Chapter Eleven
Wyvern and Forest Bonded
Elloren Guryev
Zhilaan Forest military base
Yvan’s hand is clasped around mine, our fire power straining toward each other with chaotic force, but unable to connect like it could before we connected.
The sensation has been building throughout the day and into this night, leaving us barely able to focus in on Hizar’drile, who stands with us at the center of the torchlit terrace’s command table, our allies massed before us. A small blue voice amplification rune glows in the air just in front of Hizar’drile’s chin, Vang Troi, Sylvan, and the other Dryads beside him.
“Tomorrow eve, we deploy West,”
Hizar’drile charges. “We will have, at most, three days to track down the Verdyllion and wage war on Vogel’s forces before Forest power begins its slide into dormancy and Vogel gains the advantage.”
An uneasy energy gutters through Yvan’s and my fire. As it does through the magical auras of the legion of our Dryad’khin on the terrace and perched all over the surrounding Zhilaan Forest canopy like a sea of Tree’khin, the huge sky portal above us due to be fully charged for passage to the West by this time tomorrow.
Amplification runes from every tradition are suspended above the Zhilaan Forest’s canopy to feed the Forest’s power into our Tree’khin linkage, the runes thrumming with the prismatic might of the Zhilaan’s scattered groves of multicolored deciduous trees.
All my foliage-amplified magic straining toward Yvan.
He sends out a potent lash of fire power toward me, as he has throughout the day, testing our Wyvernbond’s blockage, his aura struggling to embrace me while my fire reflexively reaches for him. As it has every time, our magic slams to an abrupt, sparking halt in the center of our bond, unable to traverse it.
Yvan tenses and huffs out a breath as he meets my gaze sidelong, the two of us exchanging a concerned look.
Because our lack of fire-connection is not our only linkage that’s veering off course.
Throughout the day, the Zhilaan Forest has been whipping elemental energy around our Wyvernbond, as if sounding an alarm while tugging us toward the Forest’s floor.
Vang Troi swipes her stylus, the sharp motion breaking into our disquiet as the voice amplification rune suspended in front of Hizar’drile flies to her.
“With twinned Mages Gwynnifer and Mavrik Glass as our tracking guides to the Verdyllion,”
she states, staring our forces down, “we will portal to the continent’s Central Lands, just above where they sense the Verdyllion’s location. Once there, we will break through Vogel’s Shadow net, enter the Sublands, and take hold of the Verdyllion while freeing Wynter Eirllyn and her forces, joining them to ours.”
At the mention of Wynter, an impassioned rush of Ariel’s golden fire streaks through our horde’s bond, Ariel’s eyes glowing sun bright, a look of ferocious determination on her face.
Vang Troi flicks her stylus, and the voice amplification rune streaks to Yvan and me.
I straighten and look out at the sea of Dryad’khin. “Using the Verdyllion,”
I roughly state, struggling to focus past my power’s mounting desperation to get to Yvan, “I’ll draw on our combined magic to strike down Vogel’s storm bands, which will likely draw him, the Black Witch, and his forces to us.”
I look to Yvan, our eyes meeting in a blaze of frustrated heat before he turns to our Dryad’khin.
“I’ll then face down Fallon Bane, fire to ice,”
he says, steel in his tone. “While Elloren and our horde, along with you, our Dryad’khin army, strike down Vogel and take possession of his Shadow Wand.”
Vang Troi swipes the amplification toward Mavrik and Gwynn.
“Once we have both the Shadow Wand and the Verdyllion in hand,”
Mavrik says, “Gwynn and I will use our twinned magic to link at least seven Dryad’khin with light power to the Verdyllion, overtake the Shadow Wand’s tether to every bound Mage and Alfsigr, and link the entire tethered West, en masse, to the trees.”
Mavrik, along with all of us, looks to the Dryads at the mention of trees. The voice amplification rune slides to Sylvan.
“Tonight,”
Sylvan calmly states, a lethal light in his pine-green eyes, “we will finish charging our weapons, our sky portal, and the storm-shield runes that will surround us when we deploy—runes that will drive back both the Eastern Realm’s weather chaos and Vogel’s Shadow storm bands.”
He scans everyone assembled. “Rest well, Dryad’khin. Tomorrow eve we deploy as one united force, fueled by foliage might.”
A wave of thunderous calls of alliance rises from all sides, echoing into the sky at the same moment that a powerfully unsettled current surges through Yvan’s power and I turn to him, shock flashing through me. Because his eyes . . . his pupils have lost their vertical Wyvern shape and have snapped into a non-Wyvern roundness.
Vothe, Naga, and our horde mates send us looks of alarm.
As the meeting breaks and everyone disperses to continue runic work, further planning, or to get a few hours of vital sleep, Yvan pulls me aside. His eyes are twin points of violet fire against the evening’s dark, his horns draw in along with his wings, his crimson hair morphing to glamoured brown. “Elloren,”
he says as his fire sears against the barrier solidifying between us, “we need to talk. Now.”
