Page 129 of Eldritch
The fury burned in my chest with a vengeance, and through tears, I clenched my teeth. “You didn’t force it upon me. You didn’t take from me without asking. But it is not my nature tohurt those I care about. So I need to be comforted, too. I need assurance that you don’t perceive me as your abuser.”
“Fucking hell, I’m sorry. I won’t ask you again, I swear it.”
“Do you feel the same relief without the pain?”
A grim expression crawled over his face. “No.”
“But back at Elowen’s…when you and I…You seemed very contented that night.”
He turned slightly away, and the shame from before resurfaced in his expression. “I summoned the flame. In my hands. I finished because I summoned the flame, and the metal…”
“The piercings…you burned yourself. So, it will always be this way?”
“Even if I were willing to try without the pain. So long as the piercings remain, I’ll never know true pleasure without it. I’ll always crave it.”
“You can’t remove them?”
“No. They’re enchanted.”
“You can experience relief this way, though. And youdoglean pleasure from it, in spite of the pain.”
“Yes, but I won’t ask you?—”
“You haven’t asked me once. Not once. In fact, you did a damn good job of hiding it. But you don’t have to hide anymore. I am offering to do it again, on one condition.” Hooking my finger beneath his chin, I guided his eyes back to mine. “I need you to assure me that I haven’t destroyed you by doing this. That you can feel something more than the ecstasy of pain, knowing that it’smeand not the one who hurt you. That you let me show you what love and caring feels like, to balance these dark thoughts you carry.”
At first, he stared off toward the water, gaze vacant and unblinking, his breaths slow and measured. A muscle in his jaw twitched, a betrayal of the silent battle behind his eyes. Themisty shield in them threatened to break, but he clenched his teeth, swallowing it back, and lifted his gaze to mine.
“What is it? What’s wrong?” I asked, cupping his cheek. When he shook his head, I threaded my fingers in his hair and kissed his forehead. “Tell me.”
“I’ve walked this world for so long, searching for you.” His brow tightened. “Centuries have gnawed at me, hollowing me to the bone. I didn’t know how starved I was, or what I craved, until I found you.” Both hands gripping my bottom, he pulled me closer and crushed his lips to mine. “I will never be worthy of your light, the purity of your heart, but I’m too selfish to spare you from this darkness I carry. Godsblood, I would follow you to the edge of existence and into the black void.”
I rested my hand against his cheek, my body stretched across his naked chest. “Youareworthy.”
His brows lowered, muscles stiff and tense as he looked away. “And yet, I bear the marks of a slave.”
“You bear the marks of a warrior unbroken by the kind of pain that would’ve destroyed lesser men.” A jagged ridge across his throat carved the violent path of a blade as it slipped beneath my tracing fingertip. “Every one of these scars is precious to me. More precious than coin or crown.”
Fingers curled around the curve of my neck, he ran his thumb across my bottom lip, eyes focused there. “You’re a fate I never dared to dream, moon witch. The stars I was never meant to grasp. But seeing how this gluttonous world devours the unclaimed, I’m calling you mine.” He dragged me into a kiss that burned across my mouth and deep inside my chest.
Cold air rushed across my skin, as he lifted me out of the tub, letting the water spill across the stony floor while he carried me across the room. The blaze of the fireplace sapped the cold, and he stood me on my feet where the hearth had warmed the stonesbelow them. With both hands, he lifted the shift over my head and tossed it away.
Completely naked, I covered my breasts, but his massive body urged me back onto the blankets that lay crumpled on the floor. Soft velvet brushed across my skin when I lay back, letting him cage me beneath his muscled form, his arms outstretched on either side of me. A brush across my thigh had me looking down between us. His stiff flesh lay against my thigh and bore the deep crescents of my nails where I’d clutched him. The agony of what I’d done to him was quickly smothered by the tendrils of worry coiling around my spine, as I took in his size, and my stomach churned to a tight knot, imagining him pushing it inside of me.
He hooked his finger beneath my chin, guiding my eyes to his. “You’ve nothing to worry about, Lunamiszka. I don’t think either of us is ready for what it’ll feel like inside of you.”
Relieved, I swallowed a gulp and nodded.
He lowered himself to my side, pulling my body in close, my back to his chest, and I watched the fire flicker as we lay naked and bared to one another. Vulnerable. Yet, I’d never felt so safe and contented in my life. Despite his erection pressing against my backside, there was no intent on his part, yet even so, my head spun with anxious thoughts.
“Does it make you nervous?” he asked, as if he’d read my mind.
“I worry that I won’t be able to accommodate.” I couldn’t imagine the pain, given the size of him.
His dark chuckle rumbled against my back. “Don’t think about it now. And know that, when the time comes, and you’re ready, I will not hurt you.”
“Will you feel pleasure that way?”
“I cannot begin to fathom what I’ll feel with you. It’s an elusive sensation that I suspect will take me by surprise.”
