Chapter 62 Tethered
TETHERED
RAE
Ash loved me.
Too often, people on the edge of death overestimated their emotions. They think they’ll never get the chance to speak their heart again, so they blow their feelings out of proportion, mistaking desperation for truth.
A part of me believed Ash mistook the affection he’d developed in our short time together for something more.
He hadn’t taken it back when the opportunity arose, but with the danger gone, I couldn’t ignore the lingering doubt—especially knowing how I felt about him.
But he loved me.
With nothing pressuring him, he’d said it again.
We had all the time we wanted to let something grow between us until Cornaith demanded I come to Elyrdin, so Ash didn’t have to say it. But he did.
When he withdrew from the kiss, I surged forward, cupped the back of his head, and took control of our kiss.
He groaned, and I tightened my fingers in his long hair.
I rose to my knees, never breaking our kiss as I grabbed the hem of his shirt and worked it up his body.
He chuckled against my lips, breaking the kiss long enough to pull his shirt over his head, revealing cut muscles and a dusting of chest hair I stroked with my fingers.
I yanked my tank top off and tossed it aside, rising on my knees to kiss him again.
He stopped me with his hands on my shoulders. “Wait a second.”
I frowned, not wanting words. I wanted him. Needed him.
He smiled at my expression. “Patience, beautiful.” He urged me to sit back on my heels, sliding his hands up the sides of my neck. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”
“Is something wrong?”
He shook his head. “Not at all.”
“Then can’t it wait?”
He barked a laugh, and I slapped his arm. “No. It can’t.”
I huffed and looked off the side of the bed for my top. I didn’t want to sit there with my breasts hanging out while we talked.
“Wait.” He grasped my arm. “It’s not bad.”
I looked up at him, waiting for him to spill it before my anxiety kicked in.
He rubbed the side of his neck, swallowing hard. “I told you before that we weren’t bound yet. That we hadn’t done the things needed to seal our mate bond and soul tether.”
I remembered he’d said we needed to exchange bodily fluids, and he needed to be in his alternate form. Was he hinting at what I thought he was?
He rubbed his hands together, looking at the bed. I’d never seen him this nervous before.
I reached out and took his hands in mine. “Are you saying you want to complete it now?”
His throat worked with a rough swallow. “If you want that. We can wait if you’d like.”
“Ash,” I said in a tone that both chastised and pleaded. “What do you want? I’ll be honest with you if you’re honest with me.”
He licked his lips and squeezed my hands. “I want nothing more than to bind you to me. I would give everything I have to bind myself to you forever.”
I stared at the faint tremor in his big hands as he clutched mine.
Knowing such a giant man trembled because he feared what I’d say…
He didn’t have to tell me he feared the outcome of our talk. I smelled it in the burnt cinnamon surrounding him.
“There are ways to sever our bond if you don’t want it,” he whispered when I took too long to speak.
“I want it!”
His eyes widened at my outburst.
I slapped my hand over my mouth, peering over my shoulder, listening for the bedroom door across the hall. When it seemed like Cyn wasn’t going to come in and raise hell, I turned back to Ash and whispered, “I want it.”
I needed him to know that ending this was out of the question for me.
“I love you, Ash.” I pulled his hand to my chest and placed it over my heart. “I don’t get all this, but it doesn’t matter. I’m coming to Elyrdin, and it’s obvious there’s more than magic between us.”
His eyes lifted from our joined hands to my chest.
“Why would I throw this opportunity away? Before those triplets showed up, I thought I’d never see you again when y’all left. I wanted you to go home, but it still hurt to let you go.”
He grabbed me around the waist and pulled me into his lap, wrapping his arms around me.
I sank into his warmth, listening to his heart pounding in my ear.
“Do you remember what I said it takes to seal our tether?”
I nodded. “Our bodily fluids and your alternate form.”
“Life-giving fluids, yeah.”
I’d forgotten that distinction. Now that he said it, I remembered he’d said cum and blood. I’d summed it up to bodily fluids, but I guessed spit wouldn’t work. I’d kissed both Ash and Cyn and wasn’t bound to them—though they weren’t in their alternate forms.
“I’ve never seen your alternate form,” I mumbled. “Can I?”
He leaned back to see my face. “You sure about this?”
“I’m starting to think you don’t trust me much,” I teased, giving his shoulder a shove.
“I trust you as much as I do my brothers.”
The bold, raw emotion of his statement sank deep and warmed my heart.
He eased me off his lap and stood up from the bed.
