Epilogue
LYRA
A Promise Fulfilled
The restaurant is tucked into a side street that smells like citrus blossoms and spiced steam.
Dim lanterns hang from vine-draped archways, flickering with bio-luminescent gas that paints everything in golden hues.
Inside, the walls are carved from obsidian-flecked Xylothian stone, the tables ringed in translucent mineral that shifts color with the mood of the diners.
Ours has taken on a shimmering pink-gold.
“I swear,” I say around a mouthful of something buttery, savory, and possibly illegal, “if you’d told me you were hiding this place back when I was slogging through jungle slime and being hunted by Brill’s meatheads, I would’ve defected sooner.”
Orion grins, sipping something cool and sharp-smelling from a blue crystal tumbler. “You would’ve hated it if you weren’t starving and freshly un-traumatized.”
“I hate how much I love it,” I mutter, wiping my mouth with the cloth napkin. “I didn’t expect you to actually be good at this ‘romance’ thing.”
His green-gold eyes crinkle at the corners. “I’ve had good inspiration.”
“Who, me?”
“Obviously you,” he murmurs, leaning in. “And all those romance novels you kept around on the Aldrin.”
The mention of my ship sends a whisper of longing through me, and Orion catches it immediately.
“I was going to wait to tell you as a surprise later, but after Brill…well, with the coast relatively clear, Evie sent that Dreller mechanic, Ty, out to Ooneryx to pick it up. She’s taking it back to the Hephaestus to finish the repairs he started and it sounds like he’s going to help give it a thorough overhaul.
It’ll be ready for us to go grab in a few weeks, and then, who knows?
Wasn’t there mention of a sandy beach and a tentacled dreamboat earlier? ” he says with a laugh.
My heart stutters and my mouth drops open. “You—you’re having her fix up my ship?”
He blushes at my disbelief, and I’m ready to climb him like a tree.
“Yeah, I know it’s important to you,” he shrugs. “If you have particular opinions about any modifications, we can call her in the morning.”
Like. A. Tree.
“I…Orion. Thank you, really. I…” I trail off, trying not to let my emotions get the better of me.
He grins, flashing dimples that I want to lick right off his face, and stars. The way he looks at me—like I’m the center of his orbit—makes my heart knock around like it’s trying to escape. I clear my throat and glance away, not quite ready to sit in the full heat of it.
“I haven’t really done a lot of this ‘dating’ thing. It’s nice,” I offer awkwardly, oddly nervous.
The look he gives me is sin itself. “Would you be more comfortable if I approached you wearing skintight breeches and a billowy shirt?” he asks, a teasing lilt to his voice.
My cheeks burn redder than the Aldrin-136’s afterburners.
“You’re never going to let me live that down, are you?” I grumble.
“I don’t know,” he drawls, crossing his arms across his chest and leaning back to eye me speculatively. “Seeing Vega dressed up as a drunk-ass pirate was pretty unforgettable. And the poor guy is back to working in the café, waiting on some new contact to drop in and ruin his life again.”
I chuckle. “Poor guy. Too bad he didn’t let you keep that billowy shirt, though.”
“I don’t know if I’ll ever forgive you for that. But perhaps you could persuade me to forget it.”
“Hmm,” I laugh, tapping my chin. “I wonder how I could do that! I don’t suppose you have any suggestions?”
He leans forward, tracing circles on my wrist in a maddeningly erotic way.
“Oh,” he chuckles, and the low sound arrows straight to my clit. “I have plenty of suggestions. They’ll have to wait for after our first dessert, though.”
“First dessert?”
The green fire in his eyes is scorching, and I squeeze my legs together to fight the ache building between my them.
“The gnuberry pie here is some of the best on Xylothia. As to our second dessert…” He licks his lips, and I might actually combust. “We’ll have that a little later.”
Ever the portrait of grace and sophistication, I let out a choking squawk and flag down a waiter faster than Ada saying I-told-you-so.
When we leave, the twin moons are rising over the horizon, and I tuck my arm into his as we walk the quiet stone paths back to his place.
His apartment is on the fourth level of a curved habitat structure that spirals like a shell, and inside, it smells like him—moss and rain and something herbal I can’t name.
It’s small but clean, warm with wood tones and stone floors. There’s a pile of half-dismantled weapons on the table, a shelf stuffed with old history books and field journals, and one plush, oversized chair facing the long balcony window.
But what I notice first is the bathroom.
More specifically, the tub.
It’s enormous—sunken into the floor with smooth walls hewn from some sparkling white stone and lit from beneath with a soft amber glow. Steam curls off the surface of water that smells faintly of neralis oil and something sweet.
“Holy shit,” I whisper, turning in a slow circle. “You weren’t kidding.”
“Nope,” Orion says, already stripping off his shirt. “Come on. I told you—you deserve a real bath.”
I grin, not bothering to hide the flicker of arousal his bare chest sends through me. I let him help me out of my clothes, our fingers brushing too long on purpose, until I’m bare before him and he’s fully naked, his mating nodes glowing faintly along his thick erection.
