Chapter 35 Madness Incarnate #3
A sound tore from him—half growl, half groan—as his hands came up to grip my upper arms with bruising force.
He wrenched me away from his neck, my teeth dragging along his skin, reluctant to release their prize.
Blood stained his collar, his neck, my lips.
The sight of it, the taste still coating my tongue, drove me further into madness.
In one fluid motion, Valen spun me and slammed me against the cold stone wall of the cell.
My bound arms were crushed between my chest and the wall, sending splinters of pain up to my shoulders, but even that registered as pleasure in my deranged state.
His body pressed against mine from behind, one hand tangled in my hair, the other gripping my hip, holding me in place.
I could feel the hard length of his arousal pressing against me through our clothing, evidence that his control wasn’t as complete as he pretended. The realization sent another wave of molten heat through me, and I pushed back against him, shameless in my need.
“You want me to take you right here?” Valen hissed in my ear, his breath hot against my skin. “Fuck you against a dungeon wall?”
“Yes,” I gasped, beyond shame, beyond anything except the desperate need for release from the fire consuming me. “Please, Valen.”
His grip in my hair tightened, pulling my head back to expose my throat. I felt his teeth graze the tender flesh just above the collar, not biting, just the threat of it—a promise and a warning. My body shuddered in anticipation, every nerve ending alive with desperate want.
Then, abruptly, he stepped back. The sudden absence of his body against mine felt like he was ripping my veins from my skin. I turned to face him, eyes wild, lips parted.
“Guards!” Valen’s voice cut through my desperation, sharp and commanding. “Now!”
The word, guards, penetrated the haze of madness just enough to spark a flicker of rage alongside the consuming need.
He was calling for help. Calling for others to restrain me, to keep me from what I wanted, what I needed.
The betrayal of it sent fury mixing with the divine fire in my veins, creating something even more dangerous than pure lust.
And as I heard the sound of running footsteps, as I knew my window of opportunity was closing, I lurched toward Valen again, desperate to close the distance between us.
He caught me easily, one hand planted firmly in the center of my chest, holding me at arm’s length.
The touch was both torment and relief, his palm burning through the thin silk to brand my skin.
“Will you behave,” he asked, voice low and dangerous, “or do I need to have you restrained completely?”
Before I could answer—before I could decide which option might bring me closer to what I craved—the cell door burst open. My three guards rushed in, eyes widening at the scene before them.
Valen took a large step backward, his hands falling away from my chest as if I had burned him. The sudden loss of contact sent me lurching forward, but the guards were already there—hands catching my arms, holding me back from the object of my obsession.
“No!” The word tore from my throat as a scream of pure frustration. They couldn’t take him away from me, not now, not when I was so close to getting what I needed. I threw my weight against their grip, twisting and fighting with a desperation that surprised even me.
The oldest guard’s face was grim but not unkind as he tightened his hold on my left arm. “Easy now, Your Highness,” he murmured, the old title slipping out from habit. “Easy.”
But there was nothing easy about the fire burning through my veins, nothing calm about the way divine madness had stripped away every civilized impulse I possessed. I needed Valen’s touch like I needed air, and they were denying me.
I threw my head backward with all the force I could muster. The impact was immediately satisfying—skull meeting cartilage with a wet crunch that sent vibrations through my entire head.
The youngest guard—my sweet, young guard, whose face I had already rearranged—let out a howl of pain. Fresh blood sprayed across the stone floor as his nose broke for the second time, his grip on my right arm loosening just enough for me to wrench myself partially free.
“Fuck!” he cursed, one hand flying to his ruined face while the other struggled to maintain its hold on me. “She broke it!”
For a moment, sweet victory. For a moment, I thought I might actually escape their grasp, might make it back to Valen before they could stop me. But the middle guard was already moving to reinforce his injured colleague, and the oldest guard’s grip on my left arm was like iron.
They hauled me back, away from Valen, away from the relief I craved with every fiber of my being.
