Iona
He opens the chamber door in half his armor.
Blood covers the black plate. Most of it is not his. The cut above his shoulder is.
He stops when he sees me.
I am standing beside the bath in a plain gray robe I have never worn to court. The fire is high. Hot water steams in the copper tub. Clean cloths and salve wait on the table.
His gaze moves from the water to my face.
“The wall,” he says. His voice is rough from shouting. “You used my name.”
“Spoken alone, it is only your name.”
“Only you could have made it more. The court knows that. They will not repeat it.” His gaze fixes on me. “For one breath, I hoped you would add the summons.”
“I was not choosing the bond from a battlefield.”
“I know.”
“Sit down.”
“Iona—”
“Sit.”
The old blood hears the command before the king decides whether to obey.
He sits on the bench.
The wood creaks beneath him.
I begin with the buckles at his throat.
His hands close over mine.
“Tell me first.”
“No. You are bleeding on the floor.”
“It is not serious.”
“It is on my floor.”
“This is my chamber.”
“Not tonight.”
For one moment he looks startled.
Then his hands release mine.
I remove the armor piece by piece.
Breastplate. Shoulder guard. Bracers. The leather beneath. Each piece lands on the rug with a dull weight.
The man beneath is bruised from ribs to hip. One cut crosses his upper arm. Another opens the skin above his shoulder where the lance found the gap.
I clean that one first.
He holds still while I wash blood from the wound.
His claws slide out when the cloth presses too hard.
“Sorry.”
“Do not apologize.”
“Did that hurt?”
“Yes.”
“I am still apologizing.”
His mouth almost moves.
I rinse the cloth.
The water clouds pink.
“You went down,” I say.
His body tightens.
“For four heartbeats I could not see you.”
“I heard you.”
“I know.”
“The whole pass heard you.”
“Good.”
He looks up at me.
I clean the cut again. Slower.
“I thought you were dead.”
“I was not.”
“That is not the point.”
“What is?”
I put the cloth aside.
My hands are shaking now. They did not shake on the wall.
“For four heartbeats, I thought you were gone.”
He does not move.
“After that, I knew.”
I kneel between his knees and take his face in both hands.
“I chose the wall while the road was still open. That was my political choice.”
His breath stops.
“I saw you fight. I saw you kill Osk. I saw what you became when that man put a knife at my throat.”
The corners of his mouth tighten around his fangs.
“None of it changed my answer.”
“Iona.”
“I am tired of your blood on the training-yard stones. I am tired of watching your jaw hurt while you pretend it does not.”
I put my thumb against the base of one fang.
He shudders.
“I chose the wall because I was useful. I choose you because I want you.”
His hands close around my wrists. Not pulling them away. Holding on.
“Say exactly what you mean.”
“I mean I choose you.”
The room goes still.
“You,” I say. “The part that waited. The part that killed for the wall and still stopped for one word from me.” My voice breaks. “I want the rest too. I want the bond. Your bite. I want to wake and know you are there.”
His eyes are black now.
I lean close enough that my mouth almost touches his.
“Torgan.”
His whole body locks.
“Come here.”
“I give you the bite. Freely. I mean it. I choose you now, and I will choose you again when the venom clears.”
For one heartbeat he does nothing.
Then he stands so fast the bench falls backward.
His mouth takes mine.
He does not become careless because the rite is spoken. He angles the kiss around the fangs even while his whole body shakes. His lips bruise mine. His tongue takes. One fang cuts his own lower lip when he moves too quickly, and I taste iron.
His hands lift me from the floor.
I wrap my legs around his waist.
He carries me to the furs and comes down over me. The gray robe tears under his claws from collar to hem. The points never touch skin.
Cold air reaches me.
His mouth follows.
He smells every mark from the hunt. Shoulder. Breast. Hip. Thigh. His nose drags over each bruise before his tongue does.
“These,” he says against the crescent above my breast. “You wore them on my wall.”
“Yes.”
“For men who came to kill me.”
“For everyone.”
He turns his jaw and fits the old mark between the points. His back teeth close and renew it.
Pain flashes.
Heat floods after.
I grip both horns.
He growls into my breast.
“Harder.”
His bite tightens.
The mark will be dark tomorrow.
Good.
He moves down my body without speaking again. Mouth on my stomach. Tongue over the bite at my hip. Claws spreading my thighs while the flat sides press warm against my skin.
He lowers his face between my legs and breathes in.
The sound that leaves him is raw.
“My mate.”
“Not yet.”
His eyes lift.
“Finish it.”
He does.