He guides me down into the hot water with infinite care, his hands gentle but sure. The second my skin slips beneath the surface, my whole body sighs.
“Oh stars, I might never get out.”
He settles behind me, strong thighs bracketing my hips, chest to my back. I relax against him, letting my head fall onto his shoulder.
For a while, we just sit. His fingers trace lazy patterns on my arms, down my stomach, across the curve of my hip. The water glows and shimmers, catching his flickering synesfores pulse against my skin—faint green, purple, and white freckles like constellations.
“I never thought I’d be here,” I say quietly. “Alive. Let alone...this.”
“I always hoped you would be,” he replies, voice low. “But I never imagined I’d get to be the one beside you.”
My throat thickens. I turn in his arms, straddling him, and the water rocks gently around us. His eyes search mine, open and unguarded.
“I’ve never belonged anywhere,” I whisper. “Not really. But I think…maybe I do now.”
“You do,” he says, palms warm on my waist. “With me.”
When I kiss him, it’s soft and deep, heat simmering beneath every movement.
The kiss turns slow and molten, his hands rising to cradle my face as I sink against him, skin to skin.
I feel the heat of his mating nodes along his cock as I settle above him, his breath catching when I roll my hips just enough to press against him.
“Lyra,” he murmurs my name like a wish—a prayer. Like hope. “Are you sure?”
“More than sure,” I breathe. “I want to be yours.”
Something flickers in his expression—wonder, reverence, the tiniest edge of disbelief. Then he nods, cupping the back of my head and bringing our foreheads together.
“I fought it,” he says, voice low. “The mating instinct. I thought I was protecting myself—protecting you. I didn’t want to tie you to a life you hadn’t chosen.”
“And now?”
“Now…” He traces my lips with his fingers, leaving a trail of sweet-scented water in their wake. Our eyes meet—his shimmering with glowing green. “Now I see that you chose it anyway. Chose me.”
“I did.” I say, dropping kisses across the synesfores on his chest. “I do.”
His expression crumples a little—beautiful and raw, and I lean in to press my lips to his.
The kiss begins soft, hesitant—lips barely brushing. But when I exhale into it, when I open for him with a sound that’s all surrender, he deepens it with quiet desperation. Our mouths move together like we’re learning each other all over again—trading breaths, memories, promises.
His hands slide down my back, splayed wide, fingers tracing the notches of my spine, and I feel the sharp edge of his need tempered by control. Always control. Even now, he waits for me to lead.
So I do.
I shift in his lap, letting the heat between us grow. My body knows him already in fragments—the press of his chest, the tension in his thighs, the hard length of him that nudges between my legs under the water. But now I want all of him. Every inch. Every intention.
When I rock against him, he shudders.
He kisses me again—this time deeper, hungrier, his tongue sweeping into my mouth with a groan that curls straight through me.
I respond in kind, threading my fingers through his damp hair, pulling him closer until there’s no space between us.
The friction builds slowly—slick skin on skin beneath the surface of the water, the pressure of his nodes pressing lightly against my overheated pussy, his lips now on my throat, my shoulder, the hollow just above my heart.
“I want to remember this,” I say, breathless. “The first time we do this—all of this—as yours. As mine.”
He nods against my skin, kissing the spot above my pulse. “I won’t ever forget.”
I feel the pulses of his mating nodes begin to sync with my own racing heartbeat, the bond stirring between us, waking up like a second awareness. A tether—his tether. Not one that binds—but one that joins.
When he lifts me just slightly and lets me sink down onto him, slow and steady, the stretch of it fills me with something more than pleasure—something sacred. Our foreheads press together again, his breath stuttering out in a low, broken sound as my body opens to him fully.
It’s not frantic.
It’s not just need.
It’s everything.
His hands hold my hips like I’m something precious.
He thrusts shallowly, gently, building the rhythm as if our souls are trying to find their cadence.
The glowing water ripples around us, shadows dancing across the walls.
I clutch at his shoulders, moaning into his neck, overwhelmed by the dual sensation of physical fullness and emotional unraveling.
And when his nodes begin to swell, I feel myself spiraling with him.
The pressure as they fill me, fitting inside me like his body was designed to fit mine by some primal, artistic god—it’s perfect.
He growls low in his throat, his pace picking up in time with the heady thump thump of our hearts in sync.
His nodes press against that secret spot of pleasure deep within me, and my climax crests on a wave of aching need, crashing over me in shudders that echo through my whole being.
Orion’s name is a whisper on my lips, and then a cry, as he comes inside me, his arms locking around my back. We stay joined like that for long moments, shaking, panting, together in a way that goes far beyond bodies.
When the intensity begins to ease, he leans back just enough to look at me. His thumb brushes a tear from my cheek.
“You’re mine,” he says softly, reverently. “And I’m yours.”
I nod, too full to speak, and kiss him again—salt and steam and surrender.
Outside the bath, the world is quiet. But inside this moment, everything is alive.
THE END