Behind the Waterfall #2
My shoulders drop. Sophia is alive. Sophia is hiding.
That's enough for now. But how I got here? The whole scheme? That’s not over, and we’re not safe until whoever did this pays for it.
I hurry to explain. “Rythar—they brought more than your forged voice. They projected the High Lord. I knew there was something off. In your command center, when he appeared with Vorak, I felt him before the light finished forming. But this time, I felt nothing. They said it was a recording. I thought that was why I felt nothing, but I don’t know.
Maybe it was the High Lord muting everything. ”
Rythar breathes hard, muscles twitching in his cheek from whatever he’s holding back. “Either the High Lord moved against me,” he says slowly, “or someone forged his hologram. Someone who can affect the connections between us. I will make them pay.”
A sob escapes me. His grip loosens as I reach for him. I wrap my arms around his neck. I don't care that he's angry. I need him closer than this.
Rythar shoves his thigh between my legs. He’s pinning me in place, but it’s not in anger. His eyes burn, black and red and gold and wild. "You will never be away from me again," he says, and his voice cracks on the last word.
I shut my eyes and bury my face in his neck. “You hid me away, and they attacked to draw me out. You can’t keep me away forever.” My voice breaks.
He growls again as he pulls my arms above my head, holding them there with one hand.
The other finds my chin, firm but careful, tilting my face up to his.
Energy runs down my arms and through my body.
Rythar looks at his arms and mine, eyes flashing wider, as if he can see it. His eyes flick to mine.
“I am your mate,” he says.
“My mate can’t be my jailer,” I say, almost choking out the sentence as I hold back another sob. I’m so relieved to see him, so relieved that he is ok, but we still have so much to face, and I can’t do it if I’m shut away. More tears run down my face.
For a heartbeat, his face does something I've seen only once before—the day I refused him in front of his warriors. Rejection. Fury riding in right behind it. His grip on my wrists tightens.
His eyes bore into mine. Then he releases my wrists and steps back.
"All my life, I have led warriors," he says slowly. "Command works on warriors. I give orders. Build cages and walls." His jaw flexes. "You are not one of my warriors. You are my bride. And I have led you like a soldier and guarded you like a treasure. Both have nearly killed you."
"Rythar—"
"I trusted you with less than I trust Drenz.
" The words come out raw. "You felt the lie in the High Lord’s image with what the Stone gifted you.
You felt the wrongness in our connection.
Drenz could not have sensed it. And you made the antivenom.
Your brilliance with new techniques on a new world saved my life, and the life of my warrior.
" His eyes drop to the bride mark on my finger.
"The Stone did not give the biome lords each a female to keep.
It gave us something else. Equals. How, I do not know.
I was taught that females are weak. And your body is weak.
" His eyes lift back to mine. "But strip the jungle from me, and I am flesh and bone.
You are flesh and bone—and the jungle has begun to pour into you through me.
Perhaps that is what the Stone built you for.
Not to stand behind me. To stand with me. "
He drags a hand down his face, and when it drops, the wrathful warlord is gone. What's left is just him.
“What do you want me to do?” I ask, voice breaking.
"I know how to please you. How to care for your body. How to hold you. But I do not know how to be held by you. I am asking you to teach me."
The mate bond is roaring in my blood, but that’s not why I move closer to him. It’s because he’s taken down the wall.
"I am your mate," he says, and for the first time it doesn't sound like a claim. It sounds like a surrender.
The mate bond burns, pulling me to him. Every nerve is awake, screaming for him.
I let it run through me. I grip Rythar’s biceps, and he has me pressed against the wall again, wrists pinned again.
But this time, it feels different. Whatever is running through me right now, this is the best I’ve ever felt in my life.
I want to drown in it. I squirm upward, press my mouth to his, kiss him deeply, give him a bite.
Rythar takes it. Gives it back.
He lets go of my wrists, drops me down, and backs away an inch. I reach up, dig my fingers into his hair, tugging him down to me. I want to crawl into his bones.
He leans against me for a moment. “You’re sharing my energy again,” he breathes.
“Don’t stop,” I plead.
He tears my clothes off like they’re paper, the fabric shredding in his grip.
His hands are everywhere, my throat, my waist, my ass.
Then his mouth is everywhere as he shreds his own clothes.
He lifts me, wraps my legs around his hips, and pushes me back against the stone as his hard cock pushes against my core.
I gasp, and he bites my neck, his teeth dragging across my skin.
“This won’t be gentle,” he pants. “Not this time. The jungle is inside me right now, and it wants you rough. If you don’t want this, say it now. Go.” His voice is ragged, almost tortured with the strain of holding back.
I don’t want him to hold back. I’m liquid in his arms. I answer with a moan, rubbing my soaked center against his waist as my legs wrap tighter around him.
Being away from him, then together again, then feeling his connection to the jungle has made my need for him a hundred times stronger.
Everything sings through me, demanding that I take him in.
He growls, a sound so deep I feel it more than hear it.
He grinds his cock against me again, hard and leaking, the head already wet and ridged with the alien texture that will send jolts of pleasure through me with every stroke.
He lowers me slightly, and the heat of his root against my core makes me buck against him.