28. Lynn
— ? —
Lynn
The forest swallows us whole.
Milo leads me deeper into the trees, his hand wrapped around mine like an anchor. The moonlight filters through the canopy in silver ribbons, and somewhere far behind us, I can hear drums.
A heartbeat. The pack’s heartbeat.
“You’re shaking,” he says.
“I’m nervous.”
“I know.” He squeezes my fingers. “I can feel it.”
“You can feel it?”
“Not yet, not fully.” He glances back at me, and his eyes catch the moonlight, flashing gold.
“That’s creepy.”
“That’s love.”
I laugh, a shaky, breathless thing, and stumble over a root. He catches me without missing a step, pulling me against his chest for a moment before setting me right again.
“Careful. The ground’s uneven here.”
“You could carry me.”
“I could.” His lips quirk. “But then you’d miss the anticipation.”
“I have plenty of anticipation. I’m drowning in anticipation.”
“Good.” He pulls me forward again. “Almost there.”
The trees thin ahead. The moonlight brightens. And then-
Oh.
The clearing opens before us like a secret.
The air is heavy with the scent of wildflowers and earth and something older, something sacred, thick enough to taste.
Milo turns to face me.
“This is where my father brought my mother,” he says quietly. “Twenty-eight years ago. Under a moon just like this one.”
“Milo-”
“I used to come here as a child. I’d sit in the grass and pretend I could still feel him.” His voice catches. “I haven’t been back since he died.”
I reach for him.
He lets me pull him close, my hands on his chest, his forehead dropping to mine.
“I’m here now,” I whisper. “We’re here now.”
“I know.” He breathes in, breathes out. “That’s why I chose this place. Because I want him here too. For this.”
The drums grow louder. Closer. Then stop.
Silence.
“They’re at the treeline,” Milo says. “Keeping vigil. They won’t enter the clearing - that’s sacred, just for us - but they’ll witness what they can. The light. The blessing.”
“What do we do?”
“We make our vows.” He pulls back just enough to look at me. “In the old language. The goddess’s tongue.”
“I don’t speak the old language.”
“You don’t have to.” He takes my hands, positions them over his heart. “Just repeat what I say. The meaning will find you.”
He begins to speak.
The words are unlike anything I’ve heard, older than Latin, older than Greek, sounds that seem to resonate in my bones rather than my ears. They roll through the clearing like thunder, and the moonlight moves, swirling around us in response.
“Kai’veth mor’asha,” Milo says. “Tu’rem sol’ani, tu’rem kal’eni.”
I repeat the words. They taste like honey and starlight.
“Sol’teri’am ven’draku. Mor’asha ven’draku. An’theri ven’draku.”
The moonlight pulses.
The air thickens with something vast and inevitable, gathering weight with every word.
“Keth’ani sol’ani,” Milo finishes, his voice shaking. “My heart is your heart. My soul is your soul. My life is your life, from this moon until the last.”
“My heart is your heart,” I echo. “My soul is your soul. My life is your life, from this moon until the last.”
The moonlight flares.
For one blinding moment, I can see nothing but silver. It wraps around us, through us, binding us in light.
And then Milo is kissing me.
His hands cradle my face like I’m the one holy thing left in the world, and when he pulls back, his eyes are pure gold.
“Lynn,” he breathes. “I need you.”
“I’m right here.”
“I need all of you.” His hands slide down my shoulders, finding the fastenings of my dress. “Right here. Under the moon. Where she can witness.”
“Then take all of me.”
His fingers tremble as he undoes the clasps. The white fabric pools at my feet like water, and I’m standing bare before him in the moonlight, shaking and sure.
“God,” he whispers. “God, Lynn.”
“Your turn.”
He strips his shirt over his head. The bandage on his arm gleams white against his skin, and I trace my fingers over it, over him, mapping the planes of his chest, the ridges of his stomach, the trail of dark hair disappearing beneath his waistband.
“More,” I order.
He obeys.
When we’re both bare, he pulls me down onto the soft grass. The moonlight bathes us in silver, and the earth is cool beneath my back, and Milo is everywhere, his hands, his mouth, his weight pressing me into the ground.
“You’re so fucking beautiful,” he murmurs against my throat. “Do you know that? Do you have any idea what you do to me?”
“Tell me.”
“You destroy me.” He kisses down my collarbone, my sternum, the curve of my breast. “Every time I look at you, I come undone. Every time you laugh, every time you argue with me, every time you look at me like I’m worth a damn-”
“You are worth a damn.”
“I’m worth you.” He takes my nipple in his mouth, and I arch off the grass. “That’s what matters. That’s the only thing that’s ever mattered.”
His hand slides between my thighs.
