Chapter 46
KORYN
The world clawed at me, determined to pull us apart.
There was darkness all around, but it refused to remain static.
It whirled and twisted, like my power when it painted my skin.
But where I reached for the light again and again, this was only infinite, all-encompassing darkness. This was Syleris’ power.
I should have been scared. But I’d learned to welcome the darkness inside of me since the landscape of my life was repainted after the Memory Gate.
I did not recoil from his power; I leaned into it.
I welcomed him into every crevice, every thought.
There was no difference between us anymore.
I was his, and there was no use in fighting it.
Maybe if I gave in fully, if I truly claimed him, he would stop trying to hide the best parts of himself.
The power around us disappeared as quickly as it had plucked us away. The roaring in my ears ceased, the clawing of the endless void giving way to the pressure of Syleris and Garrick’s hands upon my skin.
We landed on the bed in a tangle of limbs. Garrick rolled away immediately, his shoulder blades pressed into the mattress as he gasped for breath. But Syleris was on him immediately.
“My apologies, halfling,” he purred as he pressed a kiss to Garrick’s collarbone. “In my haste to have the two of you naked, I did not think about the impact my form of travel might have on you.”
Heat surged between my thighs.
It was not just his words, though. Even as he pressed a line of kisses along Garrick’s collarbone and around his pectoral muscle, his hand was between my legs. And we were, every single one of us, naked. That was power I could appreciate.
“Did we just disappear from the middle of the masquerade?” Garrick half-moaned.
We lay side by side on the bed, Syleris kneeling between us. His long, deft fingers teased my opening while he nibbled on the cleft of Garrick’s chin. I turned my head to the side so I could watch him torture my Lifebind. It was exquisite.
“As I said before, I have my own ways of hiding,” Syleris said. He paused to drag his tongue down Garrick’s throat and suck on his pulse. And to slip a finger inside of me. “And the other attendees were much too focused on their own pleasure to notice ours.”
As the word pleasure dripped off of his tongue, he scraped a fingernail over the bundle of nerves inside my pussy.
My hips jerked in response, my back bowing up off the bed.
It was impossible that a person could be so focused and so effective at giving two people pleasure at once.
Syleris was unlike anyone—man or woman—that I’d ever been with before.
“Because I am not a man.”
“You are a god,” I said aloud. I’d meant to say it with sarcasm, but it came out as a whimper, needy and shrill.
“Your god,” Syleris agreed.
I turned my eyes up to him. Before, he’d been behind me, and I had not been able to watch his face as he took his pleasure. This time, I did not want to miss a single detail. But it wasn’t his face that caught my eyes. It was his chest.
There they were, inked right over his heart.
I’d known he must have them, but I’d never let myself fantasize about where.
The two chevrons nestled together above his nipple and below his collarbone.
They were the same dark blue ink as the identical mark on the inside of my thigh and the Lifebind I shared with Garrick.
Syleris’ mark was bigger, about the size of my palm, while mine was closer to the width of my thumb.
But they were there, the physical mark of the bargain I’d made to bind myself to him for eternity in exchange for Kyrelle’s life.
I’d cursed that decision again and again.
But I’d never truly regretted it. And now, a small part of me was glad for it, because it had brought me to this moment.
I’d felt complete in my love for Garrick, even before his betrayal.
But my bond with the Dark God lingered. I’d have Garrick in life and the Dark God in death.
Somehow, by some strange and remarkable twist of fate, I had them both. Right now, right here, in my heart and pressed against my body.
Tears broke free and ran down my cheeks.
Garrick noticed them immediately. I did not even realize he’d been watching me.
“What is it?” he demanded. He brushed Syleris away and levered himself up onto his arm so that he could see me properly.
Syleris clucked his tongue in disapproval, but he retreated a fraction as well. His fingers were still between my legs, but he contented himself with teasing the mass of curls instead of my clit.
I shook my head to the side, struggling to find the words. “I don’t… I don’t deserve this. I don’t deserve… you. Both of you.”