We stride into my room, his hand tight around mine, the contact prompting surge after surge of our fire magic toward each other.
Only to have it slam up against the newly impenetrable barrier.
Yvan sweeps his hand through the air, and the night-darkened room’s three lanterns instantly light. He firmly closes the door and fuses it shut.
“What’s happening to our magic?”
I prod, tension simmering to life between us as my magic strains toward him, the memories of what we did here last night still pulsing over my body like a hot imprint. “And why are you glamouring yourself?”
“It’s the lack of a bond mark,”
he says, his gaze a fiery brand as he brings his hands to his hips. “Setting down that mark . . . it’s a strong Wyvern instinct. More intense than I imagined. I had a hard time controlling the impulse last night . . . and it keeps getting stronger, like the bond’s magic is struggling to come into its fullness. Glamouring helps to tamp it down a fraction, but I can’t go up against Fallon and Vogel’s forces glamoured with my power straining toward you. But, it’s like we discussed . . . since you’re not Wyvern’kin and we have a unique level of power . . . I don’t know what will happen to your magic if I set the mark on you and completely fuse our fire power. You and I—”
he motions between us “—we’re unprecedented.”
“That’s an understatement,”
I huff out, struggling to suppress the ridiculously strong urge to kiss him.
A charged silence descends, Yvan’s fire aura leaping toward my magic in ardent flares, hungry to break through, certainty suddenly burning inside me.
“We take a leap of faith, then,”
I offer, “the risks be damned. Yvan, we can’t hold any aspect of our true selves back from each other any longer. Come what may.”
“I don’t want to hold anything back from you,”
he agrees, eyes afire.
“Then tell me what we need to do about this.”
The flame in his eyes deepens. “I need to claim you, Elloren.”
“You mean the bite?”
He swallows, his gaze sliding to the inner edge of my shoulder, his eyes going a bit molten before they meet mine once more. “It involves a bite.”
“Here?”
I ask, running my fingertips along the spot near the base of my neck where his mouth lingered last night, again and again.
He nods, a ruddy flush forming on his face, a more heated look entering his gaze. I can sense how worked up he’s getting just from the thought of this, his fire sizzling toward me in rampant flares.
“How much of a bite?”
I ask, tension sparking in the air between us.
“A small one,”
he clarifies, clearly ill at ease with the strength of this Wyvern urge. “Just enough to connect with your blood and send fire through it.”
I hold his intent stare—his non-Wyvern, round-pupiled stare. Unsettled, I remember how he had to hide himself in the West. How he had to hide his wings. His eyes. Even his language. And that’s not what I want for him ever again. That’s not what I want for us.
“Take down the glamour,”
I urge, my fire straining toward him.
Yvan gives me a molten look, then tenses and fully releases his glamour, his pupils contracting, hair morphing from brown to crimson, horns rising and wings fanning out as his fire surges so hot that it races across my skin and warms the entire room.
My pulse quickening, I step closer to him, then reach up and pull down my tunic’s collar, exposing the skin near my neck’s base.
Yvan draws in a wavering breath, his nostrils flaring along with his fervid aura.
“Go ahead,”
I offer, heart thudding. “Claim me.”
He shakes his head, dragging his fiery gaze from my shoulder with obvious effort. “Not . . . at this moment,”
he says, his eyes and power taking on a hungrier tension. “In . . . bed.”
Heat shoots down my spine as I fully grasp what this is—a true mating bond.
Nerves firing, I move to the bed and sit down, unable to stifle a slight smile as Yvan tracks me with his eyes but holds himself back, the energy in his conflagration of power like a tensed bowstring ready to snap, everything in him longing to hurl himself at me.
Holy all the gods.
“You gave me a Wyvern Firekiss last night and you’re suddenly shy?” I tease.
Yvan flashes me a sultry look. “Say the word and I’ll do it again.”
My amusement instantly shifts to toe-curling surprise, our magic rising like storm static between us.
“You’re such a mix,”
I breathlessly observe. “You’re so Keltish and Lasair and Wyvern.”
He steps toward me and lifts his hand to caress the side of my face. “Elloren, let me make you part Wyvern too.”
A hard ache grips my heart as sparks trail his touch, tears filling my eyes as the intuitive realization hits me. This thing that he wants . . . it’s more than a Wyvern Sealing.
It’s a marriage of equals, a complete fusing of fire.
I stand up to face him, fire for fire, and take his hands in mine. Yvan inhales a shaky breath, his wildfire gaze riveted to mine.
“Do Wyverns have some type of ceremony?”
I venture. “Is there anything else that’s important here?”
“After,”
he manages, the word tight as his fire takes over, a surge of it breaking free to give me a fuller, wordless answer, his flame shot through with bottomless passion. “After this war is over, I want that.”
