Chapter 35
It took over an hour for Laz to reach the domain of the Blood Queen.
The old apartment building had been steadied by a series of massive redwood cedars that had grown far too large for the time…
windows were covered by vines, but the metal struts were still there, the skeleton of the past, held together by the growth of the future.
Veyyr’s heart stuttered under my hand. “Laz, land on the roof!” Hopefully the trees had steadied the building enough to hold the dragon.
He banked to the right and then swept back to the left, his wings sweeping across the roof, his talons grabbing the tops of several redwoods and using them to help disperse his weight. Sorrow flew from my arms as I jump off Laz’s back, landing on the roof. Testing it out.
Solid, it was not going to fall away at least under me.
Laz cocked an eye at me and I nodded. “I’ll catch him.”
He tipped his body a fraction and Veyyr began a slow slide off. I was able to grab him around the upper body, tucking his back to my chest.
“Blood Queen, I…need your help. Please!”
Laz let out a roar that rattled the trees he clutched, and Sorrow swooped by, screeching. All I could do was drag Veyyr with me toward the only door on the roof. He was not a lightweight, despite his connection to air. “I thought Sylph’s were supposed to be light as a feather?”
Nothing, no response to the ribbing. My chest tightened as I dragged him as fast as I could, his heels leaving a line in the ash and dirt that coated the roof.
“Hold.”
The voice was behind me, low toned, husky and distinctly feminine. I looked over my shoulder, the woman was cloaked fully head to foot, her face hidden within the hood, her hands tucked inside and the skirts brushing the ground. Solid green, top to bottom. Not blood red as I’d expected.
“Please, he’s dying. I—”
“Hold.” She approached us, her clothing not moving as she walked a circle around us, her voice steady. “This is a demon’s curse that eats at him.”
“It is.”
“And the demon?”
“Dead.”
Her head swivelled toward me. “You killed a demon?”
Fuck. What if she was a demon? “I did.”
She rolled her hand and Veyyr’s weight was lifted from me, his body floating horizontal to the roof, his arms and head hanging as if he were on a wooden strip that was not large enough for all of him.
“I will do what I can,” She did not ask for payment though I had no doubt there would be a request.
Something.
I followed her through the doorway, and the world seemed to stretch and distort around me, throwing me off balance.
I caught myself on the rough bark of a tree, going to one knee to stop the spinning.
My knee was on rough cement, the threshold of a doorway into a large wooden cabin.
Three stories, but it blended into the forest around it, as if it had always been there, or had been grown instead of built.
The Blood Queen was already through the door, setting Veyyr on a larger wooden table.
“Leaping the Veil can be distorting at times.” Her voice drew me into the cabin. “The sensation will pass.”
“Where are we?”
“A place of safety.”
I looked behind, but there was no door leading back to the rooftop no Sorrow, no Laz. “Tell me what you need, I will—”
“Quiet. I need you to rest too, Lost One.”
My heart panged. But I did as I was told and sat right where I was—Veyyr in sight.
Her hands hovered over his body. “You gave him gorgon’s blood.” Not a question, but I answered.
“Yes. Why didn’t it fully heal him?”
“It kept him alive, more than anything else would have.”
“A veilrunner could have healed him.”
She sighed. “Yes. But finding one willing? That is impossible.”
“I saw a herd, when I woke.”
“Then you are blessed. Because it very well may be the last herd in existence.”
Chills swept through me. “What?”
“There, on the sideboard, is a cup of broth. You have a look that you have not had much to drink or eat. Drink it all.”
I was up and moving, my feet as if compelled, my hands around the warm mug, soaking in the smells of the broth.
There was no question of whether or not I would drink it down, only that I hoped it didn’t kill me. I couldn’t deny her voice or the command in it, and as the warmth spread through my mouth, down my throat and into my body, I welcomed the abyss that swallowed me whole.
Dreams knifed at me, demanding I wake.
Bits and pieces.
Facing a younger Veyyr, his face twisted with anger.
A younger Zane laughing, head thrown back with abandon.
Glimmers of myself, younger, but harder. Meaner, trying so hard to live up to a standard that I could never. I shied from her—that’s not who I was.
Not anymore.
I burrowed deeper into the thick covers, warm and safe, the weight of a leg draped over mine, heavy, warm, possessive. A large hand pressed into the curve of my hip.
I shot up, gasping, the sheet sliding down my body. Clean, and in a clean shirt and sleeping pants.
Veyyr slept behind me, his face relaxed, chest bare which only showed more markings, both tattoos and scars. Alive. He was alive and the amount of relief had nothing to do with the bond.
Somewhere in the spaces between being reborn out of the Rift, and finding myself here with him, my heart had tangled itself up into a fucking knot with him at the center.
A knot that I couldn’t unbind and I wasn’t sure that I wanted to.
I found myself tracing a scar about three inches below his heart…I touched it, drawing the line from his sternum all the way to his side.
Whatever came, I would stand with him, and admitting that even if just to myself, was enough to calm whatever uncertainties had been plaguing me.
His fingers wrapped around mine. “Admiring your handiwork?”
My eyes lifted to his. “I gave you that?”
His lips twitched, his thumb rubbing across the back of my hand. “I would hardly call it a gift.”
My throat was tight as I stared down at him, alive, wondering if maybe we’d both died. Did that make this heaven?
