Chapter 37
Break me. Break me.
Mend me anew.
~Kole Ilrik
I entered the captain’s quarters with quiet steps, latching the door behind me before I turned to look at him.
He was leaning over his desk looking at sketches from his journal, a steaming cup of hemsbane tea next to him.
His shirt was on the chair beside him leaving all of his delicious, sun-tanned skin exposed.
He’d also removed his bracer along with his glove and false fingers like he was getting ready to sleep, but I preferred him that way with his flaws on display.
Flaws that illustrated a struggle we both overcame.
He looked up from his drawings as I closed the door behind me, his eyelids heavy.
I approached the desk, glancing over the sketches he was so diligently studying.
He spun one to face me and upon the parchment was a woman, thin and gaunt, with a long, black tail, a head smooth of hair, and bony limbs strung with lean and unnerving cords of muscle.
“I saw one the day that Gus died,” he said. “Fucking monsters.”
“I never saw a Kraal with my own eyes before that day. I wish they did not exist.”
“So that is what generations in the dark depths does to your kind. They look more dead than alive.”
“Maybe they are. Death comes in many forms. Their minds are so far from being their own, they are practically corpses, hungering for flesh.”
He slid another piece of paper toward me.
On it was drawn the grotesque, dark form of a xhoth, its mouth in a permanent smile showing its teeth.
It was tall, standing on two legs, its feet and hands tipped with sharp claws.
There were fins on every limb and one large one down the center of its back.
The sizable, unblinking eyes were soulless, like everything Akareth had ever created.
“After seeing all we have seen these past months, it is hard to believe I thought Kroans were the worst the ocean could offer.”
I stared down at the drawings, my thoughts running rampant with the possibilities. There was no telling how many we would face when we reached Theloch. If we reached Theloch.
I could drift into the tides of my endless worries for another night, or I could leave them till morning.
I swiped all of the papers off the desk, sliding them back into their leather folder.
Vidar stood up straight, finishing off his tea from a wooden cup with one last gulp.
He set his cup down and turned toward the bed, but before he was out of my reach, I pressed my hand to his chest. He first looked at my hand as if surprised and then turned to me, waiting.
And why wouldn’t he question it after how I had been acting?
I soaked him in. Studying his face seemed the best way to remind myself I was not in a dream. The lines had become so blurred, but the moment I knew he was real, it hurt that much more thinking I could lose him one final time and that would be it.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he said.
“Like what?”
“Like you don’t think we’re making it out of this.”
I moved closer to him, yearning for his warmth. “Should we not always act as if we are about to die?”
He took a deep breath, defeated, and pivoted to face me fully. “Dahlia, what is it you want?”
That he did not know dulled my desire. Perhaps it was stupid of me to expect him to understand, but I was at a loss for words.
My ability to communicate what I needed had left me and I was stuck feeling trapped, tainted, and buried under mounds of rubble from the walls I’d once built around my heart.
“I…” I began, unsure where the rest of my voice was hiding.
I shook my head, my thoughts suddenly caving in around me until I couldn’t remember what it was I had come into the room for.
I was lost.
I turned toward the door and began my retreat like the coward I’d become.
“Dahlia,” Vidar said. “Stop.”
“I will keep watch through the night again with Meridan.”
I gripped the door latch and pulled when Vidar’s hand slammed against it, ripping the handle out of my grasp and shutting it again.
“Don’t do this,” he pleaded.
I remained facing the door, closing my eyes.
“I’ve done nothing.”
“Exactly. You’re running from me again. I have seen you run from a thousand other things, right into my arms, but I cannot stand you turning away from me. Tell me what it is you need.”
“I don’t know.”
“When last I tried to touch you, you shied from me. Now… I don’t understand what you want, but I want nothing more than to give it to you, Dahlia. Please.”
“How am I to tell you what I need when I don’t understand it myself?”
“You came in here for a reason. It’s far too early for you to need sleep.”
I spun to look at him. “So that you might reclaim what Akareth has taken from you,” I blurted out.
“You said he couldn’t steal me away, but he has stolen my thoughts, no matter how I try to dismiss him.
Your ability to break me is equal to your ability to put me back together and I am in pieces right now.
