But Braern’s face had twisted, and he threw the rock down onto Lorsan’s skull with a resounding crack that echoed ominously through the cavern; and the elf’s pleas died away. Adrissu kept his claw over his limp body for a moment, making sure—he could barely feel the rise and fall of his chest, still breathing, but there seemed to be no consciousness as his muscles went slack.
“Good job,” he said, glancing up at Braern, who was backing away. The elf’s expression was pinched, and his eyes remained on Lorsan’s unconscious, bleeding face; but he nodded sharply in acknowledgement of Adrissu’s praise. If he was having mixed feelings about what he’d done, or what they were doing, Adrissu supposed he couldn’t fault him for it. So without saying anything else, he lifted his claw away to mark the ground around the unconscious elf with the necessary runes. It would be a quick process now.
“Back up a little more,” he warned Braern. The elf nodded, stepping away until his back was against the wall of the lair. Adrissu nodded, then turned his attention down to the unconscious elf.
Looming over him, he pressed the amethyst to Lorsan’s chest, making sure that the broadest side of the crystal was in direct contact with his skin. Then he closed his eyes, concentrating, and reached through the crystal and into his consciousness.
Rooting around his mind did not feel especially different from the few, brief instances that he’d touched Braern’s mind in the same way. Somehow, the thought unsettled him, wishing the sensations were as distinctly different as the elves themselves. With the tendril of magic he could feel where the elf’s memories would be, the center of his emotions—and a little deeper down, the strange tingling sensation of what was a creature’s very essence, the spark of magic within that fueled every other process.
With his own magic he grasped that deepest core, loosening it from where it sat and tugging it forward. There was some resistance, which was different from his previous attempts with animals; but it was barely enough to register, and certainly not enough to stop him. With some careful pulling and guiding, he eased the soul out of its body; when it was halfway between them and fully ensconced in the amethyst, Adrissu lifted the gem away to break contact with the skin, and at the same moment he released his grasp on the elf’s soul.
The runes around them flared and burned away, echoed by a light that burst within the crystal for a moment, then ebbed and flickered out. Adrissu pulled it up closer to his eyes—looking carefully, he could see faint glimmers of light from within, barely enough to illuminate the surface. It would never draw the eye of someone who was not already looking for it.
A slow smile spread across his face. It worked. His soul-transference ritual hadworkedon a mortal, an elf; and for an instant, he felt like the most accomplished sorcerer who had ever lived. After all, no one had ever done what he had just performed.
“Is it finished?” Braern asked softly, centering his attention. Adrissu set the gem down on the ground and gestured for him to look.
“It’s done,” he affirmed, as Braern took a cautious step closer. “See? The body still breathes, but there’s nothing there anymore. If you look closely at the gem, you can see the evidence of the soul within.”
Braern stopped just short of the body, looking down at it with a dark expression.
“What will you do with it?” he asked, eyes still not leaving the elf. “The soul? The body?”
Adrissu shrugged. “I had no plans for the body. As for the soul, I’ll probably hold onto it to see if I can put it back into something, but it will never perish, as long as the gem endures. I can leave it as it is for years, centuries, before trying anything new with it.”
“What will happen if the body dies?” Braern asked, his voice rough. Adrissu opened his mouth to answer that the absence of a soul put it in a state of stasis: it would not age nor hunger, and thus would not die—but then he realized what Braern wastrulyasking, and he paused.
“To my understanding, nothing will happen to the soul if the body were to perish,” Adrissu replied, and he took a step back, as if giving him permission.
Slowly Braern nodded, still looking down at Lorsan. His face had been carefully neutral during their brief conversation, but now something twisted in his expression—the pull of his mouth, the angle of his eyebrows.
“Do what you need to do, Braern,” Adrissu urged him, pressing his body low to the ground, so they were at eye level. “Whatever you want to do, he deserves it.”
Braern nodded, a short, sharp movement. He was still for a moment longer, considering; then he quickly reared back one foot and kicked Lorsan in the head, so hard his limp neck twisted to the side, and blood splattered across the stone floor.
After that first kick, something seemed to snap in the elf, and the floodgates were opened. He kicked and stomped, his breaths coming more rapidly at first—then he was grunting in exertion with each kick—then he was screaming, shouting expletives down at the unmoving body.
“That’s what you get!” he finally sobbed, stumbling back with his feet covered in blood. Lorsan’s face had been thoroughly smashed in; his features now only a mess of meat, and there was no rise and fall to his chest. “That’s what you fucking get, you sick bastard, that’s what you get for laying your fucking hands on me!”
Adrissu watched silently, his gut twisting at the anguish in Braern’s voice and the tears streaking his face. But then Braern looked up at him, eyes bright and glassy, and his scent of grief and anger almost instantly became something softer. Blood and viscera squelched beneath his feet as he stumbled toward Adrissu, wrapping his arms around the dragon’s neck and burying his face in the cool, supple scales there.
Adrissu lowered his head to return the embrace, drawing his wings up and around Braern’s body, as if he could cocoon him within—as if he could hold him there forever away from the world, from anyone or anything that could harm his mate.
“Adrissu,” Braern gasped, his breathing ragged. He pulled away enough to meet Adrissu’s eyes. “I need you—now, right now—like this—please.”
Adrissu’s body responded to Braern’s plea so quickly that he had not even processed what he was asking until his cock had already started to emerge, parting the soft slit between his legs.
“Now?” Adrissu rumbled, uncertain. “Are you sure?”
“Please,” Braern said again, kissing the spot on his face between the hinge of his jaw and his lower eyelid. “Please.”
Adrissu sighed out a long breath. How could he say no? He gathered Braern into his arms and pulled him into the chamber with his hoard. Adrissu set him on his feet and saw that an almost-smug grin had crossed the elf’s face, though it became a look of surprise as Braern’s eyes flickered around the room, taking in the piles of gold and jewels.
“Lay down,” Adrissu murmured, pacing around him to clear the floor. A deep, primal part of him was suddenly nervous to have another living creature in his hoard—but it was his mate, who already owned all that he had. Even as he was pushing the thought away, Braern started undressing, which consumed his attention.
“I bet I could take it, if I was in heat,” Braern murmured, as he laid his clothes on the ground and settled onto them, eyeing Adrissu’s cock with an all-too-confident grin. “I bet I could.”
Adrissu bit back a laugh, shaking his head. He absolutely couldnot, Adrissu was certain; but the thought of Braern stretched impossibly wide around him did have a particular appeal, and his cock twitched with interest. “I don’t think so, love.”