Or hell?
Somewhere in between.
“We should go,” he didn’t let go of my hand. “The healer said when we both woke, we would have time to eat and then a doorway would appear.”
“I am hungry.” I shifted closer to him, even as he shifted away.
His eyes fluttered closed. “Food would be good.”
He let go of me and swung his legs to the side of the bed to sit up.
Was he pulling away from me again? I could let it hurt me, or I could face it head on.
I felt more than remembered that the old me would have been offended, hurt, embarrassed.
Head on it, was.
I pulled my shirt over my head. “Veyyr, I did not mean I was hungry for food.”
Those ice blue eyes widened as he looked at me over his shoulder. “Mallory.”
“You could have died. I could have died.”
“No, I wouldn’t have let that happen.” He shook his head. “I saw how Zane looked at you, Mallory. He was your past. And I am a monster, Mallory. Make no mistake about that. Monsters don’t…”
“Fall in love?” I laughed. “This is not love, Veyyr.” His head snapped up like I’d slapped him.
“It is something else I think, something more binding than your magic, or my scars on your body. Something that has been building since before I can remember. I will not deny I don’t understand it either.
But it is mine, and whatever it is, it is ours. ”
His gaze never left my face. “Ours.”
I laid back in the bed, pushing the soft pants down and off, baring myself to him completely.
“Feast or famine, Veyyr?”
For a single heartbeat, doubt flickered—the kind that whispers you’ve gone too bold, too fast, and a man like him might suddenly discover a sense of honor he’s never shown before.
A flash where I wanted to pull away, to say I was kidding, the offer rescinded.
Then he was on me.
A man starved, given a feast. His mouth crashed into mine, and I met him with equal force — nothing gentle, nothing tentative. Weeks of tension detonated between us.
His hands and mouth mapped me, ruining any hope I had of staying quiet, drawing noises from me that were more animal than human. Teeth scraped my throat, grazed my collarbone, and then lower—heat and hunger closing over my breasts.
“Fucking delicious,” he growled against my skin.
I laughed, breathless, and tangled my fingers in his hair, holding him to me as he sucked first one nipple, then the other, until tight pleasure coiled through me and had my hips rising off the bed, begging for more.
His hand slid lower, bold and sure, and two fingers drove deep inside me — finding my center, making my spine arch.
“Fuck.”
His answering chuckle vibrated against my breast as he withdrew his fingers slowly… then pressed them back in, stroking, curling, a whisper of magic pulsing at the tips. His thumb circled my clit, and heat built fast, sharp.
I fought to pull him closer, to drag him over me, to feel the weight of him inside me instead of his fingers.
“I’m going to savor this,” he murmured. He kissed the curve of my neck, then slid down my body with a surety that made my pulse stutter. His mouth traced each scar—reverent, claiming—even as his fingers kept their relentless rhythm.
Pressure tightened until every breath shook.
“Veyyr, please—for the love of all the gods, do not stop.”
He paused, his mouth resting on the long scar that carved from my hip down through my groin.
“You don’t want me—”
My hand slid between my legs, fingers brushing my own clit. “If you won’t, then I will.”
His mouth replaced my fingers instantly—his smile unmistakable as he tasted me. His tongue flicked, teased, then devoured. He hit a rhythm that shattered thought. He hooked my legs over his shoulders and buried his face deeper.
I gripped the headboard with one hand, and his head with the other, fighting for breath, sanity slipping like sand between my fingers. Heat surged through me, the sounds of him feasting on me, the firm press of his hand on my ass holding me to his mouth, the sweep of his hair across my belly—
The orgasm slammed into me, ripping a scream from my throat. A landslide of sensation swallowed me whole.
There was no break, no relief—Veyyr and I didn’t work in gentleness.
One moment his mouth was on me; the next he was over me, sliding inside me in one long, claiming thrust. He caught the edge of my orgasm and drew it out, his mouth devouring mine as he filled me.
I wrapped my legs around his hips and met every movement with a thrust of my own. He pinned my hands above my head, fingers laced with mine, our bodies falling into a rhythm as natural as fighting side by side.
Shift. Adjust. Take. Give.
Perfect synchronicity.
His breath grew ragged, skin slick, muscles trembling. He bent his head and kissed me as he came—hard—hips driving into me as if he could not hold himself back. His release triggered another crest of mine, sharp and overwhelming.
My heels dug into him as pleasure tore through me again, his mouth swallowing my scream like it was a final dessert.
We came down slowly, breath coming in long panting gasps. Eyes finding one another, wide, dilated.
Still trembling, I slid my fingers into his hair. He kissed my cheeks, my jaw, my lips — soft, apologetic, like rain after a storm.
“Did I hurt you?” he whispered.
“No,” I murmured, stroking the back of his neck. “But I’m quite sure you have a few new marks on your back.”
“I will consider those a gift.” His smile brushed warm against my chest, sending butterflies scattering in my stomach. An unfamiliar, unnerving feeling.
I wanted to keep this moment. Hold it like a precious gemstone. Pretend the world beyond this room didn’t exist and would demand nothing more of us.
But when I rolled to my side, a doorway shimmered into existence on the far wall—the mark that our time was up.
I touched his cheek and turned his head toward it.
“I think it’s time to go.”