Page 90 of Storm of Blood and Shadow

“Wait for me here,” I tell Jessiva. “I have something to do.”

“No.” She doesn’t budge from my back. “No more mysterious declarations, remember? You tell me everything.”

“Fine.” I release a hoarse chuckle. My throat was designed to channel lightning and void magic, but after tonight, even its resilience has been tested, and it’s sore. “I intend to fly as high as I can without passing out, and release what is left of the Mordvorren into the highest arches of the sky. If I’m right, it won’t be able to survive at that altitude, and in its weakened state, it will dissipate and be gone forever.”

Jessiva shifts on my back, and the ropes holding her there slacken and fall. “Now that’s a good plan.”

She slides off my back and waits for me while I fight my way upward. My wings have several tears along the edges, and doing this could make them worse—but dragons have great powers of healing. If I can accomplish this final task, I will be able to rest, and my wings will recover.

Some of the wind eddying above the Twin Fangs is the remainder of what I tore away from the Mordvorren. I use the currents to buoy myself up and up, until I’m as high as I’ve ever flown. Still I beat my wings, striving against my body’s exhaustion, its need to cease the exertion and rest. I push myself past the limits of my endurance until all my bones ache and my wings tremble with every laborious beat.

When I’m this far above the world, my lungs can barely function in the cold, thin air. It will have to be high enough.

Groaning with the effort of maintaining this altitude, I open my throat again and widen the channel inside me, the pathway to the void. I force the Mordvorren out of me through a violent spasm of my whole body and a fierce push of my will against what remains of its consciousness.

It was right to fear me. Perhaps it descended upon Ouroskelle because it craved a challenge, lusted for conquest. But I proved to be too much for it—not solely by my own strength, but because of the love and support of Jessiva and my brother.

In their names I expel the storm from my body, watching it gush out in a roiling mass of turbulent cloud. For a moment, the Mordvorren struggles to condense itself, to take form—but it is already unspooling, fading, clouds drifting apart and winds scattering. Whatever combination of magic and weather held it together and gave it consciousness, that locus has been damaged beyond repair.

When every last bit of the storm has left my body, I feel as if I’ve been wiped clean. I let myself fall, watching the shreds of cloud dissipate, feeling the wind rush past my battered wings. As I spin through the air, I notice a bright orange haze from the crater of the island where I spent so many days in misery. The interior of the ancestral voratrice, which was smoking before, is blazing in earnest now, and it illuminates the night with a glow that feels brilliantly festive to me.

As I approach the broken peaks of the twin islands I catch myself out of the freefall and glide toward the hilltop where Jessiva waits. I transform as I land, as weary of my dragon form as I am grateful to it.

In human shape, with my magic sealed away to replenish itself and the pain of my injured wings abated, I find myself somewhat less exhausted. A buzz of triumphant energy stirs in my blood as I walk toward Jessiva on my two human legs.

She marches up to me and slaps my cheek. “That’s for making me think you haddiedand that you were falling!” Her voice is fractured, strained. By the glow from the burning voratrice, I can see tears glistening on her cheeks. “I was going out of my mind watching you plummet down—” She breaks off with a tight sob, struggling to hold back the evidence of her terror.

“Fuck, I didn’t realize you would think that.” I reach for her, but she jerks away from me.

I wait patiently, knowing how strong she has been tonight—how strong she has been ever since I met her. She holds her emotions inside, repressing the ones that she views as weak, maintaining the outward calm and steadiness that she wants to feel on the inside, too. She and I are so different, and yet so alike.

“Bastard,” she hisses at me.

“I’m sorry for making you worry.”

“Fuck you,” she says viciously, but when I advance, she doesn’t recoil. I move in behind her and slowly fold my arms around her body, her back against my chest.

Jessiva stays rigid at first, resistant, but after several seconds she relaxes against me. I kiss her hair and set my chin on top of her head.

“It’s over,” she whispers.

“Yes.” The word is an exhale, a deep sigh from my weary lungs.

When I was descending from the sky, I detected the burning stench of the voratrice, but in my human form it’s less noticeable. Tiny flowers dot the grass on the hilltop, and their scent surrounds us, masking the smell of the distant smoke. Woven with the flowers’ fragrance is another scent, sweetly familiar… my darling’s reaction to the way I’m clasping her my arms.

My right hand slides lower. She’s still wearing her revealing dance costume, and I can’t stop thinking about how very thin the soft material is that separates her smooth flesh from my hand. I can’t resist shifting it up and cupping the warm, supple curve of her breast.

Jessiva inhales and tenses against me. I sway my hips forward, letting her feel the hardness of my cock against her ass. Since her body is giving off the fragrance of arousal, she might be amenable to the idea of coupling.

“It’s strange,” I murmur. “I should be tired—Iamtired—but I find myself wanting to fuck.”

“I used to become very lustful after a successful performance,” she admits. “Something to do with the intensity, the excitement, the achievement—oh,” she moans softly as my left hand slips into her clothing, between her legs. I massage her clit and then curl my hand, slipping three fingers into her pussy.

“Another little river flowing for me,” I whisper, my mouth at her ear. “I’ve missed the scent of you, darling. The way you melt on my fingers.” I shift the angle of my hand, stroking her clit with my thumb while my three central fingers remain tucked into her slick warmth.

Jessiva’s body flexes in my arms as she tries to take me deeper, tries to pleasure herself on my hand. “Stop playing with me, Varex,” she breathes. “It’s been weeks. Throw me down and rut me into the fucking ground.”

The primal side of me, the part that was never quite satisfied during the mating frenzy, pounces on the idea with feral delight. I take my fingers out of her, spin her around, and cup her chin, forcing her to look at me while I lick her wetness from my other hand. Her pupils dilate and her lips part as color rises in her cheeks.

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