Page 87 of She Who Holds My Wrath

Aran lays me down with a care that doesn’t match the fire in his eyes, pulling back onto his knees as he looks down at me. “Gods, look at you, aeshira,” he purrs, voice dripping with sin. He lifts one of my legs, pressing a slow, open-mouthed kiss to the sensitive skin at my inner knee. “My sweet, sweet Velentha, you’re already soaking for me.”

The smirk he gives me is borderline sadistic, his pupils blown wide as he stares straight at my centre. I feel my cheeks flush, but I don’t try to hide myself from him. I want him to memorise every inch of my flesh, just as I am with him.

He crawls up my body, trailing hot, wet kisses and sharp little bites down my throat and across my chest. When he reaches my breasts, a deep growl rumbles from his chest. He closes his mouth over one stiff nipple, sucking hard, his tongue flicking mercilessly. I gasp, arching off the bed with my fingers twisting tightly in his hair as he alternates between hungry sucking and teasing bites, sending sparks of pleasure straight to my core.

This is the side of Aran I crave the most. The feral, primal side of him that worships me like royalty one moment, and devours me like a starving beast the next.

He raises one hand, dragging his middle and ring finger across my parted lips while his mouth continues its ruthless assault on my breast. I open for him instantly. He pushes both fingers deep, forcing them to the back of my throat until I gag around them. I feel him smile against my skin as I tightly wrap my lips and suck, hollowing my cheeks as my tongue swirls greedily.

He lifts his head, eyes blazing as he watches me. With a wicked smirk, he slowly pulls his fingers free, a thin string of saliva connecting them to my swollen lips.

“Good girl,” he growls, voice heavy with lust.

Before I can catch my breath, he slides those same wet fingers down my body and thrusts them hard into my dripping core. A sharp, broken moan tears from my throat as he immediately sets a brutal pace, pumping deep and relentless.

His other hand wraps around my throat, fingers pressing just enough to make my pulse thunder under his grip. He stares down at me like a predator, never slowing the savage rhythm between my legs.

“Are you sure you want to be ruined, my love?” he murmurs, thumb brushing teasingly over my racing pulse.

“Yes,” I manage to gasp, the word barely a whisper past the delicious pressure on my throat.

He curls his fingers deeper, pressing the heel of his palm firmly against my swollen clit. Pleasure explodes behind my eyes. My head falls back, vision whitening as the coil inside me snaps violently. My orgasm crashes through me in shattering waves, my walls clenching and fluttering around his fingers, while my entire body spasms and bucks beneath him.

Aran doesn’t stop. He keeps thrusting, dragging every last pulse of pleasure from me until I’m trembling and gasping, completely spent. Only then, does he ease his grip on my throat. He leans down, pressing a surprisingly soft kiss to the corner of my mouth before pulling his fingers from my soaked core. With a low, filthy groan, he slides them between his lips, sucking my taste off them slowly, eyes never leaving mine.

“Are you going to be my good girl and ride me, aeshira…,” he murmurs as he removes his trousers and underwear, “or are you going to bend over like a bad girl and let me fuck you senseless?”

Breathless and still trembling, I pat the bed beside me. On shaky legs I push myself up, swing one thigh over his hips, and straddle him, ready to show him exactly how good I can be.

Hours later, after whispered confessions, lingering touches, and the kind of intimacy born not from lust, but from love and desperation, we lie tangled beneath the sheet. The world feels so much smaller now, reduced to nothing but the slow rise and fall of his chest beneath my fingers that are stroking through the thin patch of hair sitting there.

I try to memorise it all. The warmth of him. The weight of him. The way he breathes when he’s at peace. Because I know this is the last time I will ever feel it.

He traces slow, lazy circles along my spine, each pass of his fingers leaving goosebumps rippling across my skin. “You’re shaking again.”

I swallow hard against the tightness in my throat, the words I’ve been holding back pressing violently against my chest. It’s time. It has to be. “Aran… I need to tell you something.”

He tenses instantly, sitting up with me as the soft silken sheets slide down to pool around my waist. The immediate loss of his warmth makes my body ache, but it’s nothing compared to the pain of the cold spreading through my heart.

“What is it?”

His eyes search mine, already sensing something is wrong. I pull the sheets back up like they might protect me from what I’m about to do. His gaze softens just slightly when he notices my discomfort.

“Korithax,” I blurt.

He raises a brow, his breath hitching. “What about him?”

“That night. The night he died,” I whisper. “I… I couldn’t let him go.”

Aran goes utterly still. I let out a slow, shaking exhale because I know what I’m about to say is going to destroy whatever fragile peace we built tonight.

“I used ancient Særathi rites,” I continue, forcing the words out even though they tremble. “Magic that has long since been forgotten. I… I preserved his soul. The Six didn’t burn his body to nothing. I transported it to the Temple of Echoing Souls. The place between life and death.” I can see it all so vividly in my mind. The ritual I so desperately performed in that throne room. My fingers moving at godspeed as I desperately worked before they could evaporate his body. The power it took from me. What I knew it would cost when it came time to finalise everything I had done.

“I placed him in stasis, held by the temple’s power. He is not alive, but not dead either. He’s healing slowly. Very, very slowly.”

Aran’s mouth parts, but no sounds come out. I can feel the dread coiling tightly in my chest, because I haven’t said the worst of it yet.

“He cannot wake on his own,” I say softly, the truth finally breaking free. “Because to return a soul from that state… a sacrifice must be made.”