Chapter 35 Clara
CLARA
The first wave is broken. Bodies lie scattered across the frost-crusted ridge, the metallic stink of blood thick in the air.
Gideon's pack has held the line, but the council's elite are regrouping below.
He finds me near the ritual pyre, still glowing faintly with residual Ward power, my chestnut hair matted with sweat and ash, amber eyes fierce and unbowed.
Without a word he scoops me up. Bridal but possessive, one arm under my knees, the other locked around my back.
And carries me through the pines to the old hunter's cabin half a mile back.
I don't protest; my arms loop around his neck, fingers digging into the base of his skull like I'm anchoring myself to him.
"Your hands are shaking," I murmur against his throat, feeling the tremor that runs through his powerful frame.
"Adrenaline," he growls, but we both know it's more than that. The mate bond pulls tighter after violence, demanding reassurance that we're both alive, both whole.
Inside, the single room is dim. Fire already dying down in the stone hearth, low flames crackling.
Gideon sets me on my feet near the rough table, then turns to strip his armor.
Blood has crusted across the dark tactical plates.
He unbuckles methodically, letting pieces fall with heavy thuds, then draws his knives and begins wiping them clean with a rag, movements precise despite the tremor in his hands.
I spread my grandmother's ritual notes across the table, murmuring incantations under my breath, tracing sigil patterns in the air that flare gold for a heartbeat before fading. The quiet between us is heavy, charged.
"You realize what you did out there?" Gideon's voice cuts through the silence as he sets down a cleaned blade.
"Saved your stubborn pack from getting slaughtered?"
"You bound several council warlocks simultaneously." He turns to face me, steel-gray eyes intense. "That ritual was designed for one target at a time."
I glance up from the journal pages, golden sigils still flickering faintly across my fingertips. "Well, nobody told my magic about the limitations."
"Clara." His voice drops to that low rumble that makes my pulse quicken. "Do you understand what that means?"
"That I'm getting better at this?"
He crosses to the table in two strides, bracing his hands on either side of me, caging me against the rough wood. "It means you're more powerful than any Ward witch in recorded history. And every supernatural faction in North America just witnessed it."
The firelight dances across his scarred features, highlighting the tension in his jaw. Blood still streaks his forearms where claws found gaps in his armor, and something primal in me responds to the evidence of his violence, his protection.
"Good," I breathe, meeting his gaze without flinching. "Let them all see what happens when they threaten what's mine."
His pupils dilate, the wolf stirring behind his human facade. "What's yours?"
"You. This pack. This life we're building." My fingers trace the fresh scratches on his chest. "Anyone who wants to take that from me can face the consequences."
"You're still doing it," I say, voice low but edged. "Looking at tomorrow like it's your funeral pyre and I'm just supposed to mourn prettily afterward."
Gideon's hand stills on the blade. He sets it down, turns slowly. I'm already stepping out of my boots, shedding the torn sweater, revealing the lean athletic lines of my body marked with fresh bruises and the faint golden tracery of old sigils that never quite fade anymore.
"We're mated, Gideon. Your mark is on my neck. Stop acting like the coming fight is yours to die in alone."
The admission rips out of him, rough as gravel. "I finally let myself have you. Let the bond take root. And now every second I'm terrified I'll watch you bleed out because I wasn't fast enough, strong enough."
His voice cracks on the last word; silver flares in his steel-gray eyes, wolf so close the air vibrates with it. I close the distance in three strides, grab the front of his blood-streaked shirt, and yank him down into a kiss that's all teeth and fury and love.
"Then stop trying to carry it alone," I growl against his mouth. "We face it together or we don't face it at all."
He responds like I've lit a fuse. His hands tangle in my hair, pulling my head back to expose the curve of my throat where his mark sits permanent and proud. His tongue traces the scar, and I arch against him, feeling the familiar heat bloom between my legs.
"You have no idea what you do to me," he murmurs against my skin, voice rough with need and desperation.
"Show me."
His hands drop to my waist, lifting me onto the table in one smooth motion. Journal pages scatter, but I don't care. Golden sigils flicker across my skin where he touches me, magic responding to the mate bond like kindling to flame.
