The Relic Page 8

  And I scythed the long, aching length of my penis again between her folds. And again. As I cooed and stroked her, as my wings warmed her from her fear-inspired chill.

  I mimicked the act of fucking without actually penetrating my darling one. Offering us both a taste of pleasure until she began to pant and the muscles I worked to caress all night began to relax. Her head to the mattress, her ass in the air. My breath at her ear, and my cock stroking her clit, I took my time. And in time, she took her pleasure.

  But it would not be enough to send her to bliss.

  If she wanted that, she’d have to ask.

  And I could hump her gorgeous ass for all eternity. Suffer with her.

  The sun rose, and though her hips had begun to squirm in an attempt to get the friction her body desperately needed for release, she didn’t ask.

  So I showed mercy.

  Slinking down her body, taking her hips in hand, I brought her swollen sex to my mouth and let her experience the art of eating pussy from another angle. One that let me delve my tongue deep, tease her anus. Flatter her clit with praise.

  Screaming my name, she came.

  A thing she had not even dared the night before.

  Progress indeed!

  Progress enough that I crossed the threshold with questionable permission, while she was dazed and assumed the perfect position to end this standoff.

  Cockhead to slit, I pressed in.

  Knowing I was too big in my true form, I took astounding care and sealed our fates with the truth of the matter.

  “You called for me.” At the perfect shell of her ear, I growled like the animal I was.

  And gained another inch.

  Permission enough.

  Battle won.

  It took almost an hour, a great deal of caresses, incessant circles over her clit, and compliments in every language man had ever spoken before I was fully seated in my wife’s cunt.

  In which time she had come apart on my cock four times, unable to resist pushing back against my intrusion and impaling herself as her channel sucked at my meat and adapted.

  My sword was sheathed in perfect, tight fire.

  The beauty of her pussy stretched around me. Sound and pulsating. Wet and welcoming.

  The very first time I had taken my wife in ages long past, I’d had to oil my cock to facilitate a struggling penetration. Now, she was wet for me. Now, I was home.

  “I love you.” I said it a thousand times or more, felt it where my soul had been returned to me.

  I wept, rocking my hips to seek that perfect embrace over and over.

  Exactly how I desired to spend the rest of eternity.

  Yet ultimate bliss could not be held at bay forever. My darling, overwrought, screamed into her pillow, clenched down around my member in a series of rippling tugs, physically demanding seed as her orgasm blossomed.

  As her eternal slave, I could do nothing but comply.

  She drained me dry, my roar shaking the walls.

  When it was over, when I carefully pulled out in smiling satisfaction to see the sticky cream flooding her contracting channel, I knew a child would be made before the year was out… and that she would love me for it.

  11

  Pearl

  It was over…

  Every part of me oversensitive to the point I would combust if he attempted to pleasure me further. Hand pressed between my legs, I turned my back to the beast and stared at the wall—the plaster now cracked from the monstrous howl that had set the building to quake.

  “There is no need to hold my seed in, my soul.” Settling at my back, draping my body in that wing, it snuggled me. “I can give you more any time you wish. Rest with me for a short while, then I have a surprise! The first of many.”

  I couldn’t imagine what could possibly be more surprising than what had just taken place.

  “I feel as if a feast is in order to celebrate! Oh, sweet wife, you have given me such a gift that I cannot even fathom how to adore you best.”

  Given him?

  Wife?

  Was I now more the wife he believed me to be because I had let him rut me? Because I had shamelessly shut my eyes to the monster on my back and abandoned all reason.

  “I won’t always be ugly to you. A pure heart like yours will learn to love me for who I am and not the shell I wear.” He kissed my neck, lightly scraping his fangs on my flesh. “I know this, because I once was beautiful, and you didn’t love me for my beauty as all other women did. It was my spirit that drew you. Even if I were to wear that form again, beauty would never earn you.”

  When his bite punched through delicate tissue, a great jaw holding my throat, it wasn’t pain I felt.

  Only a sip was taken.

  “To drink from the throat of another immortal is only done between those who are excessively intimate. It’s practically our only taboo.” Licking at the twin wounds that were already closing, he hummed out a great contented breath. “My throat is yours.”

  “I don’t want your throat.” I don’t know why I said it, or why my voice held such vindictiveness. But I felt a great need to hurt the beast. Or hurt myself.

  Rolling me to my back so he might make me look at him—or perhaps he wanted to look at me, my body was planted between two massive arms. “Once upon a time, you wanted my throat. Held a knife to it on our wedding night, would have slit me ear to ear had you the talent for it. I’ve often wondered if it was your magic that made us what we became, our oath, or my will alone. But blood? It always comes back to blood.”

  And if I had that knife now?

  Would I take the throat he bared?

  Try to kill the monster who had pulled me from my grave, cared for me, clothed me, fed me, fucked me? Twice damned was I, meeting his gaze and hazarding a question. “Why did I try to slit your throat?”

  “You didn’t want to be queen, though you were born the jewel of the kingdom.” The beast looked lost in memory. “Raised in seclusion, you’d never interacted with any man beyond our father. Who spoiled you to a fault and loved you more than our sisters. And it was not just for your great beauty. It was for your tenacity and will to have your way. The greatest queens never hunger for the duty. They must be tamed. When you tried to kill me, I’d never been more in love.”

