33 All of Me
He hadn’t known how it would feel to come home this time.
Antal’s last visit had ended in shouts, threats. He’d fled, the last of his family falling to pieces behind him, unsure if he’d ever return.
This time, he’d crossed the threshold with a dead aedari on his shoulders.
And everything felt different. His mother, there to welcome him.
His friends, laughing at his side. His father, simmered to tolerable distaste.
That part might never be fully mended. The tiles of the sitting room would never be clean of Razik’s blood.
Maybe this was good enough.
Anything was good enough, so long as he had Fionamara.
He carried her away like a prize, steps swaying as his focus drifted to more pressing matters—his hardening cock foremost among them.
And her, so maddeningly soft and warm in his arms. He kissed her.
She leaned into him, arms around his neck, her pleased hum fit to ruin.
As she teased her fingers through his hair, he tugged at her shirt, aching for bare skin, for every place he wanted to put his mouth.
Aedari blood heated his core, left his head full of softly swirling snowdrifts, but through the haze he knew one certainty: he wanted her.
An early morning, Avroz had said. Antal didn’t bother navigating to the Winter Plane, didn’t fully trust himself to manage the journey. He carried Fionamara into the back hallway, to his old room.
He stumbled on the threshold. Fuzzy thoughts, but the whole world felt marvelous, Fionamara’s snicker a song. He laid her on his bed. Fell upon her, his knees caging her hips, hands buried in the sweet embers of her hair. Merciless Void, Antal could devour every part of her. He had all night.
She stopped him with light fingers on his cheeks.
Her eyes were pools of Void, somehow slicing and soft as she gazed up at him. She lay on her back, at his mercy. Yet he stilled, awaiting her command.
“Are you sure?” she asked.
“Hm?” Antal’s hum was half confusion, half desperate need to have these clothes off her.
“Antal. You appear to be drunk. And I appear to be less drunk.” She softened, a debilitating blow, the brush of fingers across his lips making him shiver. “I’d never take advantage. Never anything you don’t want.”
Antal laughed at the absurdity. At the depth of this woman, the gentleness she masked behind her fangs and bristle.
“Fionamara.” He cupped her cheeks in return, pressing foreheads together. “I trust all of me with you, always. I want all of you. Always.”
She hummed, thumb tracing his jaw. “If you change your mind…”
She’d listen. She’d respect anything he asked. Antal knew.
“What do you want?” he breathed against her cheek.
Fionamara clicked her tongue. “Don’t be obtuse, daeyari. You know exactly how I feel once you start teasing that tongue—”
She gasped as he licked the length of her chin. A purr as he traced lower, settling a kiss to the hollow of her throat. She tasted like embers glowing against a Winter chill, salt and sweet dancing on his lips.
Undressing her was a litany. Antal’s people weren’t pious, had abandoned their religions millennia ago in favor of more tangible things—the surety of the Void, the legacy Veshri had left to them.
In these moments, though, he thought he might understand the surrender of falling on his knees.
The veneration of lifting her shirt off her shoulders.
The sanctity of black lace, soft and pliant as he unclasped the bindings from her breasts.
The wholeness of her beneath him, every curve laid bare, was a different kind of divinity.
“Have I told you how beautiful you are?” he asked against hot skin, his lips mapping the line of her collarbone. “Not enough. Never enough.”
“Tell me, then,” she said, desire roughing the words.
He took a breast in his mouth, soft enough to make him shudder. When he dragged his tongue across the peak, she arched into him, her fingers carving through his hair.
“You’re a vision.” He scraped a fang across her chest, drawing a low sound in her throat.
“When you fight, it’s like watching a tigress, a blaze of unstoppable flame.
” He drifted kisses down her ribs, a nip to the softest dip of her belly.
“It’s unseemly, the way I fall in love with you over and over again. ”
He set his tongue to the tattoos at her waist, tracing every flower across her stomach. She lifted her hips to him, easier to drag those inconvenient pants off her.
A soft bite inside her bared thigh, and she gasped. Harder, and she groaned, grasping his antlers. Antal wound his tongue down the crease of each leg, skirting the spot she wanted him to touch, devouring her need. Soft whimpers slipped out of her like pleas.
Antal had been floating before. He drowned now, submerged beneath the scent of her skin, the sounds off her lips, scarcely remembering to come up for air.
At last, he tasted her center. All of her replied, back arcing off the bed, fists tightening on his antlers.
A reward in itself, those panting sounds she made beneath the ministrations of his mouth.