A tear falls as I consider how, outside this room, the Natural World is in terrible peril. Even if we survive, there are no guarantees of any type of decent future. But there is something unshakable here. In our bonding. In spite of every last thing the world has thrown at us all. The story is not yet over, III promised, and the idea lights in my heart that maybe this moment is an important part of that story—to love, against all the odds.
Maybe that’s the important part of everyone’s story right now.
Surrendering to that love, I bring my palm to the center of Yvan’s chest, bottomless affection filling me in response to the rise and fall of his breaths, his heartbeat strong and steady.
“Claim me,”
I breathlessly offer. “But not here. Claim me not only like a true Wyvern’kin would, but as a true Dryad’khin would as well—in the arms of our fire-powered Forest.”
Yvan flies us deep into the heart of the Zhilaan Forest, our bodies wrapped around each other.
The Forest welcomes us with a pulse of heat as Yvan soars us down into a deserted clearing lit solely by the violet fire blazing in his eyes, the runes marked on our bodies and the golden horde stars emblazoned on the bases of our necks.
Yvan draws me into an embrace and kisses me, slow and sensual, taking his time as our breathing deepens and his fire crackles with suppressed power and desire.
I draw him closer, leaning back against the trunk behind me, wanting to feel the full pressure of Yvan against me amplified by the Forest connection at my back, my own fire ramping up, struggling to reach him.
Yvan holds himself in check, though the press of his body’s arousal is unmistakable. Instead, we kiss for a long while as he murmurs Lasair endearments that send an emotional ache through my heart, before he falls into the Wyvern language I don’t understand and don’t need to, hissing the words against my lips as he opens his dragon heart to me, losing all reserve. Finally showing me his complete self, his fire starting to flow into a freer, hotter stream.
Straight toward me.
His kisses gain an edge of urgency before he sets about removing my clothing with loving deliberation. There’s no aggressive shredding like last night, the slight tremble in his hands prompting a warm swell of affection through me. I gently run my fingers through his silken, crimson hair, over his pointed ears as he stills, his gaze skimming my unclothed form.
Keeping tight hold of his fire, he gives me a besotted look before bringing his mouth to mine once more and pressing me against the tree, his kiss long and hot and deliciously thorough as my hand slides up and around one of his horns.
“I love your horns,”
I breathe against his mouth, and his smile arcs against my lips.
“I can sense it in the flow of your fire,”
he murmurs, amused.
He draws back a fraction and looks closely at me before taking his garb off, a hot flush racing over my skin as I take in his naked body.
Then he’s embracing me once more, kissing and caressing me, following the trail of what I want through his sense of my fire. I let out a surprised gasp in response to the intimacy of his hot touch, slow and tentative at first as he reads what I like, then bolder.
Much bolder.
A rush of pleasure grips hold, building like a fiery tide, my head arching back as Yvan slides both hands around my upper thighs and hoists me up, bracing me against the trunk behind me.
“Are you ready?”
he asks, low in his throat, eyes burning.
I nod, lips parted with need, and Yvan pushes forward, a hard breath escaping us both as he sheathes himself inside me, his body rigid as his fire surges, his breathing staggered as his mouth comes to my shoulder.
He begins to move with urgency and power, the hot pulse of his fire gaining momentum. I tighten my thighs around him, gripping his hair, his horns. My neck arches back, his fire surging through mine as he takes me more intensely, waves of hot pleasure radiating through us both, a cry escaping my lips. I can feel his fire power mounting in potency, sense his own hot, rhythmic rushes of intense pleasure, building into an inferno.
His wings slam down to either side of me, stealing my breath as his mouth clamps down on the inner edge of my shoulder and his canines pierce my skin.
A rush of fiery power detonates, wave after wave of it, as our fires merge, the pleasure so intense I lose all sense of self, both of us hurtling into his inferno as I cry out his name and we release ourselves into each other.
There’s only his fire.
Only him.
Only his body merged with mine. Both of us one being of flame.
Fully Wyvernbonded.
As our merged fire settles, Yvan stills, holding me suspended and pressed to the tree, his skin slick against mine as our chests rise and fall against each other, the sting along the inner edge of my shoulder rapidly shifting to a pleasurable, fiery blaze.
I glance down to find a half-moon of violet flame marked there, a stunned delight igniting.
Yvan gives me an impassioned look, emotion lashing through our now fully linked fire. He lowers his head and tenderly kisses the mark, then runs his tongue over it as tears of joy blur my vision.
I send my own fire out to him, astonished to be so fully connected with his power. I pull on it, and his flame slides right through my rootlines. A shiver of astonishment flashes through him as he does the same, drawing my fire into his own, our fire magic fully melding into a shimmering, blazing caress.
Yvan murmurs a stream of words in the deeply sibilant language of Western Wyvern’kin, and I’m stunned anew to be able to fully comprehend his ardent words.
My beautiful mate.
My fire.
My Wyvernbonded love.