“Valen!” I screamed, his name both curse and prayer on my lips. I twisted in their grip, pleading with wild, desperate eyes. “Don’t leave me like this. Please.”
Valen stood just beyond reach, watching the chaos with an expression caught between amusement and something darker, hungrier.
“My King,” the older guard said to Valen, “what do you want us to do with her?”
Valen didn’t answer immediately. He stood watching me struggle, his hand absently touching the bite wound on his neck, his eyes never leaving mine.
“My King?” the guard prompted again, uncertainty clear in his tone.
“Hold her,” Valen finally said, his voice strangely distant. “Just... hold her.”
I saw it then—the fraying of his control, visible in the slight tremor of his hands, the tightness around his eyes, the way he seemed to be fighting to maintain his distance from me.
The slight shimmer in the hue of his skin.
The god was closer to the surface now, Vharok straining against the confines of Valen’s human form.
Valen stepped closer. I strained toward him, every fiber of my being reaching for what only he could provide.
His hand shot out, fingers tangling in my hair, yanking my head back to expose my throat above the collar. The sharp pain sent a jolt of perverse pleasure through me, drawing a moan from my lips.
“You want me, Princess?” Valen’s voice was barely more than a rasp, his breath hot against my exposed throat. “You would crawl for me, beg for me, surrender everything you are for a moment’s relief?”
“Yes,” I gasped, the admission torn from some primal place beyond shame. “Please.”
“Do you see what you are?” Valen asked, his voice a dangerous purr against my ear. “What you’ve become?” His grip in my hair tightened, sending fresh sparks of pain-pleasure racing down my spine.
I didn’t care. I didn’t care about what I looked like. I didn’t care about the guards or my dignity or anything except the burning need that consumed me. I turned my face toward his, seeking his mouth with mine, beyond shame, beyond rationality.
Valen jerked back just before our lips could meet, his eyes flashing with something like triumph mixed with reluctance.
“Enjoy your night, my queen,” he purred, voice laced with rough laughter. “I hope I haunt your dreams as much as you will mine.”
With a final, dismissive gesture, he released my hair and stepped back. The loss of contact was like being doused in ice water, drawing a cry of protest from my throat.
“Cut her bindings,” he instructed the older guard. “Then leave her. This will pass by morning.”
The guard hesitated. “Sire, in this state—“
“She won’t harm herself,” Valen interrupted, his gaze still fixed on me with dark intensity. “She wants only one thing right now, and she needs me to ease it.”
The cruel truth of his words sent another wave of desperate need through me. I lunged toward him again, but the guard’s grip held firm.
Valen turned to leave, his movement smooth and controlled despite the visible evidence of his arousal, the blood still staining his collar.
“Valen!” I screamed after him, my voice breaking on his name. “Don’t leave me like this! VALEN!”
He paused in the doorway, looking back over his shoulder with a smile I couldn’t read—part cruelty, part something almost like regret. “This was your lesson in defiance versus stupidity, Princess. Next time you put your teeth to my flesh, remember the consequences.”
His laughter echoed down the corridor, a sound that would have infuriated me under normal circumstances but now only intensified the desperate need clawing at my insides.
“Coward!” I screamed after his retreating figure. When he didn’t return, I was reduced to pleading again. “No, Valen, please. Please come back my King. Please!”
But he didn’t turn back, didn’t acknowledge my words. His footsteps retreated with the same measured pace he had used when arriving, as if nothing had changed, as if he hadn’t just lit a fire in my veins that threatened to consume everything I had once been.
“Damn it, girl, be still,” the middle guard growled, struggling to maintain his grip. “He’s gone. It’s over.”
I deflated, my ragged breathing permeated the now silence.
I hardly noticed as the oldest grunted a command to his younger companion, who still clutched his bleeding nose.
With quick, efficient movements, the guard produced a knife and cut the rope binding my wrists, then backed toward the door, dragging his injured companion with him.
The cell door slammed shut, the lock turning with a final, damning click. I was alone with the fire in my veins, the desperate need that had no outlet, and the lingering taste of a god’s blood on my tongue.