They reached for each other at once, frantic and uncoordinated. Fingers tangled, fabric dragged. Shirts were shed in graceless urgency, tossed aside and instantly devoured by the moss.
Gods and goddesses, he was magnificent. His torso was a breathtaking landscape of muscle overlaid with a mosaic of smooth bark. Vines looped over his ribs and shoulders, writhing with a life of their own. He was terrifyingly beautiful, a primal god of the deep woods.
His glowing eyes devoured her, lingering on the plain lace of her bra. Before he could even think to ask, Goldie reached behind her back, unhooked it, and let it fall.
The sound that ripped from his throat was pure, unadulterated awe, a low growl of possession. “You shine,” he rasped. “You are a fire, and I want to burn in your flames.”
His vines slid around her body and guided her to the ground with a gentle reverence. The cool press of the mossy floor met her shoulders as he followed, covering her in a shadow of heat and bark and breath.
He descended on her, his mouth closing over her bare breast. His lips sealed hot around her nipple, tongue lashing in wet, merciless strokes. Goldie cried out, arching up into him, shameless in her need.
The vines mirrored his hunger. One curled beneath her other breast, lifting it as if offering it to his mouth; another slithered up to tease and roll the nipple, tugging it into a stiff, aching peak. Every flick of his tongue, every scrape of his teeth was echoed and amplified by their caress.
“Fuck,” she gasped, her hands flying to his head and threading through his vine-like hair, the coarse strands flexing slightly to embrace her fingers. She held him there, urging him harder, desperate for more. He growled into her flesh, the vibration sinking straight to her clit, and he bit down just hard enough to make her cry out again.
His tongue swirled, his lips sucked, his vines pinched and pulled, and Goldie’s moans filled the atrium, shameless, desperate, carrying on the hum of the ritual.
His mouth left her breasts slick and aching, teeth marks blooming where he’d sucked her raw. Goldie barely had time to whimper before his hand slid down and palmed her through the soaked fabric of her leggings.
The vines joined him. One coiled down her hip, another traced the inside of her thigh, stroking closer, closer. Then, with a violent shudder, they turned greedy. Smooth and strong, they slipped beneath the waistband, tugging hard.
The thin fabric gave away with a sharp rip. Her leggings split open, her panties shredded to tatters, and suddenly she was bare—spread before him on the moss, flushed, wet, her scent filling the atrium.
Splice drew back just enough to look at her, and his nostrils flared as if he were inhaling every drop of her arousal. For a heartbeat he looked utterly alien, otherworldly—eyes glowing, jaw tight, his body haloed in shifting green-gold light.
Goldie’s thighs fell open in a shameless invitation. Her breath came ragged, a desperate plea in every exhale.
“Please,” she whispered, the word both a prayer and a demand all at once.
Splice’s glowing gaze devoured her, pupils blown wide, vines twitching restlessly like they were tasting the heat pouring off her skin. His chest rose and fell in harsh, uneven pulls as though holding himself back took every ounce of will.
“Bared,” he rasped, the word carrying the cadence of ritual. “Bared to earth, bared to me.”
The vines shivered in answer. Two coiled down his hips, curling into the fabric at his waist. With a violent jerk, they tore his trousers apart, shredding them into ribbons that fell silently into the moss.
He was suddenly, gloriously naked. Goldie’s eyes went wide, drinking him in. His body was all sharp planes and carved muscle, veins of light pulsing beneath his barklike skin. Vines curled around his thighs and waist, alive and twitching with his arousal.
And from the cradle of his thighs, his cock jutted forward, veined with traceries of glowing green. The blunt head gleamed slick in the dim light, every throb echoing the quickened beat of his heart.
His hand rose and wrapped around himself, stroking slowly, light flaring faintly along his veins with each motion. Goldie’sbreath tore from her chest in a ragged gasp. Gods above and below, he was touching himself for her, and it was the filthiest, most glorious thing she had ever seen.
“Root and branch. Heart and hearth. Awaken and draw near.” His voice was a growl, half prayer and half possession, each word a litany of hunger that vibrated through her, setting every nerve alight.
Splice trailed fire across her skin as he kissed her ribs, her belly, the soft hollow of her hip. Each press of his mouth felt like both worship and claim, his vines curling to cradle her as though she might break apart under his caresses.
When he reached the curls above her sex, Goldie’s hips jerked helplessly, her breath breaking. “Is this… is this for the ritual?”
He looked up, eyes glowing wild. “No,” he snarled. “This is forme.”
He surged forward, burying his face between her thighs. His tongue parted her folds, savoring her with slow, deliberate strokes before dragging upward. His lips wrapped around her clit and sucked with unerring precision until her back arched off the moss as she sobbed.
Vines curled around Goldie’s thighs, holding her wide when she tried to clench shut, their grip both restraining and coaxing. Others teased across her stomach and breasts, tugging at her nipples until sparks of sensation jolted down to where his mouth worked her mercilessly.
“Gods,” she gasped, her voice cracked and unrecognizable.
He groaned against her, the sound vibrating through her clit. His tongue flicked ruthlessly at the aching bud of her pleasure, and her hips bucked up shamelessly.
“Give and grow,” he murmured between licks, tongue tracing slow, merciless circles that made her thighs quake. “Bloom and burn.”
