Chapter Thirteen
Ekon
Never one for indecision, or for letting out his fears, Ekon found himself doing both, and that was all because he felt his mate’s desire to support him.
Encouraging him to take control. Had anyone ever done that before?
Not that he could ever remember. Fuck, it was shockingly liberating. He couldn’t quite catch his breath.
Mao wasn’t talkative. Or that was Ekon’s experience in the bunker, yet he’d expressed his frustration better than Ekon could when devastation at not finding his file swept the legs from under him.
Ekon’s ability to hold himself steady in a world of chaos he rarely understood with his obscured view of things.
Then his mate goes and puts his support there to catch him in a way that didn’t emasculate him.
It was pure strength offered for no reason other than Mao wanted to ease his pain.
The tears that came weren’t about the lack of finding his file.
No, they were about the conviction that Mao was there for him no matter what.
Those he had lived with had to a degree been “supportive,” just not like this.
Then he’d never been in this type of situation before and had no way of voicing how it made him feel inside—all tangled up.
He used that feeling and let it erupt—much like his animals when he shifted—out of the center of him.
What was inside didn’t struggle like some of his animals, it wanted to escape the confines of his skeleton.
His courage came from Mao who didn’t move from his side when all hell broke loose around them.
With the essence inside freed, Ekon could only watch as an observer as it created a vortex of power. Only it wasn’t a being as he’d feared. It was pure light magic. It pulsed much the same way a human’s pulse worked. It beat in time with his heart as it moved around the bunker… seeking.
Ekon closed his eyes, and his mouth dropped open as the magic used him as a vessel.
A magical vibration came up through his chest and out his mouth as his body arched as if in the throes of an orgasm.
His eyes flicked open at the whipping power caressing his skin like his mate had done just hours before.
Its touch electric. A whisper urging him on.
The release of pure energy when it came was just as orgasmic as the real thing.
He shuddered in violent pleasure, then his eyes focused once more, and where there had once been a wall was now a gap—a doorway to where the shadowy figure had lived.
“Holy shit… are you okay?” Mao’s husky voice penetrated through the residual magic buzzing around him.
Ekon sucked in a breath and exhaled slowly to allow his pulse to return to normal as the effects of the magic left him riding the orgasmic high.
He blinked repeatedly, his brain not computing how they’d missed the devastation in the bunker.
If he didn’t know better, he’d have said the place had been hit by a hurricane when he stood in the middle of all the destruction. Fuck, did I hurt my mate?
His eyes flew to Mao in panic.
No… no, you didn’t. But you seem to have unlocked our mating connection.
Sorry—
Don’t be. It is all part of what’s special about us.
Gentle hands cupped his stubbly jaw and took away the sting of the snap in Mao’s response. Fingers rubbed at the wetness gracing his cheeks as Mao’s dark eyes held concern. “Looks like you found where the fae was living from the smell coming from the room. Wanna go and see?”
He hesitated, unsure why until this other part of him whispered in his mind, you’ll find what you seek. “Did you hear that?”
“Yep, felt it too, like an electric current running from you to me.”
Ekon nodded warily. “Something like that. What’s inside me feels stronger, like it’s taking energy from something… not just me? Fuck, I’m not making sense, am I?” he muttered, stepping around Mao, forcing him to let go to head to the room suddenly impatient with himself.
“Not fully, but then it’s not every day you discover you hold a dynamite load of magic inside you.”
Mao’s chuckle was warm and held affection, and Ekon basked in it, tension ebbing from his shoulders as he stepped over piles of paper and broken shelves looking more like twigs.
Did I really do all this damage?
Yep.
Ekon stopped at the gap in the wall and looked back at Mao, checking once more to reassure himself Mao was unharmed. That’s something, I suppose!
More chuckles said that Mao had caught his thoughts, and Ekon’s lips twitched. This type of connection certainly had its benefits.
It most certainly does. Mao winked and slipped a supportive arm around Ekon’s waist as he glanced into what appeared to be a large, furnished cavern of sorts.
The major focus was a huge, sumptuous bed covered in fur.
A blue velvet couch sat opposite the bed with two oak tables, one at each end.
Both held open books. Countless shelves that looked handmade, housed thousands of books covering most of the wall space.
None of them disturbed like in the bunker.
“The magic didn’t touch anything in here.” Ekon lifted his arm and focused his magic much like he would an animal to seek what he was looking for. The place held small wall torches that flickered and flared as the magic inside him met that of the room’s previous occupant. The same, yet different.
The power was intoxicating; it came with the urge to strip and get on that bed and…
And?
Ekon’s skin heated with embarrassment at where his thoughts had headed, when he couldn’t say for sure if the arousal pulsing in his pants was because of his mate or the magic. He kept that to himself—he hoped.
“The magic in here is strong and feels decadent,” Mao stated, like it wasn’t an issue, as if reassuring him.
Ekon cast a relieved look at Mao who stalked to the nearest shelves, his long, lean fingers taping on the spines of the books, his gaze intent. “Not more files?”
Mao shook his head, the dark waves glowed in the flickering lights revealing highlights of auburn.
“These aren’t files…” he murmured distractedly appearing to read as he opened a book, getting Ekon to walk closer.
