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They shouted in tandem, sensing each other as never before. The bond morphed from solid threads into free flowing water, plunging them into its endless current. Lunara swore she felt herself as he did, as surely as she felt him inside.

He pulled almost all the way out, pausing, slamming back in, over and over. When he swooped down and latched on to the nipple peeking between her knuckles, Lunara felt its stiff bead dragging against her own tongue. The soft and supple sink of his lips like she was the one lapping there, choking back a cry when his teeth clamped down.

He wrenched her hand to his chest, loosing a guttural moan when the edge of her nail caught him, scraping over the hardened tip there. It magnified her sensation, invisible ends meeting to create an infinite cycle. Brand’s strangled breath told Lunara he was with her, in the same place, experiencing all of its divinity.

The agony of the last few months, being severed from him, didn’t fully hit until that moment. Like her pain when healing and ignoring herself, Lunara hadn’t realized what she’d been living with.

Even after his restoration, Brand kept this from her. Had built his walls and blocked her out. It wasn’t malicious, and she knew his heart was in the right place, but…

Fucking moons, she was pissed.

Lunara yanked his head back. “Never keep this from me again,” she hissed, meeting him stroke for stroke. “I don’t care how wretched life gets. I don’t care if you’re afraid. I don’t care if you think you’re protecting me. I am yours and you are mine. This is mine. Never again, Brand.”

“Never again.” He released Lunara’s knees in favor of her hips, thrusting harder. “Fuck, I swear it. Never again.”

Brand surged into her, his searing kiss like an oath, and she misted them together.

His back hit the floor as she clawed her way upright, leaving long, scarlet welts down his pectorals, his abdomen, the stain bleeding into the burnt sienna tint of skin. Whorls of light chased them as he bucked, his body multiplying beneath her, larger and larger. His horns lengthened and curled, his fangs dropped, and the growl he loosed vibrated in the air.

Neither the Lesser, nor the Greater, but some divine being in between.

Lunara went boneless when his cock swelled, stretching her further. Mindless, when it hit deeper. Illamiata pulsed, and she absorbed some of Brand’s rage in order to accommodate him. To take the absolute perfection he was pounding into her every particle, riding him with fervid violence. The world went red at the edges, fire spread through her veins, and she grew.

Both Sorcerit and Demon. Lunara the Moonweaver and Lunara the Greater.

It was over when Brand sat up, wrapping one arm around her lower back, grinding them together, his other thumb finding her pulsing clit and adding the pressure she needed. His tongue laved over breast and collarbone, raking his fangs over her skin. Dragging his open mouth up the column of her throat, the rasp of his beard in its wake. “Let go, little moon. I’m finally here. I’ve got you,” he whispered against her lips.

“And I’ve got you,” she answered.

Ecstasy scattered their pieces together. His roar joined her scream, every clench of her sheath met by the rhythmic bursts of his essence as it filled her. As they returned to themselves, as they were remade, the stunning disarray snapped back into different places, everything between them bound more tightly, more powerfully.

Brand swept the curls clinging to her damp cheeks away, tears in his own eyes. “Burning Solyrian, I love you, Lunara. You are the most beautiful creature in this world.” He pressed his brow to hers, arms banding around her, until he held her as close as two people could possibly be. “I meant what I said. I’m finally here—me—and I will never separate myself from you again.”

A vision of them in front of the mirror in their tower washroom flashed, her Demon making demands and extracting his own promises from her.

“We are beautiful together, Brand. Remember?”

“I do,” he rasped. “I think I also said that we are nothing apart.”

He did, but it sat ill. Lunara was no longer the same person she was on that night, and neither was he. They’d spent most of the last two months apart, but she hadn’t felt like nothing in that time. Their trials helped them to find more of themselves. To grow into these versions entwined here and now.

“You did, but I’d like to revise that statement.” She cupped his jaw, running her nose back and forth over his. “I think the loveliest thing has been discovering we’re quite capable on our own as individuals. That we’re both stronger than we ever realized. You’re still everything you are without me, and I’m still myself without you. It’s not that we are nothing apart—it’s that we’re better together. It’s the choosing that makes all the difference.”

“Ah, little moon.” Brand planted a soft kiss at each corner of her lips. “I somehow love you even more.” He was moving again, slow and sweet, coaxing a shuddering exhale from her lungs. “Again?”

It was the first time he’d asked and not commanded, a shy intensity there that Lunara adored.

“Yes. Please. Again.”

Brand showed her just how much he loved her, again and again, until every last one of their five hundred and seventeen minutes was gone, and then some.

Curled up on the most comfortable damned couch he ever had the pleasure to lay on, Brand traced the twisting branches of Lunara’s scars, the slashes that cut through the web, and nearly wept.

He knew the beast was ultimately responsible. Knew there was nothing of choice in the matter. But it was his body, his clawed and twisted hand, that wrought the tragedy. It was one of the worst parts of the ordeal—that he would live with the memories of another’s actions like they were his own. That they were his own, for all he hadn’t been in control.

“I’m so sorry, Luna,” he whispered, finding her gaze with his own. “So very sorry.”

Her brows dropped. “You remember?”