He sets his mouth at a hard slant, both points clear of the flesh he tastes. His tongue opens me with one long stroke, then presses hard against my clit.
His name breaks out of me as I pull on his horns.
The reaction tears through him. His claws sink into the furs beside my thighs. His mouth seals around me, lower lip and tongue doing the work while the fang points remain visible above.
He puts two fingers inside me.
Then three.
I am sore from the hunt and bruised from the attack. He feels the resistance and slows without asking. Works the muscles open. Uses his tongue until the ache becomes heat.
“More,” I say.
His fingers curl.
The first climax hits fast. My hips lift from the furs. His forearm pins me safely while my body clenches around his hand.
He keeps going.
I try to close my legs.
His palms catch my thighs. The claws curve around them without touching.
“No,” I gasp.
He stops.
Looks up.
I am shaking too hard to breathe properly.
“Continue.”
The old voice rolls through me.
“Good.”
He returns to me before the first tremors end.
The second builds on top of the first. Tongue, fingers, the roughness of his jaw, his scent thick in the hot room. I push at his head and pull him closer in the same breath.
He knows the difference because he watches, not because my body has given him permission.
He works me until I come again with both hands locked around the bases of his horns and his name breaking apart in my mouth.
When he rises, his face is wet from me.
Both fangs are bare.
His cock is hard against his stomach, heavy and flushed dark. The broad crown shines with thick slickness. The raised ring beneath it is pronounced. The twin ridges along the underside stand hard beneath the skin. At the root, the muscular flare has already begun to swell.
I reach for him.
He catches my hand.
“Not yet.”
“You have waited long enough.”
“I have waited a hundred years. I can wait until you are ready.”
“I am ready.”
“For me.” His hand slides between my legs, gathering the wetness there. “Not only the rite.”
I take his wrist and guide his slick fingers over his cock.
“Then prepare me.”
His eyes close for one second.
He works three fingers inside me again, slowly. He spreads them, presses deep, and circles my clit until the muscles loosen around the stretch.
Oil waits beside the bed. He works it over me, then strokes more along his whole length until both of us are slick enough for what comes next.
When I can take the width of his hand without pain, he withdraws and moves over me.
The size of him blocks the fire. Horns. Shoulders. Fangs. Blood-washed scars. Claws buried in the furs beside my head.
Serathi nursery tales give monsters hunger and women terror. None ever described this: his whole body shaking because I said yes.
He positions himself against me.
“Still yours?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“Still chosen?”
“Yes.”
He presses in.
The flare stretches me. The ring catches. He rocks shallowly until my body opens around him.
When the head slips inside, I gasp.
He stops.
“Continue.”
The raised band comes next. The two ridges drag through me, firm and unmistakable. He moves in by inches until the shaft fills what his hand prepared.
The swelling at his base presses broad and hard at my entrance.
He does not force the last of himself in.
He waits.
I wrap one leg high around his back and pull.
His hips meet mine.
The fullness is enormous.
Neither of us speaks.
He stays there, chest heaving, jaw clenched, claws sunk into the furs.
I lift my hips.
“Move.”
He pulls back slowly.
The ring catches at my entrance. The underside scrapes deep.
The first thrust is controlled.
The second harder.
By the fourth, the restraint begins to fail.
His mouth drops to my shoulder. Not the throat. The old mark. His back teeth hold it while his hips drive into me.
I grip his shoulders and take every stroke.
He fills me on the inward drive. His shape makes the retreat almost as intense as the thrust. His base swells harder with every movement, thickening where our bodies meet.
“More.”
His hand closes in my hair and turns my head.
My throat lies open.
He freezes.
The two fangs hover above the side of my neck.
He does not choose the easiest place. He moves his hand beneath my head and turns me farther, exposing the thick muscle above my collarbone and behind the main pulse line.
His thumb presses lightly beside the artery, checking the path.
His thumb checks the artery twice.
His body remains inside me. The swelling grows thicker, but not fully. Not until the venom.
Even now, he waits.
I touch his cheek.
“Now.”
His eyes search mine.
“Torgan. Now.”
He thrusts deep and holds.
His mouth seals to my neck.
Both fangs enter.
The pain is not clean or small.
It is two sharp points driving deep through skin and muscle. My body tries to recoil. His hand supports my head. His other arm locks beneath my hips, keeping me from tearing myself on him.
I cry out.
He does not move his jaw.
The fangs remain set.
Then the glands high in his jaw clench.
The first pulse of venom enters.
Heat pours from the bite in a violent line. Down my neck. Across my chest. Into my stomach and lower, where it contracts every muscle around his cock.
He roars against my throat.
The flare at his base expands fully.