Chapter 16
Sixteen
Ifound Visarous in the Academy’s temple, muttering sweet nothings to the spirits. It was a place of solace for him, just as my early morning walks and the battlefield had often been for me.
‘I need you,’ I said, pulling him from his trance-like state. He sat at the dais, head bowed in his usual white flowing robes.
‘Need, never want,’ he commented, before standing up from the dais he had been kneeling at. ‘What can I do for you, my Queen?’ he sneered, as though my title burned his tongue as he spoke it.
‘I need the Spirit Caster right now. I need you to look into soul bonding for Skin Seepers. Any accounts you can find of it happening in the royal bloodline. I need to know how it worked, how it felt and whether it could be broken.’ His eyes widened, and his nostrils flared.
Jealousy. I had seen it for the first time just the other night when he watched me dance with Demir.
‘Why?’ he gritted through his teeth.
‘Remember your place, Visarous. I ask the questions, you obey. You do not get to question me.’
‘I have earned the right to ask. Do you not see me losing this battle within myself? I tried for so long to see you as nothing more than my queen, but I can’t.
I can’t lie to myself anymore. I need you the way I need air.
I want you—by the gods, I want you in mind, spirit and body.
You are everything. At some point, you stole a piece of me, and I haven’t been able to find it while merely standing by your side.
Perhaps I’ll find it again deep inside you.
’ He smiled a devilish grin, replacing his earnestness as he stepped closer.
‘Do what I asked,’ I said, stepping away from him.
‘I don’t need to. I already have. You think I didn’t look this up sooner in the hopes that you were my soul bonded one, or that perhaps I could make you mine.
I’m not proud of it. But I thought it would give me the excuse I needed to throw away all self-control and pursue you sooner.
I know the answers to every question you have, but first, I have a few questions of my own and you will answer them,’ he said.
‘The other night before the ball when I felt you drip in arousal for me, did you want me?’
He was playing with fire, but I could see he was on the edge. I could force his hand, but the quickest way was to concede just slightly—dangle a carrot and have him keel over. I nodded.
He took a step towards me. ‘Every time we slept together in the past, did you want me, or would anyone have sufficed?’
‘You,’ I breathed. It was the truth, but I didn’t want him because of any feeling; it was because he was familiar, a place where I felt comfortable and almost whole—but not quite—for a few brief moments.
I had tried to sleep with others, but there was always something missing.
I wanted Visarous because he wanted all of me in a way that others didn’t, they had only wanted a taste of my power. It was never truly about him.
He took another step towards me, closing the distance between us, wrapping his hand around my hip while his other thumb stroked my bottom lip. His lips met the nape of my neck as he grazed his teeth over the surface of my skin. Drawing his lips to my ear, he breathed the next question slowly.
‘Now, do you want me?’
My core clenched as his teeth grazed my earlobe; he tilted my chin towards him, his piercing blue eyes hungry.
‘Visarous,’ I breathed, reaching out to stop him, but the sound of his name on my lips snapped any restraint within him as his lips crashed into mine.
His tongue found mine as I parted my lips, consuming each other in a ravenous dance.
He dropped a hand between my thighs, trailing higher and higher until I could feel his fingers stroking and teasing me through the thinnest barrier of clothing.
I gripped his shoulder as my body shuddered with pleasure.
Both of his hands grabbed my legs and hoisted me up, wrapping my legs around him he walked to the wall and slammed me hard against it.
Pinning me in the air as he moved his hips between my legs, I could feel the hard shape of him screaming for me, wanting me.
Wanting to be inside me, and in that moment, I wanted him inside me.
The escape the physical afforded my mind.
I started pulling at his belt as he let out a devious laugh at how quickly I had folded to my desires, to him and his body. Visarous bit my lower lip as he pulled his belt free and unbuttoned his pants. I went to undo my own, but he stopped me and set me back on my feet.
‘Uh-uh, Skylar, you are not getting what you want this time. Today is about what I want,’ he said as he pulled out the length of his member. It was hard and dripping with need. I could almost feel it pulsing against the wall.