"Every time you use that power," he breathes, fingers tracing the glowing marks along my ribs, "every time you bind someone with that ritual, I feel it through the bond. It's like watching you wield lightning."
"Is that your way of saying it turns you on?"
His laugh is dark, possessive. "Everything about you turns me on. Your stubborn mouth, your fearless eyes, the way you refuse to back down even when you should."
I hook my legs around his waist, pulling him closer. "Good thing you like difficult women."
"I like you," he corrects, hands sliding up to cup my face. "Only you. Always you."
Clothes vanish in a frenzy. My jeans hit the floor with a thud; Gideon’s pants follow, his belt clattering like dropped weapons. The scent of sweat and leather and blood still clings to us, making the air thick and primal.
I’m already dripping.
The slick heat between my legs is undeniable, embarrassingly obvious, arousal coating my inner thighs, clit swollen and flushed dark pink.
Half from the fight, half from him. Gideon growls low in his throat at the sight, his steel-gray eyes molten with possession.
Then he drops to his knees like he’s paying homage to a queen, and that’s the last coherent thought I have.
His mouth is on me in an instant. No teasing, no hesitation. Just his tongue dragging through my folds in one long, filthy stroke, drinking me in like he’s starving. A shudder wracks my entire body, and my hands fly to his hair, fingers twisting in the dark blond strands.
"Fuck, Gideon—"
His response is to latch onto my clit with sucking pressure, relentless and perfect, his fingers plunging deep inside me, curling hard against that spot that makes my vision whiten.
I arch off the table, a choked cry tearing from my lips, and the magic responds.
Golden sigils igniting across my belly, my breasts, pulsing bright with every flick of his tongue.
The feedback is instant, electric. My magic surging into him through the bond, crackling between his lips and my skin, shocking pleasure so intense I nearly black out.
I come faster than I ever have in my life. Thighs clamping around his head as my pussy spasms, gushing against his mouth while he groans and drinks me down like it’s his damn salvation. My cry echoes off the cabin walls, raw and broken.
The aftershocks leave my limbs trembling, but Gideon isn’t done.
He rises, wiping his beard with the back of one hand, lips slick and gleaming under the firelight.
His cock juts between us, thick and veined and painfully hard, his body still thrumming with that godforsaken alpha energy that makes my legs weak.
"Again," he demands, voice rough.
"M-mate, I just—"
But he’s already dragging me to the edge of the table, fingers digging into my hips as he lines himself up. There’s no preamble, no slow stretch. Just one brutal thrust that buries him to the hilt, his balls slapping against my ass as he fills me in one perfect, punishing stroke.
I scream.
Magic explodes between us, golden light erupting from my skin, painting the walls in flickering sigils as he fucks me like he’s trying to brand himself inside me. And maybe he is. Every slam of his hips sends stars across my vision, my second orgasm already building at a terrifying speed.
"Look at me," he snarls.
I do. And it undoes me completely. His face is feral, lips parted around his pointed canines, sweat dripping down his temple as he drives into me again and again. Mine. The bond screams between us, his claim absolute.
He doesn’t let me come down.
I’m still gasping through the aftershocks when he rises, cock thick and glistening between us, the base already swelling with his knot in that way that makes my stomach flip.
Before I can catch my breath, his hands are on me.
Pressing between my shoulder blades, flipping me onto my stomach, hips shoved to the table’s edge until I’m spread open and exposed, ass up, face pressed into the scattered pages of my grandmother’s journals.
His grip on my hip is iron, possessive, and then—
One stroke.
No working up to it, no easing in. He slams home in a single thrust, splitting me wide, the stretch so abrupt and ruthless that my back arches, a ragged moan tearing out of me.
His cock is a brand inside me, heat and pressure and ownership, and already my magic reacts in a cascade.
Golden sigils igniting along my spine, thighs, wrists, the power threading around him in taunting, molten ribbons.
"Fuck—" His voice is pure gravel, rough with need, the sound sending a pulse through already-sensitized nerves.
Then he moves.
His thrusts are relentless. Deep, driving strokes that hit so deep my vision blurs, the drag of his cockhead over that sweet, swollen spot turning pleasure into torment inside me.