  “That sounds sick.” Truly sickening.

  Careful of his talons, Vladislov cupped my cheek. “There is nothing sick in love. You found joy in freedom, in my body, in my obsession, and even in your duty.”

  Joy might not be the emotion I would equate with what had just happened. Unable to decide if I had tricked myself, or he had fooled me, or if I really was a whore willing to take the cock of a demon having been tempted with little more than a tickle between the legs.

  What bothered me most was that if he had asked me, I would not have said yes.

  “Which is precisely why I didn’t ask. You called out my name in need, and I gave you what you needed. It was an ask enough.”

  How he could play at words, and actions, and move me at his whim…

  Laughing, the beast contradicted my concerns. “It’s the other way around. I cannot think but for you. Watch your every minuscule movement, listen to your heartbeat, see you fed, clothed, cared for… bedded. I am your slave.”

  “Then I order you to leave me forever.”

  Laughter turned to so pained an expression my heart ached to see it.

  He spilled a tear. “I would not go, because you are incapable of such cruelty.”

  “I’m sorry.” Why I said it, or why I meant it, I could not even begin to contemplate.

  Boxed in by his arms, arms that were muscular in ways no creature should be, solemn as the grave, Vladislov said, “I would make love to you again, face to face, before we bathe. I want you to see me when you feel beauty, and know that I see you.”

  My ardor had cooled, yet the seed between my legs was slippery enough for seeking fingers to play in when his knee moved to separate my thighs.

  With an
arch, my body refused the command of my thoughts. And though I fought to keep my legs closed, it did not take long for his weight to settle between them. The first thrust stole my breath, dragging over something inside me that drew out a shameless moan.

  Just as he had commanded, I witnessed his pleasure as he took my body. Eyes roving from bouncing breasts, to my parted lips. And where his eyes went, his mouth followed.

  Tongue twisting with mine, fingers dancing over my breasts, I submitted as a wife submits to her husband. Locking my ankles at his back, taking all he would give me.

  As Adam took Eve in the garden.

  Hideous as he was, every bit of me burned. But not with shame as it should have. With passion when I was given what my corrupted body craved. My world turned to pure white when he sliced his throat and set it to my mouth.

  I drank as he filled me, coming so violently that had he been human, I would have accidentally killed him.

  In the panting aftermath, whatever surprise he had planned was forgotten. The night spent entwined while I came apart under beating wings, a snake-like tongue, and eyes full of adoration that moved me.

  And frightened me in equal measure.

  The sun rose, the sun set, over and over while I learned the ways of pleasure. It was not until I was straddling the beasts, riding at my pace while I sang out my release that I was shown mercy.

  Exhaustion left me crumpled on his chest, sleep winning over even as I felt more of his seed pumping inside me.

  I dreamed of Jesus in the desert and forty days of a dark winged angel trying to talk sense into his son.

  12

  Vladislov

  The bloodbath was not a hit with my bride. And in all fairness to my intention, was unfair in itself. After all, I offered candlelight, flowers in abundance, snacks… a cake! But she would not put a toe in the tub.

  Pearl even tried to yank her hand from where our fingers were entwined… as if I’d let her run off and possibly hurt herself in an unwarranted panic.

  Human in form and lighthearted in tone, I attempted to smooth ruffled feathers. “The mass murder playing in such detail through you mind did not take place. Every drop was donated. All immortal, all happy to indulge their queen in a fun… let’s call it… tradition.”

  Which was not exactly dishonest. Those immortals drained for the event really were happy to be thrown a snack so I might plump my withered prisoners up again for future bath time fun. But the miniscule details were unimportant. “It’s the perfect temperature, enhanced with essential oils, full of petals to slip against your skin, and the finest salts to soothe your aches. Best to get in now before it begins to curdle. Do you want our people to be sad to hear their gift was wasted?”

  But she was not budging no matter how gentle my voice or touch.

  The expression of horror on her face was not melting into gratitude.

  I could work on that. Lips stretching in a smile that displayed the fangs Vampirekind was known for, I reached for a golden dome, sweeping it from a beautiful offering with a silly flourish. “I have chocolate for you. Parisian delicacies,” the words sung as I tempted her with a bite of sweets.

  Though her nostrils flared at the aroma of so much decadence, under her breath, she muttered, “This is sin.”

  My own muttering was far less tragic and far more eye-rollingly annoyed. “Wasting it might be.”

  Okay, so this was the third tub I had filled over the last few days of rigorously fucking my bride. But what had swirled down the drain was not wasted exactly. It was a practice run to make sure that this tub was perfect. Even the candlelight had been arranged just so to play off the quickly setting sun. A pretty stage, a room inviting my timid bride to embrace the heritage that had been denied her.

  What point was there in hesitation? My Pearl just needed a little mental nudge. “Humans have bathed in milk for as long as I have walked this earth. Does milk not come from animals? Yes, it’s generally used for sustenance, but it also softens the skin and is enjoyed as a luxury. You ingest immortal blood—” I gave her a roguish wink, growing hard just at the thought of it. “—and we both know I’m your favorite snack. The only difference here is perspective.”

