Chapter 13 Riven #2
“Creed mentioned some participants were willing and unwilling. I still…I don’t understand. I obviously know what unwilling means, but not in this sense. Like if they don’t want to be there, why are they? Is she kidnapping them and forcing them? Or?”
“In a sense, yes. Every female born or otherwise in the Abandon, who has a Domain under Seduction, has to work at Seductions for an undetermined time. To refuse that would mean being stripped of your power. Those who are pretty powerful and their abilities manifest in a more sexual way, have no issues with this. It’s those whose abilities are of the nonsexual sense that put up a fight. ”
“That’s fucking…”
“Disgusting? Yes, yes, it is and that is where the issue lies with me. I didn’t understand this until many, many years later. What the Goddess of Seduction neglected to tell poor, sweet, influential me was that harmonizing them and their powers wasn’t a good thing for everyone.
“My Harmony was stealing their will to keep fighting. It was subduing those who didn’t want to be there to the point they just lay there and took it.
While it was basically super charging those who wanted to be there.
I was amplifying and creating a never-ending, incredibly potent supply of sexual energy for not only them, but for her to feed on. ”
I breathe in through my nose, out through my mouth repeatedly to the tempo of Thayla’s heavy heartbeats. I’m practically panting, trying to keep up.
Her soul might not shiver in my chest like it does the others—yet—but her body tells me all I need to know. Her quiet sniffles, the vibrations beating beneath her surface.
She’s a fucking storm of emotions, ready and willing to destroy everything in her path.
For me.
“You keep up this sudden silent treatment and I’m going to start thinking you’re upset with me.”
“Never. I…fuck, I don’t know what to say or ask.
You’ve kept this from your brothers this whole time?
They have no clue what you were really doing?
And your father just allowed this? I mean, him pulling this shit now, I understand.
He’s an evil piece of shit, I guess always was, but you were six.
You all were just children. Where the hell were your mothers this whole time? Did he kill them?”
Errr. Not opening that jar of taurnshit.
“Couple things. First, my father washed his hands of me the second my Chaos came out. I became the disgrace he now calls me from that moment on. His and Derivius’s feud…
that’s a long story paved in blood and betrayal.
One I’m not getting into tonight as well.
Our mothers are a hard limit that we don’t speak on. ”
I grimace when she flinches against me.
“Are they alive?”
Does dead to us count as being alive?
I keep that question to myself.
“Unfortunately. Second, no, I haven’t verbally admitted that my Harmony can puncture and manipulate power to my brothers.
There’s no doubt they’ve pieced plenty of it together, just as I’ve done with certain things about them, but you know, eating dinner and sharing shit all openly has really never been our thing.
Plus, they don’t come swim with me in the hot spring.
“They know my Harmony does things to the body, emotions, and whatnot. Creed for sure has an idea of what’s really happening.
I don’t know how he’ll take it if or when he learns how much I influenced his over the years.
I still can, to all of them, and I’m sure that wouldn’t sit well with them.
How do you say, ‘Hey, by the way, in Seductions, my Harmony isn’t just making everyone feel happy-go-fucky.
I’m actually subduing their powers so they can be raped more easily. ’”
“Riven—”
“No, no. Don’t sugarcoat that. That’s exactly what’s happening. There’s no running from that truth.”
Everything within me locks up tighter than the chains that held me hostage. Her silence has me on the verge of losing it.
I took her words and promises in the hot spring to heart.
I was honest because I didn’t think she’d judge or be repulsed by me like I am of myself.
She exhales hard, and the whistle of wind spilling from her lips causes my lungs to empty as well.
“There isn’t any running from it. You’ll never be able to run from something you can’t fully control. I need one more answer.”
I hold in my sigh. I’ve got my Chaos guarding my tender little heart right now and the more we keep talking, the more that armor keeps chipping away.
This is something I have to do piece by piece.
To tear that whole shield down in one go could very well unleash a type of Chaos the realm has yet to see.
Instead of giving her permission to carry on with my words, I roll over and adjust us until we’re nose to nose.
“I want to hear you say it. Tell me that’s why you hate and won’t accept your Harmony.”
My finger traces her cheekbone down to her serious, pursed lips. I tap them twice to make them loosen up.
“To say I hate my Harmony is cleaner, more straightforward. Simpler. But nothing is truly simple in our lives, little burden.”
