way she melted when his thumbs passed the small of her back.
He committed it all to memory until it was etched into his mind as permanently as the mountain itself.
He reached for her hand and brought it to his mouth where he kissed each of her fingers and licked her palm. His fangs, the sharpness of his teeth leftover from his shift, scraped lightly against her skin, but she did not flinch.
His other hand traced back down her spine, one nail carefully drawing circles on her thigh just below her bum.
She squirmed against him, and it stirred something deep in him—something he had never felt before.
He felt parts of his body stiffen that had never done so, and he suddenly moved her body off of his, ashamed and embarrassed at his reaction.
Elowen didn’t understand at first, his sudden change in mood; not until she sat up and saw the heaviness between his human legs from a slit in his pelvis she hadn’t noticed before.
“Oh,” she said quietly, looking away to hide the pinkness in her cheeks.
“I am sorry,” Midas told her, pulling a quilt over him to hide his shame. “I did not mean…I did not know.”
“It’s alright,” Elowen said, finally meeting his eyes again. She rested her hand over his to assure him she was not mad.
“I did not mean to dishonor you,” Midas said. “It is shameful for dragons to…” he could not find the words, for he was too embarrassed. “Such things are reserved for our mates. There is a ritual and it is sacred.”
“I understand,” she replied, nodding. “Maybe we should…sleep now.”
“Yes, sleep,” Midas agreed, though he had no intention of doing so in this smaller, human form.
He moved away from her and shifted into his true dragon form where he was able to control his body easier.
Elowen settled on the furs and blankets he had gathered for her, and Midas wrapped himself around her like he always did.
He did not sleep much that night, afraid his body had ruined what his heart treasured so deeply.