Chapter 64 #2
Alora’s eyes widened. “It’s you… Rumiel is your real name?”
“It was the name chosen by my father. It means His Mercy.” His crimson eyes burned with something colder than wrath, something more broken. “Yet he had none for me.”
Her heart squeezed when she realized the monument depicted the moment he was cast out of the Heavens. She cupped his cheek.
Sighing, Rune pressed her palm to his lips. “Do not pity me, Alora. I had to fall to find you. And I will not let anything take you again, not while I draw breath.”
“I know.”
He searched her eyes. “But I sense your worry.”
She worried about many things.
Worried now that he would once again retreat and hide beneath his armor.
Rune lifted her chin, thumb caressing her lip. “Whatever armor I had you have stripped it away. All that I am is yours.”
Alora shut her eyes, resting her head on his chest. “Your heart is heavy,” she murmured. “I can feel your distress. Let me in. Where did you go?”
His heavy sigh curled over her damp hair.
“I searched,” he said quietly. “For anything. Any relic. Any scrap of hope I might have missed. I searched the deepest pit of Karag D?r for my chains, the only thing divine enough to hold him.”
Her chest tightened with a sharp intake of breath.
“But they are gone…perhaps now absorbed into the earth.”
Her shoulders sank a moment, then she gasped. “What of the shards? The ones Eldrik used to bind me and Zinnia.”
“Hellstone,” Rune said flatly. “The same ore used in Vorak’s prison. But it would take more than a few shards to hold him.”
His crimson eyes dulled by something far worse than fear.
Alora stilled when she thought of her lost dagger.
“What of…” But she hesitated.
“What of Sunstone?” Rune smirked bitterly and dragged a hand down his face.
“That was perhaps the only ore that might have helped us … yet I eradicated it from existence. When I returned to the Mortal Realm, I scoured the ore from the earth, erased all knowledge and makers of its forging, because I would allow nothing that could be used against me again. I believed myself invincible.”
He laughed once, the sound hollow.
“I was wrong.”
The torches trembled in the throne room and Alora’s vision welled as she thought of her dream.
“Even then, Sunstone would have merely been an advantage. What I truly need is Seraph fire, divine flame that quells all darkness.” He opened his hand and crimson flames danced over his palm. “But only Hellfire answers to me now.”
Alora closed his fingers over the flames. “I don’t understand why Elyōn cannot simply destroy him?”
Rune’s gaze lifted to the mural of beasts.
“Gods cannot kill their own kind,” he reminded her.
“The same is true for Primordials. For balance is the foundation of creation.” He looked back at her.
“To erase a force like Vorak without something to take his place would be like tearing a sun from the sky and offering the earth nothing in return. The Realms would collapse and life as you know it would cease to be.”
Alora trembled as she imagined it, everything crumbling beneath her feet. The world was unraveling now because of the tear in the sky.
“I’m scared,” she admitted in a whisper. “Is this war pointless then? Are we marching toward our deaths?”
Rune took her face, pressing his forehead to hers with a soft sigh. “I did not find you again only to lose you. We will survive this.”
“How?”
“By binding Vorak to the Rift.”
Her eyes widened. “Is that possible?”
Rune gaze flickered and she read his uncertainty in the bond. “If I can cast him into it, the Rift will seal and he will be bound for an eternity.”
But to do that, he had to survive a battle against a Primordial. Her chest tightened as she was hit with the vision of him turning to ash.
Alora shook her head, desperation clutching her heart. “That is not our only option. Tell me about the Soul Anchor ritual.”
His jaw clenched and he stepped back.
“If there is a way we can stop him before this leads to a war we may not win, then you must tell me.”
Rune turned away from her, his clawed fingers resting on the wall. He was quiet for so long, she thought he wouldn’t answer.
“A Soul Anchor,” he ground out. “That is how Elyōn bound the Titans. He anchored them within Rifts of the Abyss, making them the pillars that hold up the Realms.” His jaw clenched, hard enough to crack.
“That is a Soul Anchor, Alora. It’s entrapment.
Forever. And it would take a powerful soul to hold it. ”
Alora’s body went cold, a hollow ache spreading through her chest. This was what the Dominions had been talking about. A mortal soul could not hold it, it would take a powerful being. Yet in her heart, she already knew whose soul was needed.
Rune’s hands clamped down on her shoulders, firm and furious. “No.”
Her eyes welled. “But I can save everyone…”
I can save you.
“No.” His voice broke, fury and anguish burning together. “I will not risk you, Alora. Never. The Realms be damned! I would let it all burn to ash before I ever sacrificed you.”
The ferocity of his declaration rang through the bond. Rune dropped his head against her shoulder, and a tremor ran through him. His large wings wrapped around her, as if to shield her from all to come.
