Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Lothar
The monster slammed its now singed and blackened foot down, narrowly missing us as we hurtled toward who the fuck knew what, but whatever it was, I would not let it hurt Roxy.
Wrapping my arms around her bent knees, I lifted mine, cocooning her smaller frame with my own as we flew through the gateway, leaving the oppressive darkness and its gore-loving monster behind, and burst into blinding light.
I braced, tightening every muscle a moment before we crashed down on what felt like wood. We rolled, crashing against a wall with force. Still surrounded by me, Roxy cursed and turned her head in an effort to see where we were, to see if there was danger, and I did the same.
We appeared to be on our own. For now, anyway.
A bird squawked overhead, and I realized the ground beneath us was rocking slowly. I breathed deep and got a lungful of sea air. “We’re on a ship.”
“What?” Roxy pulled away from me, and I forced myself not to drag her back.
She bounded to her feet, a knife already in her blood- and gore-covered hand.
I listened intently for anything or anyone that might be nearby. The ship creaked, swaying, an enormous black sail puffed out catching the breeze, sailing us toward the setting sun. “Do you know what realm we’re in?”
Roxy had her back to me, and I watched as she lifted her face to the sky and breathed in the sea air. “We’re on the Night Sea,” she said. “There are demons close by, can you feel them?”
I focused, and she was right. I could definitely sense them. “They feel different.”
She pointed across the ocean. “That way is the Night Realm. Home of the goddess Nox, the personification of night, and also Death and Somnus’s mother.
” She pointed toward the horizon, where we were headed.
Black clouds had gathered in the distance, and forked lightning flashed through the sky. “We’re sailing toward the Outer Realm.”
I’d been alive a very long time, but I’d never traveled so far from home.
I’d also never doubted my instincts before, but I was struggling with that now.
So far from Hell, from my brothers and, fuck, so far from the beast—the part of me that had always steered me in the right direction.
I couldn’t trust what my gut was telling me anymore.
I had this sensation of being untethered, as if the beast, who until recently had been one with me since my creation, was drifting farther and farther from me with every day that passed.
“Lothar?”
I shook off the unease. “I’ve heard of it, but I don’t know anything about it.” She stood to my side, the wind whipping her thick, wavy black hair around her face.
“It borders Limbo and should be a kind of no-man’s-land between Death’s realm and Nox’s, but she’s been stealing Outer Realm territory for herself over the centuries.
There were demons and other creatures living there a short time ago, before Death and his mother finally had it out.
Most of the demons are rogue, escapees from Hell, and I’m not sure how many are still there, or how much sway either of us will have over them once we reach land. ”
I rubbed my forehead, and my fingers slid in the blood covering me. “So Drake just decided to send us back home?”
She gripped the railing, staring out at the ocean. “I’m not sure. Nothing is ever simple with Drake.”
“Let’s search the ship.” The ship’s wheel held steady, the vessel appeared to be steering itself. “There wasn’t a welcoming committee, and this ship doesn’t seem to need a crew, but we might not be alone.”
She nodded and finally turned to me. “You’re right, let’s—”
I snarled, my fucking heart stopping in my chest. She was injured, badly. I could see it even through all the blood and other shit covering her.
“I’ll be fine,” she said not missing my reaction. She strode across the deck and opened the door to the cabin under the helm. “Once we’ve searched the ship, I’ll take care of it.”
I wanted to snatch her off her feet and force her to let me tend her, but the stubborn look on her face told me that would be a serious mistake, which meant we needed to conduct this search as fast as possible because the beast went wild seeing Roxy like that.
Over and over, he was slamming into my subconscious and writhing under my skin, trying to force me to shift.
He wanted to lick her wounds and heal her, right the fuck now.
Striding ahead of her, I stormed the small cabin we’d walked into, opening and closing cupboards and looking under anything big enough to hide someone.
Roxy headed for the steep stairs that led below.
I got in front of her again and went down first. She huffed but let me have my way.
Thank fuck, because the beast was becoming more insistent.
There were several smaller cabins below as well as the captain’s quarters, and after a thorough search we were positive all of them were empty.