“They’re journals.” He flicked several pages, and there was a delicate script filling the pages.
“What was he journaling?” Ekon asked at the clutch in his belly feeling a disquiet coming from Mao.
Mao glanced in his direction the concern back clouding his beautiful eyes. “You tell me.”
He held up the journal and Ekon scanned the language his brain interpreting for him.
“The comings and goings of those who brought the files. Fuck,” Ekon scowled as he glanced at the many full shelves.
“It could take years to read through these! Why can’t I just click my damn fingers”—he snapped his fingers together with a decisive click—“and what I need that relates to me pops off the shelf and into my hand!” he demanded angrily. Because, really, fuck my life.
Mao’s eyes widened with alarm that hit Ekon in the solar plexus, at something behind him. Ekon’s animals all surged to protect as he swung around claws out ready to strike down the threat.
He blinked rapidly, his breath coming in short pants. There was no one there. No, that wasn’t quite right. There wasn’t someone, there was something—a book floating in the air as if held by invisible silk. “Fuck… did I do that?” If he had, then he had no damn clue how.
“I believe you might have.” Mao didn’t move his eyes off the book, staying right where he was, a tension radiating off him.
Ekon wasn’t faring much better, unsure how to take this new turn of events.
“Should I… grab it?” It sounded like a stupid question.
Okay, it was when the book was hanging there, when it hadn’t been there when he’d walked into the cavern.
He would have noticed, surely? Then with how the room felt to him, he couldn’t say for sure.
“Yeah, I don’t believe anything in here would harm you after what I witnessed in the bunker.” Mao came and stood next to him, laying a hand on his shoulder, squeezing. “We can do it together.”
Ekon gave him a grateful grin, but shook his head, his bangs falling over his right eye.
He shoved it back behind his ear, rolling his shoulders as if preparing for a boxing match.
“No, I think it’s meant to be me.” Let’s hope I’m right and not about to get my ass kicked by magic I don’t understand.
I’ll be right here, helping you kick its ass back to wherever it belongs.
There was that reassurance and support that cushioned Ekon’s heart in cotton candy. The sweetness so new, it gave him a toothache.
He walked over to where the book was and didn’t give himself time to second guess himself further, reaching to pluck it out of the air.
His fingers curled around the leather-bound covering, and he bowed back, chest thrusting to the ceiling with the power.
It didn’t caress this time, it punched and punched hard enough Ekon’s organ’s shifted inside him.
He gasped painfully, clinging to the book as rage came in a tidal wave.
It wasn’t alone. Grief. Soul-wrenching. The kind that changed a person swiftly followed on the second wave.
This was more powerful than the first. He couldn’t breathe.
Couldn’t move under the weight of it that held him in a tight embrace.
Then there was Mao reaching for him, freeing Ekon, holding him against the solid body. A woody scent surrounding him that was all his mate. “I’ve got you. Fuck, I can feel the grief like it’s my own,” he rasped in a strangled moan, both of them clinging to each other.
Ekon couldn’t see his features clearly with tears rolling unheeded down his cheeks from that very grief.
Since his arrival at the bunker, he’d suddenly become a damn crybaby.
Nothing would stop the hiccupping sobs he attempted to rein in.
“They stole my essence. They took a part of me, and I remained here, captured by my need to know why.” The words were forced from his throat, but it wasn’t him speaking. “You came from me.”
They both trembled as Mao held them… not just Ekon but the magic being too. “We’ll find all the answers. We will,” Mao pledged adamantly.
Who he was speaking to, Ekon wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter; he believed Mao though and so did the fae. Ekon recognized this when the grief lessened. The book wedged between them, did it have what they needed?
Ekon scrubbed at his cheeks with the back of one hand, staring at it. The feelings too fresh for him even to consider opening it—reading it.
“You don’t have to do it now.” Mao held him for a few seconds longer, brushing a soft kiss over his brow, the affection undoing Ekon. “You’ll know when you’re ready.”
Ekon wasn’t sure he would ever be ready to face another’s tragic suffering when he’d inflicted so much of his own. Was this my burden to bear for penance?
We can hold it together if it is. You are not alone in this.
Their gazes met and held for long seconds.
The depth of emotions running through Ekon this time were all his own.
He exhaled shakily and came forward until their lips were nearly touching, his eyes searching Mao’s.
For the first time, he acknowledged how much it truly meant to have a mate, and his heart opened like a sunflower catching the first rays of sun, blooming under the feelings coming from Mao.
Their noses touched, rubbing gently against each other’s.
Their cats surfacing, scenting each other before their lips met in a soft kiss that held affection.
The sweetness of it made Ekon’s eyes sting. Thank you for being you.
I don’t know how to be anything else.
They stayed like that for some time, kissing as if time no longer mattered. The heat simmered between them, only the flames were held at bay when this wasn’t about getting naked. This was all about allowing one man to hold another steady until he found his balance once more.
Sometime later, Ekon kissed the tip of Mao’s nose and gave him a shy smile, feeling his cheeks warm at the adoring look Mao wore. “I think it’s time to blow up some shit, don’t you?”
Mao’s eyes narrowed and a devil may care grin spread over his attractive features. “You bet your sexy ass it is!”