My fingers scrabble for purchase on the wood, my moans pitching higher with every snap of his hips, every slap of skin on skin.
His knot catches, tugs at my entrance, and each time that thick ridge threatens to lock inside me, a fresh wave of golden light flares across my skin, wrapping around him, clenching around him like my body refuses to let go.
"Gideon— " I twist, gasping, but he holds me down, fingers digging into my flesh as he fucks me harder, deeper, his growl vibrating against my spine. "Can’t—can’t take—"
"Yes, you can," he snarls, voice dark with promise. "You take every fucking inch."
And when he finally forces his knot past the desperate resistance of my body, locking us together, I scream, magic detonating around us in golden wildfire.
The table groans under our combined weight as I push back against him, meeting each punishing thrust with a grind of my hips. Splinters catch in my palms. His grip on my hair tightens, but I roll my hips harder, rubbing my clit against the rough table edge.
"Harder," I demand, voice raw.
He gives it.
Hips pistoning, muscles corded with restraint finally snapping, he drives into me with a force that rattles my teeth.
His free hand slides up. Calloused fingers pinching my nipple to a frantic peak, then down, down to where I’m split open around him.
Two fingers press against my clit, rubbing merciless circles.
I come apart.
Magic detonates. Golden light floods the cabin, sigils igniting like struck tinder across every inch of exposed skin.
My pussy clamps around his cock, violent spasms milking him in pulses that drag a half-growl, half-moan from his throat.
Wetness soaks his balls, drips down my thighs, but he doesn’t stop.
Just adjusts his angle and fucks me through the convulsions, each thrust sending fresh lightning through my nerves.
Gideon’s canines graze my bond mark.
Then bite.
Sharp pain-pleasure whites out my vision. I scream, back bowing as his teeth break skin, as his knot swells against my entrance, stretching me wider, wider—
With a wet, obscene pop, it locks.
The first thick jet of cum floods me. Scorching heat, pulsing in deep, erratic spurts that have my body jerking like a live wire. My third orgasm hits like a landslide, walls rippling around him, greedy and desperate, as if my body’s trying to fuse us together permanently.
Magic erupts.
The golden sigils flare white, burning into both our skin. His on mine, mine on his. Weaving something deeper than flesh between us. Sensation crashes through the bond:
My stubborn, defiant love.
His bone-deep terror of losing me. Raw and primal. Our resolve tangles, knots together. Wildfire in shared veins.
He collapses over me, forehead pressed between my shoulder blades, breaths ragged. His fingers lace through mine on the table, pinning them in place as his hips roll in shallow, involuntary twitches. Still fucking cum into me, still claiming.
I turn my head just enough to catch his eye.
"Sealed the deal again, Alpha?"
His laugh is rough, exhausted. "Fuck you."
"You are."
His teeth find my earlobe. "Smartass witch."
His thumb traces the fresh bite on my neck. "You’re not dying."
I press back against him, just to feel him hiss. "Neither are you."
Magic hums between us, a promise forged in sweat and blood and come.
Let Orion come.
Let the whole damned council come.
We’re ready.
His knot still throbs inside me as we shift onto the blankets.
The firelight flickers over sweat-slick skin, illuminating the bond mark on my neck where Gideon’s teeth broke skin.
His arm locks around my waist, pulling me flush against him as if even now, with his seed still spilling into me, he’s afraid I’ll vanish.
His lips find the shell of my ear. "Stop thinking."
"I wasn’t—"
His teeth graze the tendon along my throat, and the words dissolve into a groan. "Liar."
I feel him smirk against my skin. His hips shift, just enough to make his knot pull.
Eventually, his knot softens enough for him to slip free, but he doesn’t let me move. Just drags me tighter against his chest, one broad hand splayed over my stomach like he’s imprinting the shape of me into his palms.
I swallow. "Cassian’s probably wondering where his Alpha is."
"Cassian can fuck off."
I let my fingers drift up to trace the scar cutting through his eyebrow, the old wound jagged and pale against his sun-kissed skin. "Just memorizing you."
His fingers tighten around my hip. "Don’t."
"Don’t what?"
"Talk like you’re saying goodbye."