We made our way to the galley next, where a fire in the stove blazed and a huge pot of water bubbled away on top and another with some kind of rich-smelling stew, but still no sign of life.
“Drake must be worried. He even provided dinner.”
“No fucking way will I be eating that,” I muttered.
We hit the cargo hold, but that was just as empty as the rest of the ship.
“Looks like it’s just us,” Roxy said. “I’ve been reaching out, and I can’t feel anyone else here.”
Neither could I. Good. I grabbed her hand and led her back up the stairs and down the narrow hall into the captain’s quarters.
“What are you doing?” she asked, her big blue eyes narrowed.
“Strip, I’ll get water.” Not waiting for a reply, I strode back to the galley.
Quickly filling two buckets with boiling water, I strode back and tipped them into the small tub sitting on one side of the room, then strode back and did the same again.
Then I switched to cold, scooping it from a barrel of fresh water, to get the temperature just right.
Roxy just stood there, not taking off her clothes.
“Strip, Roxy. Now. You’re injured and covered in blood. ”
“I can tend my own wounds, Lothar,” she said. “You go and keep watch and I’ll—”
“No.” That was unacceptable to me, and to the beast. At least we agreed on that. I strode over and jerked her jacket down her arms.
“Lothar,” she snapped. “Stop it.”
The beast snarled, taking hold of my vocal cords for the second time. “We will tend you, female.” I grabbed at my throat, clamping my jaw tight. It was my voice, but it was the beast’s words.
Her gaze snapped up to me, wide, alarmed. “We? Lothar, what’s going on?”
I ground my teeth, refusing to let him do it again.
It should be impossible. The beast wasn’t supposed to have autonomy.
We were one being, of one mind, yet the animal in me was fracturing, splitting me in fucking two.
I shook my head instead and tugged at the bottom of her shirt, trying to fucking plead with her, with just a look, because I needed this and the beast wasn’t going to let me leave her here on her own.
Whatever it was, she saw it written on my face and relented, but there was a wary expression in her eyes.
She finished stripping off, revealing the extent of her raw, angry skin that had been burned by the monster’s toxic saliva.
I snarled, and she got into the tub. There was soap and a washcloth beside it, and I handed them to her, unable to look away, to take one fucking step back until I saw her washing that filth off her skin.
She did so without argument, cleaning off every bit of muck, then finally rinsed the blood from her hair before silently lifting the soap and cloth toward me.
That’s when I realized my flesh was burning as well.
I’d been so focused on Roxy, I hadn’t even noticed.
Tugging off my gore-soaked shirt, I dipped the cloth in the bath water, lathered it with soap, then quickly ran it over my face, neck, chest, and shoulders.
The relief was almost instant, as was the warm buzz over my skin, telling me my healing had kicked in and was already working to mend the damage.
Roxy’s, on the other hand, would take longer. The saliva had soaked her thoroughly and had burned deeper. Tossing the cloth and soap in the tub, I reached into the water.
She grabbed my biceps. “I can get out on my own.”
The beast’s constant need to growl and snarl had me tightening my vocal cords and clamping my mouth closed again. I had no idea what would come out of my mouth, but with the shit the beast was thinking, I knew I didn’t want to give him free rein to talk through me like I was his fucking puppet.
Ignoring her protest, I hauled her out of the water and carried her to the bed.
She sat silently watching me as I quickly stripped and washed as much blood and other shit from me as fast as I could.
It wasn’t the best job, but it would do.
All I could think about was looking after Roxy, of tending to her wounds.
When I was sure I wouldn’t get her dirty again, I advanced on her, clearing my throat as I got on the bed with her.
“Lothar? What are you doing?”
I wrestled control back from the beast. “Need to lick you,” I said. It was all I could manage to get out.
Her cheeks flushed and she blinked up at me, and I knew what she was thinking.
I didn’t have time to correct her, though, and as much as I’d fucking love to go down on her and get another taste of her pussy, healing her was the driving force inside me right then.
I leaned over her, and her arms came around me a moment before I dragged my tongue over her shoulder and up the side of her throat, right over the top of her burns.
My eyes drifted closed at the taste of her blood on my tongue and the sweet warmth of her arms around me.
