Page 241 of On Wings of Blood

His mouth hovered over my neck. His hand lifted the hair away.

“No,” I whispered. I was trapped, caught in a spell I hadn’t even known was being worked upon me.

Blake didn’t hesitate. He sank his fangs into my neck with sudden force, piercing my skin.

I gasped. The pain was instant, sharp and hot.

I could feel the blood pulsing from my veins into his mouth. My body shuddered.

My breath came in quick, shallow gasps. My mind screamed for me to push him away.

But my hands wouldn’t move.

The pain began to fade. Something almost like pleasure replacing it.

I lifted my hands, not to throttle him, but to tangle them in his hair. “Blake,” I pleaded.

“I feel it, too,” he murmured, between pulls. “We can’t deny it. We aren’t supposed to. It’s never been so good. You’re mine now. Always.”

Blake’s fangs were deep in my neck, his lips pressed firmly against my skin as he drank.

He wasn’t stopping. The pull of my blood called him.

Something was changing. Energy was draining from me. My body, once warm with heat, was beginning to grow cold. I tried to move, tried to shove him off, but my limbs were weak.

“Blake...” I gasped.

He didn’t stop. Or he couldn’t. His hunger, his need, seemed all-consuming.

His grip on me tightened as he drank deeper, more urgently.

My vision began to blur, the world around me starting to slip away. I felt my body shaking. The ground was trembling.

But it wasn’t just me.

The stones of the Dragon Court were shaking.

Suddenly, we were thrown to the ground, Blake’s fangs ripping from my neck, as our bodies collided with hard stone. I cried out in pain but my voice was drowned out by the deafening sound of stone erupting around us.

The entire courtyard was vibrating with incredible force.

Blake rose up over me, wrapping his arms around me, and shielding my body with his own. “Stay down,” he growled, his voice harsh.

“Get off,” I choked out, struggling weakly against him.

But he wouldn’t move.

A huge chunk of stone crashed nearby, sending dust and debris swirling into the air.

Then another fell, striking Blake on the head.

I screamed as blood began to trickle from a gash on his forehead, dripping onto me. But still, he didn’t move. His breathing was heavy, his muscles tensed as more stone rained down around us.

Amidst the chaos, something caught my eye.

The stones that were falling. Every single one of them was black.

The ground shook again, harder this time.

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