Garrick’s eyes went wide. Syleris was already in my mind; he could follow my line of thought and see exactly where I ended up.
He’d been there to see it happening. But that did not stop him from frowning down at me as he rolled to the other side.
I now had one male on each side, each propped up on an elbow, each staring down at me.
Syleris teased my curls. Garrick’s eyes darted down, catching the movement. He must have decided that if Syleris could touch me, he could too. He cupped my breast and slowly dragged his fingertip over my nipple.
“You cannot distract me from my feelings,” I said to the pair of them. Although if that was their goal, they were doing marvelously. My body was very interested in their touches, even if my mind and conscience rebelled.
Syleris slid his finger back inside me. He captured my mouth as I gasped, invading it in time with my pussy. When he drew back, he held my gaze. Pinned me as effectively as if he’d held me down.
“You are the single good thing I have done, Koryn,” he said.
“I thought you denied any goodness,” I whispered.
“In myself? Absolutely,” he agreed. “But not in you.”
I turned away, scared of the intensity that filled my chest. It was not my power, and it was not cold. It was warm and real, and it tipped my world toward a new reality I did not think I was ready for.
Garrick caught my wrists, preventing me from escaping. He stared down into my eyes as he held me immobile. “You are good. You deserve to be happy. You deserve to be worshipped.”
Before I could argue, Garrick kissed me. He pinched my nipple and devoured the breathy cry of pleasure that he elicited. He twirled my tongue around his, claiming every corner of my mouth and every worry of my heart.
Syleris charted a path down my body. He dipped his tongue into the indentation of my belly button and then dragged it along the stretch marks on my stomach that had appeared during puberty.
Once, I’d been self-conscious of them. But when he pressed an open-mouthed kiss to every single one?
How could they be anything but beautiful when they were given homage by the Dark God himself?
I couldn’t take it. The two of them worked in glorious tandem, but I could not just lie there.
I needed to touch them as much as I wanted them to touch me.
Syleris was too far away to caress his skin, but I grabbed a handful of his silky hair.
It was so soft. The keeper of hell had no business having hair that soft.
Syleris heard the thought and retaliated by tugging on one of the thick curls between my legs before sliding a second finger inside me.
I found Garrick’s cock as Syleris curved his fingertips inside of me again. I swiped a fingertip over the head, already wet with thick beads of precome.
“Witch,” Garrick moaned against my mouth. The sound of that need already, from just one touch…
He pinched my nipples at the exact same moment that Syleris found that spot inside of me. My climax roared in my ears, pleasure and pain and surprise mingling together so fast and hard. I jerked against them, gush after gush of my own release splashing out over the bed.
“You have so much to give, sweetling,” Syleris murmured against the insides of my thighs. He licked the full length of my entrance, giving my clit a little twirl with his tongue, before cleaning off my legs with his mouth. By the time he finished, I was trembling again.
Garrick kissed me gently, easing me through the intensity. My hand was still around his cock. I started to stroke it, only to feel a much bigger, stronger hand cover mine.
“Let me.”
I was still shaking, but a little whimper of protest worked its way up my throat.
Syleris’ dark chuckle filled the air and kissed my skin. “We won’t forget you.”
He nudged Garrick back. I caught my Lifebind’s look of annoyed protest beneath his thick brows, but with his cock in Syleris’ hand, there wasn’t any outright argument. Garrick lay back against the bed. All of the pillows were on the floor already.
He was magnificent splayed out like this.
Every single muscle on his body bulged. Before him, I had not even realized a body could have so many muscles.
But knowing him, I’d learned that his physical strength paled in comparison to the strength of his warrior heart.
Garrick loved fiercely and without reservation.
He had taught me that was strength, not weakness.
I leaned down and brushed my lips over his. “I love you,” I breathed.
Garrick reached up, sliding his hand into my hair and pulling me back down. His kiss was gentle, but more insistent.
“Let me taste you,” he whispered.
I understood what he meant, a new surge of arousal gathering between my legs. But I was not sure that I could take it.
“You can.”