He gripped the back of my head and pulled me down onto my knees.
I knew what he wanted. It’s not something I had ever given to him.
I had never, in all our times together, ceded any control or power—not really—and I definitely had never knelt for him.
Our relationship had been about serving me, not his own wants and needs, but he had made it clear he could no longer accept that.
Perhaps because I was running from the reality of Cain’s words, I decided to oblige.
I needed as much distance as possible from Demir, and maybe this one act would damage that inescapable bond.
Maybe my submission to another would prove I could never submit to my enemy.
I opened my mouth and enveloped him, drawing him in deeply.
His fingers tangled through my hair as he let out a soft moan and gripped the wall to steady himself.
He was warm, smooth, and hard in my mouth. I relished the taste.
His muscles tensed with every lick and suck.
I had long refused this thinking it was a loss of control but in this moment I realised I had complete and utter control over how his body reacted and what it did.
I took him to the edge, then eased off, watching the desperation in his eyes—a crescendo that never peaked.
‘Fuck Skylar, don’t do this to me,’ he said as I trailed the tip of my tongue over the tip of his length. Gently, I grazed my teeth over it. His body convulsed in pleasure.
‘Beg,’ I said, an order and a challenge.
‘Please, Sky, please—oh gods, please. Finish me, I can’t breathe from how much I want you, need you, need me inside of you. God, you drive me fucking crazy. Please!’
With that, my mouth widened and took in the length of him until he hit the back of my throat.
I moved quickly, my tongue stroking his length, the wetness pooling until I felt his whole-body tense, his breath stopped and a warmth spread inside my mouth.
It was thick and smooth but something in me rejected it.
I spat it on the floor in front of me, refusing to swallow and claim him in that way.
He dropped to his knees and kissed me. It was an intimate, vulnerable kiss. Not the rapid push and pull we normally engaged in. This conveyed his tenderness towards me and something about it made my skin crawl.
‘Satisfied?’ I asked.
He smiled. ‘Never, not with you. I’ll always want more, Sky. More than what you can give me.’ A pained look met my gaze.
‘If it comforts you to know, I have not found my soul bonded one. I simply wanted to know more as Cain had come across some research in the libraries. He spoke of the Water Whisperers and Morgadians but thought you might know something he didn’t about our people from your research at the temples,’ I said.
Believing the excuse I had given him for my curiosity, he told me what he knew.
‘I did come across something from a single scroll during the rebuild of the first temple, and no other texts substantiate it, but it said that unlike us Skin Seepers and Fae, it was common for the dragons of old to find their soul bonded mate and be with them for eternity. The scroll says that soul bonding occurs when two people, who are two halves of a whole, meet one another and share one soul. It is primal; it is ancient magic bestowed by the dragons and is unshakeable. There is nothing in this world that can create it or break it. It transcends all known magic. Those of the royal bloodline who descend from the first dragons, like yourself, do not feel a primal pull; instead, it is described as a warmth felt in their presence and a coldness in their absence emulating the comfort of the eternal flame. Like a dragon's fire, keeping you warm but turning cold when they are away to show you the wrongness of being apart. Once someone of your bloodline finds their soul bonded, the flame is known to bestow the ability to read their thoughts but not other gifts; however, this gift apparently doesn’t extend to those who aren’t Skin Seepers, making it a one way connection.
Only one leader ever bonded outside of the Skin Seepers, and that was more than two hundred years ago. ’
I paled, feeling sick to my stomach. Not only was I Demir’s soul bonded, but he was mine. My body began to shake. Visarous, thinking I was cold, pulled me up to my feet and ushered me to our room. I barely registered the hall or the faces of those we passed.
Once we were back in our room, I ran for the bathroom the instant I could and vomited all over the sink.
I held on to the edges of the copper and stared at myself in the mirror.
No, no, no! How could this be happening?
Why had the spirits and dragons of old played such a sick joke on me?
Why must every step of my life be filled with difficulties?