Chapter 19
Seraphiel
The words leaped out before I could stop them. The last thing I wanted was to draw attention to myself. The light in this room, this nursery, was bright enough to showcase every single, horrific choice I’d made.
The monster I’d become. But I couldn’t let the one who had been my best friend stew in his self-recrimination any longer. “It was my fault, Gav. From the very beginning.” I closed my mouth, flinching when Feather whirled around, then ran to me.
Her green eyes sparkled with unshed tears. “Rumple, I couldn’t heal you. Here.” She grabbed a goblet of some sort of juice, lifting it to my lips.
“No, you’ll need that,” I said, but she shook off my concern.
“We have infinite supplies,” she explained, her words falling over each other as she told me about the room we were in, and the box on the table.
“Gavriel put his soul… in a box?” She blinked at my question, uncomprehending, and in her thoughts, I saw a sudden image of a naked man holding a gift-wrapped present in front of his genitals.
I fought back a smile. I didn’t need to ask if Feather was all right. If she was thinking about dicks, even dicks in boxes, she was as normal as ever.
“Just a small part of it,” Gavriel muttered. “A little bit I didn’t need.”
Feather frowned at him. “Was that a ‘just the tip’ joke?”
Gavriel’s lips twitched. “Of course not.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “Gavriel, souls don’t have appendixes. Appendices? There are no ‘extra bits.’” He and I smiled at one another over her head. There was so much she didn’t know.
My smile died almost instantly, though, because there was so much I hadn’t shared with Gavriel.
“I need to make a confession. It was my fault, Gav, all that went wrong. I was so angry, so lost, in the void. I blamed you. But when I realized, in the Maker Hall, what I’d done…
” I turned to Feather. “Even what happened to you, little one. I am to blame.”
“Why would you say that?” she asked, stepping up to me and reaching for one of my hands.
I pulled it back as fast as I could. Hurt shone from her gaze.
“You don’t want me to touch you? Little late for that, hm?
You’ve been inside me and all.” She pointed to the smears of gray under her skin, trying to joke.
But I knew my little sacrifice, and I’d hurt her.
I held out my hands, allowing her to see the long, dark claws, sharpened hooks of hardened smut that were as thick as my fingers at the base. They were evil weapons of destruction. I had no intention of touching her with them. “I might hurt you. I can’t chance it.”
She reached slowly for my hand and ran her own fingers over it.
Like my feet, neck, and face, my palms and fingers weren’t plated by the thick armor, and I shivered beneath the gentle touch.
She continued her exploration, skipping over the jagged surface and smoothing my hair first behind one ear, then the other.
I closed my eyes, lost in the sensation of loving hands on me.
Soft, gentle touches, after so long knowing almost nothing but the harsh void.
Her fingertips traced my forehead, sweeping from my temples over my eyelids, down my nose, and to my lips.
It was excruciating. It was exquisite. Her skin was silk and cream, her breath sweet and floral when a hint of it stole through my own sulfurous haze.
But the shadows in my skin writhed as she touched them as well, and I was certain she saw them.
I fought not to curl into a ball and hide myself, knowing she was witnessing the corruption just beneath my flesh. That had defeated me.
“You would never hurt me,” she breathed in my ear, lifting my hand to her face. I tried to pull away but she held me firmly, her petal-soft cheek silver-pink beneath my charcoal palm.
“Please don’t. I could scratch you.”
Slowly, intentionally, she crawled up onto my thighs, on her knees. She reached both arms around me, her hands cresting the tops of my wings, pinning me to the sofa, and said huskily, “Don’t threaten me with a good time, Rumple.” Then she licked up the side of my face and giggled. “Yum.”
I stammered for a moment. “Feather, you can’t… you can’t be attracted to this.” I gestured with my free hand to my body. “I’m repulsive. I’m a hideous caricature of everythi—” Before I could finish my thought, her mouth landed on mine, and I forgot what I was saying.
She explored my lips with her own, her tongue darting out to taste the seam of my mouth. Her hands stroked the tops of my wings, and the resulting pleasure—even muted by the thick coating that protected them—made me moan in delicious agony.
And then her tongue was in my mouth, learning the shape of mine. Oh, Great Maker, tasting me. Meeting my tongue with hers, and exploring my mouth.