I thoroughly enjoy the kiss she lays against the pad of my finger. I use that same digit to wipe away the lone, reckless tear she let escape her misty eyes. My hand splays across her lower back and I drag her closer to me.
“In my Harmony’s pursuit of protecting me, it steals away the protections of others. My consent in the way my power was used was stripped from me and in return what does it do? The same thing to many others. You can’t really ever accept that.”
“If you ever find yourself in that situation again—which you won’t. I won’t allow it—but if you do, your Harmony taking over is going to happen again. By not accepting it, you’re never going to control it.”
“Bad angel. Using Amick’s teachings against me.” I smirk at her very serious stare. “No more for tonight. You wanted to hear this from me, and I wanted to give you what I could. The more we keep talking about this, the less of me you’re going to find.”
“Promise me something then.”
I slide my hand from her back and stick my pinky out.
“How official do you want this promise?”
She fights her smile by biting her lip, but she locks her finger with mine.
“As official as you’re willing to make it.”
“Go on then.”
“Promise me if you grow to hate me or resent me, you’ll tell me. Openly and honestly, but delicately.”
My poor heart nearly falls out of my chest at her breath of a request.
“Hate you…” I hum as I lean forward a small bit.
Just enough that my lips taste a sample of hers.
The soft little sound that she couldn’t silence hits me square in my chest. Her pinky tightens against mine with the desire to deepen what I’m giving her. I pull back and bring our tangled digits to my lips.
“How could I hate a creation made so perfectly? The only way to give her a flaw was to soul bind her to four imperfect creatures.”
“I’m full of flaws and you, your brothers, you four are far from imperfect. You’re all perfect to me.”
Perfect to her…
She’s perfect for us. All of us, I’ll begrudgingly admit.
Let me not be selfish.
“Chaos, Seduction, Creation, Accord, Consequence, Boundaries, or Obliteration. I don’t care which comes out of you, Thayla. You’ll never use them against me or my brothers the way they have.”
I untwine our pinkies and lay her hand to my heart. My fingers travel from between her eyebrows, down her nose, lips, till they gently grip her throat. From there, I slide my palm down her body until I can pull her shirt up and rest it against her bare skin.
“May the Veilatara stomp me to death if I ever grow an ounce of hatred in my heart for you.”
“Riven…”
Her husky, low voice sends a shiver down my spine.
“Sharing space with my soul is about as official as I can make my promise, little burden.”
When Verlet denied me access to the hot spring to escape, I became overwhelmed with the need to be close to the one being who can ease the night terrors effortlessly.
She doesn’t even know she does that for me.
I don’t want her to ever think I seek her company for my own relief, so I’ve never expressed it. Probably never will.
I came in here tonight, hoping she’d let me hang out with her. I’m not an idiot. I’m just ignoring the fact everyone’s mad at me for the stupidity that caused me to get taken.
The sensation that says that decision was inevitable still overwhelms me, so I stand by my choice.
Besides the point.
I was going to be happy with her allowing me to hang out in her hot spring where I could smell her. I didn’t expect a talk, not a serious one, nor did I expect to declare what I just did, but it’s out there now.
Consuming my thoughts.
A forbidden craving has taken hold of me, and it will be satisfied.
She has no clue about the amount of time I spend thinking about her and her sliver of soul that saves me from myself daily.
Her eyes widen like she’s only now realizing how far that will take things. What that really means for her and me.
I hesitate only for a second.
Maybe for me. Maybe for her. Her unwavering permission.
I’m not sure.
Her hand slides from my heart to my neck and we move as one. I tug her so close to me, she has to hike her leg over my hip. A hiss tries but fails to tear our mouths apart. I suck that unexpected fucker down.
There was no warning my dick would harden so fast the second it touched her. I mean, yeah, sure, it’s stuck between our stomachs, not her thighs, but regardless…
For the fucking creators. Her bare skin against mine is a sensation I’m already obsessed with.
My hand glides to about an inch or so above of where I really want it. I can’t, though, not yet.
Her hips shift on their own against me, and I swallow down my groan.
“Thayla…”
“Yes. To whatever you’re about to ask, the answer is yes.”
I stifle a snort and pinch her chin, forcing her to open her lids and look at me.
“If I start, I’m not stopping.”
“I don’t want you to stop.”
“I want your soul.”