I’m already soaked, have been since he started speaking in that ancient tongue, and when his fingers find me, I moan so loud that birds scatter from the nearby trees.
“There she is,” he breathes. “There’s my girl. So wet for me. So ready.”
“Always.”
“Always?” He presses two fingers inside me, curling them just right. “Even when you wanted to kill me?”
“Especially then.”
He laughs, a dark, delighted sound, and adds a third finger.
“You’re going to take more tonight,” he warns. “More than before. The ritual - the goddess-”
“I can take it.”
“I know you can.” He pumps his fingers slowly, stretching me. “That’s what makes you so fucking perfect. You can take everything I give you and still ask for more.”
“Then give me more.”
He withdraws his fingers.
I whimper at the loss.
“Patience,” he murmurs, positioning himself between my thighs. “We have all night.”
But there’s no patience left in either of us. The moon is overhead and the vows are spoken and the bond is pulling, demanding completion.
He enters me in one long stroke.
The sound that tears from my throat isn’t human. It’s raw and desperate and hungry, and Milo swallows it with his mouth, kissing me deep as he bottoms out inside me.
“That’s it,” he groans against my lips. “Take me. Every inch. Show the whole moon who you belong to.”
He starts to move.
The rhythm is slow at first, reverent, almost, each thrust measured and deep. The moonlight swirls around us in time with his movements, and I can feel something building, something beyond simple pleasure.
“Faster,” I beg.
“Not yet.”
“Milo-”
“Trust me.” He shifts angles, hitting something inside me that makes my vision white out. “Let me worship you first.”
He does.
He worships every inch of me. His mouth finds my neck, my jaw, the sensitive spot behind my ear. His hands map my ribs, my hips, the curve of my waist. And through it all, he moves inside me with a patience that borders on cruelty.
“Please,” I sob. “Please, I need-”
“I know what you need.”
He picks up the pace.
Harder now. Faster. The wet sound of our bodies fills the clearing, drowning out the distant drums. Milo pins my wrists above my head, holding me in place as he pounds into me, and I wrap my legs around his waist and hold on for dear life.
“You feel so fucking good,” he groans. “Perfect. Made for me, Lynn. You were made to take me.”
“Yes-”
“Say it again.”
“I was made for you-”
“Again-”
“Made for you, made for you, only for you-”
He slams deep, and I break.
The orgasm tears through me and I scream his name up at the moon, clenching around him so hard he curses, both of us past anything careful now.
But he doesn’t stop.
He keeps moving, chasing his own release, and I can feel something changing, feel him growing thicker, harder, pressing against the entrance of my womb with an insistence that makes me gasp.
“Lynn.” His voice is wrecked. “The knot - it’s-”
“I feel it.”
“It’s bigger than-” He shudders. “The goddess. She’s - it’s more than usual. More than I expected-”
I cup his face in my hands.
“I can take it.”
“It’s going to stretch you so full-”
“Good.”
His control snaps.
The knot swells.
I’ve felt this before, but this is different. This is massive. Impossible. The pressure builds and builds until I’m convinced I can’t take any more, until I’m gasping and clawing at his back and-
It pops inside.
I scream.
Milo’s whole body shakes. He buries himself to the hilt, the knot locking us together, and collapses against me with a sound that might be a sob.
“Lynn-”
“I’ve got you.”
“Fuck - the way you clench around me-”
“I’ve got you.”
The knot pulses. He spills inside me, hot and endless, and the sensation triggers another orgasm, gentler this time, waves of pleasure rolling through my body as we cling to each other.
His forehead presses against mine.
Our breath mingles.
Our hearts beat in sync.
“Lynn,” he whispers, voice shaking apart. “There’s something I need to tell you.”
“Now?”
“It has to be now.” He pulls back just enough to meet my eyes. “While we’re locked together. While you can feel what I feel.”
And suddenly, I can.
It floods into me all at once. Emotion that isn’t mine, pouring through some channel I didn’t know existed.
“We’re mates,” Milo says. “Fated. The goddess didn’t pick a random name from a raffle. She picked my other half.”
I stare at him.
“The pull I felt when I walked into that classroom - that wasn’t coincidence. That was destiny. The universe telling me that I’d found the other piece of my soul.” His eyes are wet. “You’re my mate, Lynn. You always were. From the moment you were born, you were mine.”
“You-” My voice cracks. “You’ve known this for a month?”
“I didn’t want to pressure you-”
“A MONTH?”
“I was terrified!” He laughs, or maybe cries. “I was so fucking terrified that if I told you, you’d run. That it would be too much. That you’d think I was crazy-”
“You are crazy.” I smack his shoulder. “You absolute idiot. You let me think I was just some random girl-”
“You’re the furthest thing from random-”
“A MONTH, Milo!”
“I’m sorry-”