Antal’s cock was painfully hard, begging to rub against her, aching for the release she offered. Not until his work was done.
Everything was a fight with her. She struggled, fingers knotting against the bed sheets, hips squirming as he worked his tongue over her.
Into her. A cry. A shudder. At last, she settled like a bridled mare, succumbing to the rhythm he set, hips rocking in tandem.
The breadth of Antal’s world consisted of her splayed thighs.
Until she broke. Fionamara fractured with a moan, clenched through her teeth like some bitter defeat, as if every sound she made wasn’t divine.
She bucked against him, still wild. Antal fought her down, tending to each spasm as she snarled, as she whimpered.
At last, she slackened, falling back against the bed in a pant.
One was never enough. Slowly, dutifully, Antal teased her with his tongue. Coaxed her with a press of energy-warmed fingers. He worked her into another moan, a fiercer string of pleas on her lips. Filthy, those lips. Downright treacherous with his name on them.
Once he’d finished her a second time, Antal granted a reprieve, settling back to rest on his heels. He breathed in cool air. Savored the taste of her on his mouth. The moonlit lines of his room settled clearer than before, the high of aedari blood wearing off.
He brushed knuckles across her sweat-damp skin, admiring every curve.
Fionamara lay in a lazy sprawl against the sheets. Hair splayed. Eyes glassy with content. She grinned as she reached for him.
“What would you like, my Lord Daeyari?” she asked, soft enough to shatter him.
Antal considered all the ways he could have her.
Then… all the ways she could have him. A deeper heat burrowed in his groin, a pleasure rarely satisfied. But he trusted her. Completely.
He took her hand. She obeyed, letting him lead her to the edge of the bed. Anticipation kindled in his chest as he pulled open a drawer.
Fionamara’s eyes widened at the contents.
“Antal, darling,” she breathed with wicked delight. “You’ve been holding out on me.”
Hardly. Antal’s collection of toys wasn’t as extensive as hers, nor as adventurous. The drawer displayed phalluses of various sizes and materials, from polished metal to softer plant synthetics, stored in cases to keep them clean.
“You’re sure?” Fionamara asked.
“Pick one,” Antal returned.
He lay on his stomach, tail swaying, enjoying the concentrated furrow on Fionamara’s brow as she perused her options. She pulled out one of the larger offerings—because of course she did. Made of smoothed elk antler—because of course she did. The tool affixed to straps she could wear at her waist.
Fionamara held her selection up for approval. Antal growled, an invitation.
Still, she hesitated. Soft fingers cupped his chin. “Are you sure?”
So soft at her center, this woman.
“Exquisitely sure.” He nipped her chin. Dropped to a taunt. “Do I need to show you how to use it?”
“Don’t insult me, Antlers.”
She shoved Antal onto his back, his head hanging over the edge of the bed, sparing the pillows from his antlers.
Her touch was whisper soft as she unfastened his shirt, cruel caresses as she traced circles down his chest. Down his abdomen.
When she unbuttoned his trousers, he groaned as his cock lifted free.
He was wretchedly hard, aching for her touch.
She denied him with a knowing smirk.
Her fingers ghosted down his thigh. From the drawer, she retrieved a vial of oil. Antal watched with bated breath as she dipped her fingers inside, retracting them with slow pageantry, allowing several drops of lubricant to slip off her nails and fall cool against his hip.
She slid slicked fingers down his abdomen.
Around the base of his cock.
Then pushed a finger into him.
Antal moaned, back arcing as his tail lashed the sheets. Fuck, it had been so long since he’d had this.
He wanted so much more from her.
Fionamara explored him gently. She worked a second finger in, plying him wider. Testing bolder strokes that sent a shudder up his spine.
Then three fingers. Merciless Void, he was hers so fully. His tail wrapped her leg, an anchor. A reassurance that this was everything he wanted. Antal lifted his hips, a plea for more.
He loved holding her down as she fought.
He loved the thrill of letting go, trusting himself to her without restraint.
He loved her, every piece. Whichever way they came together.
Fionamara donned the straps with ruthless efficiency. She oiled her implement, never breaking eye contact, tongue tracing her lip. Veshri’s teeth, she had done this before. The tease of the phallus against his ass left him breathless, bracing for…
Antal fractured as she pushed into him. So slow. So cautious.
Not all his partners had been, when he’d offered himself this way.
When Antal was younger, still trailing his father’s heels in the halls of the Daey Celva, a hungry apprentice with everything to prove, he’d sparred with many better-connected daeyari.
