Chapter 13
Reva
Jack’s on his back, eyes closed and a slight smile on his face. As I kneel beside him on the floor, Torin helps me to feed a bandage around his waist, which I tie in a neat knot. Before I can pull away, Jack tugs at my arm, and I sprawl awkwardly onto his chest with a squeak.
“Well, hello there.” His sloppy grin has returned as he opens one eye and peers at me.
“You can use me if you like. I don’t think you like me much, but here you are, tucking me in and snuggling me when I feel lonely.
” He wraps an arm around my waist, and it’s like an iron bar, pinning me to his uninjured side.
“I don’t know why Kitty and Tor aren’t already here.
If I were them, I’d never leave your bed. ” He giggles to himself. “Never”
I wriggle slightly, shooting a pleading look around for one of the other men to help extract me from this overenthusiastic embrace.
Jack’s wrong; I don’t dislike him. But his obvious attempts at flirting always seem to fall kind of flat.
They tend to feel like manipulation attempts, nothing real.
But he seems in earnest right now, even if he is loopy for whatever reason.
Kit takes pity on me, detaching Jack’s arm. “Come on, bud. Torin will cuddle with you if you need someone.”
“I can’t believe a bird bit me,” Jack says, poking at his side with a pout. “I thought we were pals. You know, I used to sneak out really early when I was a kid since it was the only time I could shift without anyone noticing. I’d go sit on the rooftops with the other birds.”
“Uh huh,” Kit says as I manage to shift out of reach. “That sounds kind of lonely.”
“I was a lonely kid,” he slurs. “Then I met Torin, and he was like no one else I’d ever met. He didn’t pretend to like me in public and hate me behind closed doors.” Jack grins, squeezing his eyes shut. “He hated me right to my face.”
I snort, glancing up to meet Torin’s amused gaze. “How did the two of you become friends?”
“You know how people say if you spend enough time in Ashwick, the smell kind of seeps into you?” Jack says.
“Uh huh.”
“It was like that.”
“You’re saying you were like a bad smell?” My lips twitch as Torin lets out a soft chuckle.
“Yeah. I’m a lot to take.” Jack’s smile slips away, and my gut clenches.
“Maybe we should get you to bed.”
“You should get some sleep too,” he says, pushing up until he’s sitting upright. “You can’t have gotten much sleep after all the hanky-panky with Tor and Aster. I saw them both staggering out of your room, and I know that look. Sex drunk, right?”
“No hanky-panky,” I insist.
Jack’s eyes are overly bright as he peers around at us. “That’s a shame. It might help with your little issue.” He turns his focus onto Aster, who’s looking very shifty all of a sudden. “Show them the books, bud.”
Aster’s cheeks are flushed bright red as he awkwardly fumbles with the bag Jack dropped earlier, plucking out a handful of books with thick leather covers. “I asked Jack for books on how we might boost my magic,” he mumbles.
“Is that where you’ve been, Jack?” Torin grumbles. “Stealing from libraries again?”
Jack pulls a face, rolling his eyes. “I’ll have you know, I got all of these from a bookshop and I paid them money.”
“Well, good for you,” I say, my curiosity piqued by Aster’s bashful reaction.
He clears his throat. “They’re, uh, they’re on sex magic. How you might use sex as a boost to get more power.”
Now I know why Aster is looking all hot and bothered. My eyes dart around and I quickly discover both Torin and Kit have already got their eyes locked on me.
Jack
“HOW LONG DID IT TAKE you to go through this lot?” Reva asks, flipping through one of the handful of books I dragged here in my raven form.
I bark out a laugh. If she only knew.
I went through every book in the bookshop where I found that particular heavy tome she’s holding. Then I went through all the ones in the next town and the one after that, traveling until my wings gave out, until I found something that made any kind of sense.
Considering I have what Tor calls ‘trouble keeping on track’ and ‘difficulty keeping my damn mouth shut for more than two minutes’, I impressed myself. Really, I did.
Too bad that telling anyone would mean revealing my new party trick, and that’s something I’m not willing to do.
Not yet, anyway. I’ve been testing it out, flexing the limits.
I flew for longer and further, taking breaks and then kept going until I was miles from anywhere.
When I landed, I mooched about, read as many books as I could until my eyes were practically bleeding, then I found the fanciest place I could sleep.
Then, when I woke up, I did the whole thing again.
Days and days went by until I wound up losing track of time entirely. I must have washed and dried and rewashed my underwear a half dozen times.
I’m no closer to understanding it than I was before I started my little experiment. But I did manage to find some answers for Aster.
I plop down right in front of Reva, lolling back until my head is in her lap. Tor lets out a little grumble of displeasure, and Aster’s eyebrows shoot up. Reva though, she just peers down at me with a slight frown. Then her hands are in my hair, giving a few tentative strokes.
I let out a long sigh. I’ve been starved of company recently, and I’ve missed them.
Missed her.
Part of me wonders if anyone noticed I was gone.
A needy part that I silence immediately.
I like being able to fly off and do my own thing without telling anyone.
But sure, I like having people wonder where I am.