  Opening her mouth as if to argue, like a true gentleman, I put a finger to her lips and saved her the trouble. “I’m right, of course. So in you go.”

  Where my touch traced her kiss-swollen lips, she frowned. “I wouldn’t want to take a bath in milk either. I’d hardly had the funds to taste it before you woke me up from the nightmare.” Visibly shuddering, my darling bride grimaced, because somewhere deep in her very scarred psyche, a bubble of awfulness I refused to pop grew. It grew, and it teased at the scars Darius had dug into her mind.

  Everything that had been done, taken, rewritten, molded, concealed… it was in there. It clamored. Someday, it would make her a monster in need of checking. Which was why my gentle Pearl needed taming and self-acceptance.

  I’d make her a God… and she might make the whole world pay for it.

  Maybe the world deserved what they created—Vampire, human, Daywalker, and all the other monsters creeping along the earth’s crust.

  Pupils dilating, Pearl stared down at the warmed tub. “I can hear the screams.”

  Yes, she could. But they were her screams. Buried and in need of exorcism. Hand to my heart, I set my obsessive, complete, unbreakable love plain on my face. “On my honor, no contributor to your warm bath died.”

  There was really no point in bringing up the human livestock that had gone into fattening up the donating immortals… considering the unraveling mental state before me. Their blood was not technically in the tub, so it didn’t matter. The effort, the two previously drained tubs, and the volume—a cool hundred humans had most likely been eaten. But they would have been eaten anyway. Just like cows were butchered in messy slaughterhouses en masse.

  Pools of scintillating immortal blood, romantic moments of this nature, were not produced from mass hunting of monkeys on the streets. The humans involved had been taken from pens all over my worldwide domain. And not even the good bloodlines. Those fed to immortal prisoners were waste product. Hardly edible.

  But again, that was neither here nor there. Overthinking wasn’t going to get my bride into that tub. The racing echo of her heart, the ripples of her mind, the little twitches all over her body—nothing that night was going to get her into the tub.

  I had misstepped.

  I had conquered nations.

  Therefore, I knew every mistake held the seed of an even better victory. “Pearl, I’m sorry.”

  “Why?” How confused she was. How disarmed. Horrified, dangerous, full of my strength and learning her own. The very essence of her trapped in the mind of a stunted seventy-year-old. An infant, considering our longevity.

  A survivor whose fangs would grow back sharper than they had ever been before.

  It wasn’t her hesitation or the newness of the situation. It was a fundamental, lingering complaint. My Pearl was offended, yet she didn’t comprehend why. My vicious bride reborn was angry, but not with me.

  Even in that moment, her mind wrestled with the joy she found in our physical pleasure. The pain Darius had stripped from her. The pain he had left her with.

  The endless slog of her life until, in a state of terror, she had finally found other beings like her.

  The unfairness.

  A bath of blood.

  A cracked porcelain sink she had vomited crimson poison into after ripping the throat of Chadwick Parker on that snowy night in 1927. The unfairness of the world and the fact that a thing she regarded as the antithesis of the Christian God was the only creature to show her kindness.

  Her mind screamed. Her face became that of stone.

  The impassive visage of an angry queen.

  “I won’t go in your tub.” What a voice she could wield when she dug it out.

  What a woman.

  She challenged me. Me? A creature of her worst nightmares. Her brideg
room. A bat of my eyelash and she would implode.

  The things Darius had done to her were nothing compared to a true imagination.

  There were vast, innumerable, disturbing, elegant reasons I was feared the world over. Why I had earned so many monikers.

  There were reasons I was also beloved. The morning star. The most beautiful creature to walk the earth.

  The most hideous.

  Running my fingertips through her tousled hair, my heart aching with love, I gave her truth. “I can have the building burned to the ground so your eyes might never lay upon this room again.”

  Waspish, she threw off my touch and crossed her arms under perfect breasts. Plumped, delicious skin I might never have my fill of was distracting beyond belief. But I kept my eyes on hers, even as she challenged, “You can’t burn a building down because I don’t like something in it!”

  “Of course I can.” Seriously, starting fires was really easy. The amount of cities I had sacked….

  I mean, really. If mankind had any concept of the civilizations I had crushed into powder—metallurgy, plumbing, technology—the entirety of documented history would be upended.

  But it all had come too soon when the rest of the world was still picking fleas from their hair.

  And the best minds were welcome to join my family. To become my children, of a sort.

  Da Vinci still painted hidden works when he was not unraveling astrophysics. The human lives that child of mine has suffered. Because living as a human is suffering. Especially to the brilliant.

  “Vladislov”—had she just spoken my name?—“I dreamed of your time in the desert. He warned you. You warned him. Neither father nor son listened.”

  Taking her chin in my hand, struggling to remain human in appearance when I was so deeply affected, I said, “The tub, Pearl. We can talk of my indiscretion while I was awaiting your rebirth later.”

  “Would he hate me?” And the question was bare to me—I could see it plain as moonlight. Would he hate her for what had been done to her?