She squirmed, and I licked again, gently, using my healing saliva to start work on the deepest wounds.
“You’re healing me?” she said.
I nodded, and the beast growled his approval. Was that disappointment I heard in her voice? I hoped so because I planned on having her writhing against my tongue again very soon.
“You know I have accelerated healing as well, right?” she said in a soft, sweet voice that lifted goose bumps across my shoulders and tingled down my spine.
Maybe so, but not as fast as me. There were several bruises on her skin and it stressed the beast out to see them.
She tried to push me off, but the beast growled louder, and she sighed and gave up, giving me what I wanted. Good. She squirmed again and giggled.
“It’s warm and it tingles,” she rasped, then gasped and squirmed some more. “I can feel it working.”
My chest expanded with relief and pleasure that I could do this for her, that she was experiencing a feeling that was good enough that it made her laugh, and my rogue beast agreed with me wholeheartedly.
In these moments with Roxy, when I gave in to the beast’s instincts, even if they confused me, he and I slipped back into alignment, and we were in perfect harmony.
It was intoxicating and filled me with a sense of rightness.
I wasn’t sure if the feeling actually came from being with Roxy, or that I was again one with my beast.
The former confused me. This need to be close to the little handmaid made no sense. And the latter made me feel like a parasite. Honestly, I didn’t understand what I was thinking or feeling, only that I needed to do this, to care for her, to tend her wounds.
She’d stopped squirming and laughing, but she wasn’t trying to push me away either.
“I think I’m okay now,” she said in a soft voice that made my skin tingle.
But I couldn’t stop, not yet, not until I’d licked every bit of red, raw skin, not until I was sure I hadn’t missed a spot.
I lifted her, so she was sitting up, and again she let me.
This way I could get better access to her shoulders and upper back.
Gathering up her thick hair, I lifted it out of the way and got back to work.
That’s when I spotted the vicious scar at her side. It was red and inflamed and had to be painful. “What happened here? Why does this look so fresh?”
“It’s nothing. The mud in Ferine irritated it, that’s all.” She tried to pull away, and I pushed her back against the mattress and carefully dragged my tongue over it.
“Lothar…you don’t have to—”
I swiped over it again, and she gasped softly, her fingers sliding into my hair.
This scar, I didn’t like it. I wanted it gone. I wanted anything that caused her pain, now or in the past, fucking gone. When I licked the ragged scar for the last time, and I was certain I had tended to every single wound on her body, the knot in my gut finally loosened.
“You’ll be okay now. You’re okay.” The words swimming around my head tumbled from my mouth. I wasn’t sure if I was reassuring her, myself, or the beast when I’d uttered that, but again a wave of relief washed over me.
She stared up at me, a look in her eyes I didn’t understand, while her hand touched my back, her smooth warm skin sliding over mine in a way that was gentle, soothing. “I’m okay, Lothar. Thank you.”
The beast wanted to nuzzle, and I didn’t resist. I let him have control and went with my animal instincts.
A repetitive thumping sound rolled from my chest as I rubbed my face against her throat, as I branded her with my scent.
That was very important, covering her with my scent again after washing it off.
I needed everyone who came near her to smell my scent on her.
The beast was blissed out and taking me along for the ride.
“Will you get on your hands and knees for me, female?” The beast growled, talking through me again, but I was totally on board with the request. I felt fucking dizzy with lust for her.
I couldn’t think straight, my mind wholly focused on mounting the curvy little female beneath me.
I kissed her throat, her jaw. “Will you?” I asked against her skin, but this time it was all me.
She made a soft, desperate sound that had me lowering my body on top of hers, forcing her to fall back on the mattress.
Hooking a hand under one of her legs, I spread her wide so I could grind my hard cock against the soft silkiness between her strong thighs.
I kissed her cheek, the corner of her mouth. “Please, kitten.”
Roxy stilled beneath me, sucking in a shaky breath. “Lothar—”
A light flashed so bright that when I spun toward it I had to lift my hand to shield my eyes. The closet. The light began to fade instantly, until all that remained was a soft glow from around the door.
The flash of light had come from inside.
I snarled, bounding off the bed.
Roxy followed. “I think we’ve got company.”