“Do you not know how precious you are to me, ra’ayati?” His voice broke. “My beloved wife, I refuse to exist in a world where you are not.”
Alora’s throat tightened and her tears fell.
Before she could argue, Rune lifted his head and crushed his mouth to hers.
It was a distraction, desperation in his kiss. But she allowed it, clutching him close as shadows wrapped them both in a vow too fragile to speak aloud. Because she needed him as much as he needed her.
Heat threaded the air between them, a charge like lightning before a storm. Magic flicking over their skin. Shadows wrapping around them, and in the next breath she was no longer in that dark cold chamber, but in Rune’s throne room. Standing before his grand obsidian chair.
“Sit,” he commanded, velvet and smoke.
Alora obeyed, the cool stone biting beneath her. Her eyes widened when Rune knelt before her feet like a sinner at the altar, shadows bowing low like a thousand silken courtiers at her feet. His hands gripped her thighs, spreading them with deliberate ease.
“You will sit where only I have ruled,” Rune murmured, she shivered at the prophecy in his tone. His hands trailed up her thighs as he lifted her leg, kissing her ankle. “It’s your rightful place and I find myself bowing.”
There was something in his words, something he was trying to tell her.
Rune tugged at the laces of her robe, letting it fall open, exposing her chest. Her body warmed as he kissed the curve of her hips, licking and nipping at her skin.
“My gorgeous, you are more than a queen,” he murmured, trailing fire up her skin, “much more than a goddess. The divinity in your veins is tied to your purpose, while mine is to serve you.”
The heat in his tone made clear what service he intended to give. The great hall was empty, but anyone could enter at any moment.
“Wait,” she gasped faintly as shadows brushed teasingly over her breasts. “Do we mean to do this here?”
He smiled against her skin. “Still so shy? My queen, you have brought a king to his knees. Any who dare to interrupt would not leave this chamber breathing.”
She whimpered as his forked tongue circled her nipple. Each press of his mouth down her stomach trailed fire on her skin.
“Now be a good girl,” Rune murmured, crimson eyes flaming with something far more dangerous. “Sit back and let me worship you.”
Her pulse thrummed wild as his hands spread her open, his fangs grazing tenderly against her skin. When he parted her robe fully, her pink core was already wet and glistening.
A low growl rumbled in his throat and his glamor fell away.
The last of her protests melted with it. Alora laid back as he placed her legs onto the armrests, spreading her open like a blooming flower. Then his mouth pressed against her, stroking a path of fire through her core.
She gasped, clutching the back of the throne, her head falling back. He moved in slow, deliberate strokes at first, savoring her, tasting her like she was sweet honey meant only for him. The vibration of his groans rumbled against her core, making her hips jerk.
Every caress of his tongue spoke of devotion. Every touch spoke of obsession. Untamed. Worshipful. And utterly unholy.
Shadows coiled up her arms and thighs, pinning her in place, holding her open for his feast.
You are my source of life, goddess. He rumbled in her thoughts. Give me what I need.
Her body obeyed. The chamber echoed with her shrill cry as she came, waves of pleasure tore through her, her thighs trembling against his shoulders. Rune groaned into her release, drinking it down as though it were the fountain of divinity itself.
When she finally sagged into the throne, boneless and panting, Rune lifted his head. His lips glistening with her lust, his crimson eyes burning.
“I have walked through wrath and destruction for the melody of your voice,” he said softly. “Should I have a soul, it is branded with your name. I would set the stars aflame for you.”
Alora’s heart clenched.
She was his. And he was hers.
Damn everything else that came between them.
Magic stirred at her will, and in a breath the shadows plated Rune in the throne, yielding to her command. He smiled slyly as Alora stepped between his knees, her robe puddling at her feet.
Magic hummed low as she reached for the straining bulge in his trousers and freed him. She stroked each thick length slowly, tracing the glowing paths.
Rune moaned at her touch, his head falling back when the pads of her fingers teased the ridges.
“It is my turn to worship you,” Alora said, climbing onto his lap.
She fit herself over them, taking him within her body with ease as though it were the only place she had ever belonged. His claws tightened on her hips, breath shuddering as she slowly moved, riding him in a rhythm that had them both gasping.
“Yachid sheli,” she murmured in the language of the Heavens, lips brushing his pointed ear. “Bechiri.”
The knowledge came unbidden, woven somewhere in her soul.
Rune went utterly still, his chest heaving, red eyes wide as the meaning struck him.
My only one. My chosen.
Something in his expression broke open. Softness flickered there, then vanished, consumed by desire. Rune took her throat and claimed her mouth again, holding her close as their bodies met with desperate need.
Their breaths tangled and the shadows surged high around them, sealing them in velvet dark. They made love as if the dawn might never come, pouring everything they were into each other.
And the throne bore witness to something far more sacred than gods.