I’d like them to stare out to sea or up into the sky, wondering where I might be or if the next bird to appear will have my majestic wings.
“Is that why you were gathered in that weird little circle earlier?” I ask. “You were trying to summon me home?”
Tor snorts. “We were trying to fix my hands, you self-absorbed arse.”
“Ah, finally showed them off, did you?”
“You knew?” Reva’s voice comes out soft, but she stops stroking my hair and I freeze.
Pasting on my most charming grin, I grab her hand and give it a squeeze before returning it to the top of my head. “Have you been giving him a hard time for keeping it quiet?” I ask. “I hope you’ve really been making him squirm.”
“That’s your thing, not mine,” Tor mutters.
It is. It really is. I’d fucking love it if she told me off for being a cheeky little shit and then made me prove myself to her. Maybe she could even tug on my hair and then kiss me deeply and tell me I’m a good boy.
But I’m getting distracted.
... and hard.
Not the right time for my little buddy to start getting excited. I need to focus on boring things. Kitchen tiles. Dust motes. Books. So many books.
“So... the, er, sex magic,” Reva says softly. “Do you think it can help Torin with his hands?”
“Sex magic,” I repeat the words. Partly because I love saying them and partly because Tor keeps puckering his mouth when I say the words and I enjoy forcing him to make involuntary facial expressions.
“Do you actually have anything useful?” he grumbles.
Reva starts running her fingers through my hair again. She huffs a low chuckle, tugging on a handful, just as though she read my mind. My eyes meet hers as my cock hardens even further, twitching underneath the open book I’m using to disguise it.
“Sex magic?” she says, her lips twitching as she joins me in teasing Torin.
“Sex magic.” I nod, then immediately regret the movement, dropping my head back into her lap.
“Can we all stop saying those two words?” Torin grumbles. Man, he is in a mood.
“What’s got you so grumpy?” I ask, and the look he gives me is absolutely blistering.
Then he waves his arms around, and I screw up my nose in understanding. “Oh yeah. No hands.”
“They still work just fine.” He reaches over and flicks me on the knee. I jerk, nearly dislodging the book in my lap which is currently the only thing keeping me from flashing my rock-hard cock at the rest of them.
“Are you sure?” I twist to look up at Reva. “You can tell me if they don’t work right. I can keep a secret,” I mock whisper that last part earning me another flick to the knee.
“I still have hands.”
“Right, so if you pick up that book there, you’ll see what I’m talking about.” I wave my very visible hand at Torin and then at the small pile that Aster’s clutching in front of him. “Same for you, Aster. There are a couple there you should be able to understand.”
I feel a quiver in my belly as Aster and Torin peer at each other and switch books. Aster’s eyebrows shoot up, and I ignore Reva’s gaze as it focuses on me.
“How do you have books in Valmorian?” she asks me softly.
Because... yeah, I may have traveled a lot further than I’d like to admit.
I didn’t go all the way to Aster’s village since it is a lo-ong way away.
But I might have lied about not having stolen any of the books from a library.
Only because I’d already read them and found what I needed.
It was either that or I tore out pages if I thought they were interesting or useful.
And that would make the others lose their shit if I admitted my sins.
“So... you know how witches are always having orgies,” I say. It earns me twin blank looks from Aster and Torin, but Reva pauses in her ministrations and lets out a soft hum.
“The coven in Kit’s old town used to be renowned for them. People got upset when they weren’t invited. It was a whole thing,” she says.
“Exactly,” I say. “Well, it’s not just because they’re all horny, polyamorous fuckers,” I say, holding my hands up at Tor’s glare.
“No judgement here. Wouldn’t we all be so lucky?
Anyway, the books say a lot, and I mean a lot, about a bunch of stuff.
Personally, I’d have preferred a nice little summary or even a few pictures to explain the key points, but too bad. ”
If they only knew how much time I spent scouring pages and going slightly insane to find the answer.
Aster reaches over to pass the book he’s reading to Reva. “Energy transference at the moment of climax,” he says.
“How did you even know which books to pick up when they’re in a language you don’t speak?” Reva asks me.
“Allow me to keep some mystique, pretty lady,” I reply.
I’m not about to admit that I tracked down a more advanced version of the translator I got for Aster, one that allowed me to read books in another language as well as understanding the spoken words.
“You don’t seem as shocked as I thought you might be by the whole orgy idea. I was planning to break it to you gently, but, well, I got excited,” I say, ignoring how Reva has stopped stroking my hair and is now making eyes at the other three.
There’s an odd feeling in my chest I don’t know the word for.
Am I... jealous?
No, that can’t be right. I’m not that deep.
“It says the most powerful results come when you involve the most powerful people,” Tor says.
“Maybe you should make a list, all the people you’d be willing to include.”
“Reva—” Aster’s tone is low and intense, fully interrupting me midway through explaining my brilliant idea. “How do you feel about this?”
She huffs out a sigh before running one hand over her face, patting her cheeks that are flushing a glorious shade of pink. “Is it crazy that I’m considering it?”
Then she gives another light tug on my hair, shifting my attention to the little grin that’s spreading over her face. “Pass me another of those books and let’s see how we do this.”