I can feel it. Every day, I put forth a great effort to hold myself together because beyond all reason, I’ve somehow become surrounded with people who would worry themselves over me if they saw how truly damaged I am. Mend me.”
Calmly, he stepped back.
“Tell. Me. How.”
“Kicking,” I said, internally crying out while my tone remained level. “Screaming. Weeping. I don’t care. Just fix it. Your tenderness, rare as it is, is lovely, but I need your heavy hand. Do not let me run from you. Not from you.”
“Fuck, Dahlia, don’t toy with me. You know what I’m capable of.”
“I do. And I need that man tonight. All of him. No binds.” I stepped toward him, taking his scent into my lungs. “Make sure that if he gets his hands on me, he is made furious by how little is left to claim after you’re through with me.”
I could see his eyes darken at the challenge like I was a piece of meat he’d been resisting for days, despite his hunger.
He took one last breath before his mouth was on mine, hot and relentless. The sting from the hemsbane tea was subtle, making my lips tingle, but I didn’t care. Nor did I care when he forced his tongue into my mouth, flooding it with the sweet and bitter taste of the toxic herb.
Vidar gripped the nape of my neck, pulling me off him. I peered up into his ravenous gaze, my heart like waves abusing a shoreline.
“Get on your knees,” he rasped.
He pressed a hand to my shoulder and immediately, I bent for him, falling to the floor. He gave my hair another tug, forcing my head back before he began pulling at the laces of his britches, his intense eyes demanding my full attention as he exposed his hard length.
“Put your teeth away, siren,” he said. “Or I’ll tie you to the bed and deprive you of my touch till morning.”
My whole body shuddered at his harsh words, my lips parting with invitation.
He tangled his fingers in my hair again, pressing the tip of his cock into my mouth.
I licked my tongue over the smooth tip, savoring the taste of him before he pushed himself deeper.
The back of my throat swelled at the invasion, robbing me of breath, and like the starved siren I was, I rejoiced at the control he had.
Every time he thrust into my mouth, I felt him deeper, and each time he groaned, I dragged my tongue under his length just to feel him tremble.
Grabbing hold of Vidar’s hips for balance, I urged him to use me, my nails biting into his skin until he hissed at the twinge of pain.
He thrust with more force, assaulting my mouth as if he was angry and I craved the chaos of it.
When his muscles began to tense, it only made me hungrier.
I swallowed the head of his cock, taking him as deep as he was able to go until I felt a hot stream flood my throat.
He moaned, his body going rigid under my hands.
Holding my head, he came, emptying his seed into me with a strained breath.
Finally, he pulled out of my mouth and gripped my jaw, craning my head back.
“Swallow,” he demanded.
My throat flexed, taking down every bit of him before opening my mouth just to prove it.
Collaring my neck, he urged me to my feet and all but threw me on the bed.
I sat up on my elbows as he stalked toward me, a tower of strength, fury, and obsession.
I burned inside, longing for his touch to singe away the remnants of my enemy’s.
Eyes fixed on me, Vidar stepped out of his britches and then began to undress me, tossing articles of clothing onto the floor until I was completely bare with nothing but my scars to cover me.
He looked over each one, cherishing them in ways that I never had, before he hooked my knees with his hands and tugged me to the edge of the bed.
I watched him stand between my thighs, stroking his cock with one fist to bring it back to life.
“The thought that some fucking coward of a god tried to take you from me,” he said, spitting into his palm to slicken his grip.
“It reminds me what a monster I am. All I want is to make you scream my name so loud he can hear it from the bottom of the goddamn sea where he hides like a worm. I don’t care what he did to you in your sleep.
It pales in comparison to what I can do to you when you’re awake and every day that you’ve been distant has fed my resolve. I want you back, Dahlia.”
He stepped over to one of his chairs, pulling a knife from his leather belt. The way the lantern light moved across the sharp edge excited me as he returned to the bed and repositioned himself between my legs.
“This is real,” he continued, holding up the knife. “I’m real. Our pain is real. As real as our pleasure.”
He turned the tip of the knife toward his palm, piercing the flesh. I licked my lips at the sight of him dragging the blade across his skin, cutting until blood wept down his wrist. Dropping the knife on the floor, he turned his hand to face me, showing me the hot, red blood dripping down his arm.