I tried to move away, but she held onto my wings, and we were both in danger of falling off the sofa. My tail whipped up and wrapped around her neck, pulling her away gently. She pressed into the slight constriction and whimpered… then winked when I tried to apologize.
What was she thinking? Was this some sort of sacrifice she thought she had to make, to show me I was still Seraphiel? She couldn’t truly want me.
I tried to look stern. “Little one, what are you doing?”
Obviously impatient, she looked down her nose at me. “I heard rumors that you were some sort of merge expert. But apparently, it was all hype. That’s okay. I can teach you.” She dove for my mouth again, but I held her by her shoulders.
“Feather, my tongue… it’s forked.” I stuck the tip out, so she could see. Her eyes went the tiniest bit hazy. But not with fear. She was lusting after me?
“Oh my…” she said, rubbing herself against my armor unconsciously. “It’s so big and thick. Ummm, you can feel things with it, right?” She ground herself down on me, not at all accidentally this time, and I thought I might choke on my “big, thick” tongue.
“Yes,” I yelped as she circled part of my tail with her hand, testing the circumference. She ran her hand as far up it as she could reach, and I shuddered with intense pleasure.
“You felt that for sure. Hmm, I wonder what else this tail can do.” She sent an extremely graphic image of me fucking her tight pussy, while my tail wrapped around her waist, the tip thrusting forcefully into her ass, and my tongue was lapping at her pink nipples.
My cock went so hard, it felt like it might break off inside the armor. “Little one, you don’t find me abhorrent?”
She shook her head in mock despair. “Did you even see my Kindle history, Rumple? You know exactly what a tail and horns do to a dirty-minded girl like me. You’re literally sixty percent of my most outlandish fantasies come true.
If I could figure out how to get this shizz off you”—she pulled at my armor breastplate—“I bet we could work that number higher.”
“But... my smell,” I argued. “And I must taste terrible.”
She blew a stray piece of hair out of her eyes, still looking for a finger hold in the armor at my shoulder. “You remember that chain-smoker boyfriend I had in Chicago? He tasted twice as bad as you do, and I let him stick his—”
I snarled, my sharp fangs clicking on air. “Don’t talk about other men, Feather.”
She batted her lashes and rubbed herself against my thigh.
“Oh, jealous? What about my mates, then? I’ve licked and kissed them, too.
Everywhere. When Mikhail was all smutty, sometimes he tasted a little charred as well, but a good girl learns to get over the initial salty—” I stopped her teasing words with a long, passionate kiss, until a quiet voice drew my attention.
“I’ll just take a nap for a bit.”
Shit. I had completely forgotten about Gavriel. Sorry.
He had his back to me, and was using a cloth to wipe his feet clean. Don’t be. If I had her on my lap, I wouldn’t want to chat either.
I bristled slightly. He didn’t deserve her touch any more than I did. A faint wash of understanding and agreement filtered out of his closed mental shields. And pain. I had a feeling he had more wounds under his leather trousers, and I cleared my throat. “Gavriel, if you need—”
“Oh, wow. That was rude of me.” Blushing, Feather peered over her shoulder. “Sorry, Gavriel. You two were talking about fault and blame and stuff. Carry on.” Gavriel didn’t look up, but he smiled at his feet.
His increasingly bloody feet.
“Take off the trousers, Gav. You may have wounds underneath that… Renaissance fair outfit.” I fought to keep my tone light, but something told me Gavriel’s energy was dangerously low.
“Don’t criticize. I fully approve of the leather ensemble,” Feather chided, her finger straying to my horns. Then she froze. “But I agree with Rumple. You should probably strip down, just to be certain. I could do a thorough inspection.”
For a moment, I thought all three of us were going to burst into laughter. Or start fucking. There was a lot that Gavriel and I could teach a sweet thing like her.
Feather’s eyes got huge, and I realized I had broadcast that. Oops, I lied.
Tease. And anyway, you don’t know what Mikhail already taught me. I’m practically a sexpert. That may be what my job will be in the Celestial Realm. Madam of the Merge. Those Celestials seemed pretty uptight. I can loosen them all up, teach them some better uses for all those macramé knots.
For that moment, my heart was as light as my armor was heavy. My little one was here with me, in a place that was as safe as any could be outside the Celestial Realm, and she was whole and well.
It would all be perfect if I could just get this damned armor off. We could puppy pile.
Puppy pile? Heck to the yes! She started prying at the edges of my armor as if she could find a seam to tear it off.