Instead, he covered my stomach with his hand, pressing down. Heat spread out from my core, pleasure tingling through me.
“Lyr, you’re so close,” Belekoroz groaned, watching me with hooded eyes. “I can already feel it.”
So could I, the first spasms of my climax sending delightful little shivers through my entire body. No. He needed to join me, our magic and our minds entangling inextricably once more as we drowned in each other.
“Please.” I slung my legs around his hips, desperately trying to press him deeper inside me. “Take me. Please, Belekoroz. Please.”
All my pride, my resolve to keep a clear head this time, had left me. Only need for him remained.
The little smile on his lips held a tenderness I couldn’t place. “Since you are begging so nicely, I won’t be so cruel as to deny you what you want so much.”
Then he shifted his hips, thrusting deep, and all my thoughts scattered. Yes. This was what I had needed, that hard length fillingme again and again as I shattered around him. I cried out, my pleasure spilling over, my Light crackling over my skin and his. He held me down, neither allowing me to bury my fingers in his shoulders nor my magic to mingle with his.
“Fly for me, my queen,”Belekoroz growled into my mind.
My body obeyed his command as if it were made for it, tensing up in one peak after another. He didn’t slow down, muscles bunching enticingly with every hard, deep thrust. My eyes fluttered closed, the sensations overwhelming me. Firm fingers closed around my chin, shaking my head in reproach.
“Don’t you dare close your eyes.” Belekoroz’s gaze captured mine, his expression feral. “I want you to watch while I fuck you. I want you to know that it’s me doing this to you and no one else.”
Something in his tone called to me. Something reaching so far beyond our games, beyond the physical pleasure we used to sink our claws in each other, to tear each other apart. Something vulnerable and raw. I had to answer to it, a flash of power freeing my hands.
Belekoroz froze when my fingers found his cheek, our bodies still joined. My touch trailed down his jaw, featherlight on his lips. So often his beauty seemed like the ice of the north to me, flawless and unforgiving. Tonight, pleasure gilded it with warmth, an unexpected softness that made me ache.
“I know it’s you,” I said, giving in to the feeling swelling inside me. Such deceptively simple words, but they said so much.I see you. I want you. Be here with me.
Letting all my shields fall away was temptingly easy with him. An offer. To become one completely once more, to share our powers and our minds.
I wasn’t sure he would take it. He hadn’t joined me yet, holding on to his control with single-minded determination. A control soincredibly hard-won, his breath labored, every taut line of his body quivering, beads of sweat dripping down the firm plane of his chest, the shadows around us roaring like a captive beast.
“What are you doing to me, Baradaz?” The emotion flickering in those dark eyes above me, trickling from his mind to mine, felt astonishingly close to fear. Fear and longing. Perhaps I wasn’t the only one afraid to take that first plunge and soar into the sky.
“Condemning us both,” I answered truthfully, one of those strange premonitions we immortals sometimes had, before burying my hands in his hair and dragging his mouth back to mine.
“Some things are worth burning for,” Belekoroz gasped between deep, biting kisses.
I cried out in bliss as he finally allowed his magic to intertwine with mine at the same time as he plunged inside me once more. “Oh, Light, oh, Light—”
“No, my queen.” A hoarse whisper, full of the promise of more pleasure to come. “Tonight, Darkness rules here. And you will enjoy every single moment of it.”
I moaned, my body rising instinctually as the immensity of his desire for me filled our bond, as deep and dark as the Abyss.
“Hold on to the stone.”
I heeded his command, one of my hands closing around a piece of jagged stone that jutted out above my head, my heart racing.
“Good.” A tight smile, his eyes lost in dark fire. Then, he let go.
Darkness raged around us, stealing all the Light. My world consisted only of him. I took everything he unleashed upon me with greedy hunger, every hard thrust that threatened to loosen my grip on the stone, every surge of power that made my magic flare up in answer, every rough kiss that captured my hoarse cries.
At last, my mind was quiet. All thoughts, all doubts gone, onlypleasure remaining, burning everything else away. I didn’t even startle when the stone beneath me crumbled to dust, safe in the knowledge the shadows would catch me, hurling me toward another precipice until we both fell over it, until the bleak plains of the Other exploded into a gleaming whirlwind of Darkness and Light.
CHAPTER
28
Noctis
Throughout the ages, I had mastered the art of snooping discreetly. After Rada’s departure, I didn’t search the house right away. My little queen was no fool. The likelihood of her coming back to catch me in the act was high. So I focused on farm duties first, tending to the chickens and guiding the araks into the pasture. A grin formed on my face as they obeyed effortlessly, settling into the lush greenery to graze.