Just another way of collecting information.
They’d been consensual, but selfish, taking what they wanted from him.
Fionamara was just as vicious as any of those creatures. But underneath that, always a caring edge to her touch. With her, he felt safe.
“Ok?” she said lowly.
“Yes,” he breathed.
She moved in him. And he crumbled.
Antal tipped his head back, eyes closed, just… feeling her. Feeling full. Savoring the mix of ache and euphoria. His breaths shallowed, pressure building so agonizingly deep inside him. His own cock, hard and throbbing. He dug his claws into the sheets to steady himself.
“How do you like it?” Fionamara purred.
Antal gasped. Swallowed. “Slow,” he rasped.
“Slow?” She ran her hands over his hips, bracing another thrust. “Is this slow enough?”
“Perfect.” A moan. “Merciless Void, you’re fucking perfect.”
“And you’re such a good boy. On your back for me. Letting me fuck you.”
At last, she took his cock in her hand. Slow, merciless strokes, rubbing from base to tip. Harder. Twisting. A tortuous rhythm with her thrusts inside him. He growled, but there was no fight. Only surrender. He gave himself to her, letting the build consume him.
When he finished, he felt it everywhere.
He cried out, release ripping through him, hips bucking as his cock emptied into her hands. His legs shook with the intensity of it, each Plane-tilting spasm leaving him tattered and raw and hers, hers, hers.
Then in the aftermath, vulnerable.
He shuddered as he came down, that moment always feeling a little too exposed. That flicker of fear, that he’d bared himself so fully. But then, her hands were on him, cupping his cheek, splayed on his chest to help him settle. So soft. So safe.
This woman was his undoing. He’d perish at her hands a hundred times, and never relish it any less.
“Perfect,” he whispered.
Fionamara’s touch was gentle. Her smirk was smug in triumph.
They moved together through the motions of recovering, cleaning.
Then back to his bed. Antal pulled her against him, smothered in sheets, everything to make her feel as safe as she’d made him.
Fionamara nestled into his chest. Such a small, soft thing when he held her like this, measuring her drowsy breaths, savoring the sweet scent of her hair.
Overwhelming sometimes, that she was all his.
“Fierce as a tigress,” he whispered, pairing an affectionate nip to her cheek.
Fionamara hummed, her eyes catching dusk light through the windows.
“Still not quite,” she said of the pet name.
Antal had begun to suspect this game might be endless. He wasn’t sure he cared.
“My flame,” he purred, brushing fingers through her hair.
She hummed again. “It has potential.”
Antal held her. He breathed her in, lulled by the heat of bare skin against his. Unfathomable, the prospect of ever letting her go.
“How about… ezria?” he said.
She frowned. Of course. He’d not taught her the word in daeyari.
“Wife,” he said in seasonspeak.
Fionamara stilled. Her eyes were pools of Void. Her lips parted.
“Wife?” she mouthed like a secret, uncertainty in her quiet.
Antal wasn’t. He’d never been more certain of anything in his life.
“Fionamara, bond with me.” He kissed her temple. “Marry me.” Another, on her cheek. “Be my wife. My ezria.”
His mouth found hers, and he felt her lips curl a grin. She kissed him back, slow and commanding, fingers slipping into his hair. The shift of her hips against his front sent a fresh jolt through his cock, no matter what they’d just done.
She laughed.
“Marry you?” She sounded like she was tasting it, rolling it on her tongue. “You’re asking me now?”
Antal laughed with her, low and confiding in the dark. “What’s so funny?”
“You.” She kissed him again. “Silly beast. You can’t ask me these things when you’re like this.”
“Like what?”
“Drunk.”
Antal scoffed. “I’m not drunk.” Maybe a little. A floating sensation lingered in his head. Hard to tell if that was from aedari blood, or just her.
Fionamara cupped his cheeks, eyes bright and wicked. “Ask me again. Tomorrow. When you’re thinking straight.”
“I’ll ask you today.” Antal kissed her harder, dragging his tongue into her mouth. “Tomorrow.” He ran his teeth down her throat, relishing her moan. “I’ll ask you a thousand times, Fionamara. I’ll never stop wanting you.”
And then, neither of them had anything more to say. Antal had the taste of her in his mouth. Fionamara, hands urgently clawing his shoulders. He pushed her down against the bed, and he fucked her again, doomed by every piece of this woman.
Brought to life, each time she pleaded his name to the dark.