I’d seen Cyn in his alternate form plenty of times, and Ezra once—well, twice, if I counted the time I’d been delirious, but I didn’t remember much. But from the way Ash looked at me, you’d think I’d never seen another Shyrlivi in their alternate form.
He stood rigid, shoulders rising and falling with each tight breath.
“Ash,” I said, keeping my voice gentle and measured. “I’m not afraid of you.”
He smoothed his hand over his braids on the side of his head and breathed a laugh, tension falling away. “I know.” He shook his head. “It’s you I’m afraid of.”
My mouth popped open.
“Yeah. It’s stupid, I know.”
“No, it’s not. But I don’t understand why you’d be afraid of me. You’re the one transforming.” I crawled to the edge of the bed and sat down, reaching for his hand. “You don’t have to, you know.”
“I’m doing this. But…” His hand tightened around mine. “Promise you’ll tell me if I scare you during everything. You’ve seen Cyn and Ezra, but you’ve never been vulnerable like you will be while we seal our bond—when I feed on your blood.”
I didn’t remind him that Ezra had bitten me and taken blood when I needed venom removed from my body. I hadn’t been fully present that day. I didn’t know whether I would feel fear in a lucid state or not.
“I promise I’ll stop you if I’m afraid. But Ash, you’ll know without me saying anything. You said you’d smell it if my emotions are strong enough.”
He released my hand and stepped back.
The air shimmered around him, rippling and blurring like a heat haze over concrete in the middle of summer. When it cleared, I sucked in a breath.
Ash’s hands and forearms resembled Cyn’s and Ezra’s with blackened skin extending to the elbows and trailing into tendrils that blotted out his tattoos.
He didn’t have any of Ezra’s extra markings on his neck or chest—markings I now understood represented his Void subspecies.
Ash’s high cheekbones looked sharper than before, almost taking on the same cut-from-marble look Cyn had naturally. Two ridges on each side of his forehead pointed inward toward the space between his eyebrows, giving him a menacing appearance.
From his Viking-style hair, a pair of black, ridged horns extended up and curled down. Instead of curling back or inward like a ram’s, they curled out to the sides. I imagined him using those sharp points to defend against attacks from the side.
With his hairstyle, the pointed ears added to an ethereal warrior appearance.
His lips parted, exposing incisors and canine teeth extended into sharp paired fangs.
“Say something,” he said, his deep voice lower than before.
I shook off the awestruck feeling I had. “You look… wow. Yeah. You look hot.”
His laughter sounded almost like a purr.
“Can I touch you?”
“You never have to ask.”
I reached for him as he stepped forward, sliding my hands up his abs to his chest. I licked my lips as I looked up into his black eyes.
While I couldn’t see his green irises anymore, his scent and facial features told me enough without his eyes revealing his feelings.
The hardness pressing against my stomach didn’t hurt either.
I slid my hands up to the back of his neck and pulled him down to me, kissing him softly at first, deepening the kiss only when he relaxed.
His tongue teased my lips, and I parted them for him. Even with four sharp fangs, he managed not to nick my tongue as he kissed me with passion.
His arm banded around my back, and he pressed forward, placing a knee between my legs as I fell back on the bed. His body cloaked mine. With his hands braced on each side of my head, he bent to curl his tongue around my hardened nipple.
I panted, squirming beneath him as he tugged on my other nipple while flicking my piercing in his mouth with his tongue. When his fangs grazed the sensitive skin around my nipple, I whimpered in need.
I wanted him to bite my breast.
As if he’d heard my thoughts, he looked up at me, dragging his fangs across my skin again.
“Please,” I panted.
His fangs pierced my skin, drawing a hitched cry from me as pain morphed into pleasure. The flat of his tongue chased the sting and deepened the sweet sensation.
“It’s true,” he rasped, dragging his tongue across my nipple before looking up at me. “Your blood tastes like candy.”
I bent my knees so he could position himself between my legs and press himself against the ache between my thighs, right where I wanted him most. I dropped my head back with a moan.
I didn’t want to wait anymore.
I reached for the waistband of his pants, but he stopped me, laying a hand on mine.
“What’s wrong?”
He glanced down at my hand. “There’s something else you should know.”
“I’m not afraid, Ash.”
“I know.” He smiled. “But in this form, we’re… bigger. I need you to tell me if it hurts.”
My eyes widened. He’d left out that little detail when we talked about the differences between Shyrlivi and humans.
“I promise I’ll tell you.”
When he moved his hand away, I curled my fingers under his waistband, tugging his pants down to his knees. He pushed them the rest of the way, kicking them aside.
He wasn’t lying.