Page 82 of A Haven of Brimstone and Darkness

“No matter what happens tomorrow,” I tell her, my lips hovering just above hers as my cock pounds against the inside of my trousers. “Know this—” I draw one fang along the soft cushion of her lower lip, enjoying her gasp. “I will rip the heads offanyonewho thinks to take you from me.”

With that, I give her no more room. My mouth falls upon hers, swallowing a cry of surprise as I flick my tongue against her lips, demanding entry. And just as I knew my sweet Little Thief and liar would, she grants it—taking me inside and letting me have my wicked way.

As our lips collide, I catch sight of the two who followed me here. Their faces remain shadowed, but I don’t care that they watch me with her. They, like the woman in my arms, are mine. My blood. My possessions. My brothers.

Chapter 38

Ruen

Kalix’s eyes remain open for a moment more before he turns them to Kiera and really goes at her. The kiss is everything that Kalix is—savage, cruel, and completely irreverent. He has no care for her wants or desires unless they serve him, and yet, she seems to meet him match for match. He’s kissing her and running his hands up her arms, gripping the back of her nape to move her where he wants. She’s not fighting, though she could.

Maybe that’s why she doesn’t—because unlike most people—Kiera is one of few that could truly harm him and she feels safe in her own skills enough to let a creature like him take her.

“We should go.” Theos’ quiet words break the silence between us and as one, the two of us turn to go back down the staircase that led all the way up here.

I shouldn’t have said what I said, yet still … Kalix’s words echo back to me from what he’d said to Kiera on that bridge.Ruen is like me … he would do anything, hurt and kill anyone, to keep you alive.

Fuck him. Fuck him for being right.

I close my eyes as Theos and I slowly, silently descend the staircase and re-enter the grand hall of Ortus Academy. Theshadows hover in every crevice, an empty echo of our near whispering footsteps the only thing I can hear aside from the rain that patters at the mountain’s transparent upper half.

Pausing at the mouth of a hallway that will lead us back to the rooms, I look up and watch the gray clouds gyrate and move overhead, some of them so low that they’re pierced by the jagged points of the academy’s exterior.

“Ruen?” Theos stops several feet away when he realizes that I haven’t followed him and glances back.

“Go on,” I tell him, still staring up. “I’ll be there soon.”

He hesitates, but when I offer no assurances and don’t speak again, I hear his sigh and then the shuffling of his footsteps as he finally leaves. When he’s gone, I don’t feel any better. My lungs still squeeze in my chest, my body cold and tingling as if a wave of both euphoria and sickness is overwhelming me.

I take a step back, away from the hallway and back into the grand hall. There are hundreds if not thousands of people here in this mountain—Mortal Gods, Gods, and Terra alike—and yet, its silence is the loudest of them all.

Ruen … will live with his for the rest of his life—and still he, too, would make the same choice.

Fucking Kalix. Damn him. I’ve already lived with enough guilt to kill a much stronger man, and yet somehow the thing inside my chest that beats with life continues on as if none of it matters. Even when the mind is ready to lie down and die, sometimes, the body refuses to let it.

Standing in the center of the grand hall, I close my eyes and draw up an image of my mother—or I try to. I clench my hands into fists when all that comes is a grainy, fuzzy recollection of a woman. Soft curves, long hair, average height, average in face shape, average in just about every aspect, but for one thing.

The feeling she emits.

Kindness.

Love.

Caring.

Determination.

It matters not that she’d lain with Azai, that she’d birthed a child she should not have had; the moment I entered this world, I was hers and she mine. Behind my closed lids, I feel a burning take root. Pain searing up through my skull.

Kalix might be my brother, but he’s never belonged to me. Not the same way he considers me to him. He’s mine to look after, mine to guide and direct. Theos is similar save for the fact that he’s less impulsive. Theos is mine to protect and teach, but Kiera … she’s ultimately different.

She is just … mine.

“Did your brothers take your precious toy?” I stiffen at the familiar deep voice that comes from the darkness.

Immediately straightening and opening my eyes, I jerk my chin down and scan the vicinity. Azai’s voice is like a resounding echo in a dark cave, though coming from many directions and none of them resemble the shape of a man.

Turning slowly, I cast a look backwards. It would be like him to come upon me from behind. Strength doesn’t necessarily mean honor, after all. The blow doesn’t come from behind as I expect, however, but from my left. It slams into my side with a sharp jab that cracks right into my ribcage. Something inside breaks—snapping with sharp agony so piercing that I go down on one knee, my hand coming around to try and hold the injured side in place lest the broken rib puncture an internal organ. Azai doesn’t care. He attacks again, his fist coming down on the back of my skull like a hammer. Skin splits, wetness oozes down, soaking into my hair before dripping down the side of my neck and plopping onto the stone floor beneath me. With a growl, I release my side and catapult myself from the ground, wrappingarms around his middle and shoving the soles of my boots into the floor to carry him up and into a wall.

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