Page 107 of To Free a Soul
When he first woke up and had been able to sense that a very long time had passed, he thought any tentative bond between them would be shattered. He’d broken promises, had essentiallyabandoned her when she could have needed him, and provided unanswered solitude and isolation.
Somewhere during their separation, things had not worsened, but bettered. How that was possible, he didn’t know.
Especially when there was unshed pain that lingered in her gaze, and internal wounds that she’d shared but not unburdened herself with. How an echo of loneliness came from her and often mimicked his in a spiralling parallel.
I like it.These changes, this softness and constant reach for him, left behind a tender sentiment to shiver through the cloud of his shadows.I’m growing fond of this side of her.
Their bond was strengthening alongside Weldir’s affection for her. And his deep, darkening obsession with her had begun.
If he wasn’t with her in this part of his realm, speaking with her through a viewing disc, fixing Tenebris, or consuming souls in a safe way that didn’t drag him under, Weldir was in his cave of memories.
Being there annoyed him as much as it transfixed him, living in the moments of her pleasure nostalgically, while furious that he was unable to add to them. Not in the way he – and apparentlyshe– desired.
I’m growing stronger.Lifting his right arm, he collected all his solidness to gauge his power levels, and it encompassed his entire right hand to his right elbow.But this is not enough.
Not to resume their intimacy – especially as he constantly put off growing his mist now that she’d helped him lay it all across the world again. Fixing Tenebris was taking time, effort, and mana he didn’t have to spare, and Nathair still lay asleep within it. All the souls within slumbered, and it made his afterworld dreary and depressing – he now hated being there, when he once enjoyed watching it teeming with life.
Five years wasn’t enough to regain what he had built over the course of nearly two human centuries.
The only silver lining was that his well of mana stores, although empty, was deeper. He had more souls within Tenebris, and each one offered him just a speck of power every day to feed him. Those tiny fragments of power, as a collective, as a whole, were likely the only reason he’d survived Nathair’s carnage, and why he’d woken up when he had.
Lindiwe has been helping as well.
In between searching for souls for him, she’d come to rest here – freely and comfortably – before spending time with him. They sat together and watched their offspring through viewing discs, as if she hadn’t spoken to him theentiretime she’d wandered the world, noting anything and everything that could be of interest to him, just to share her voice as he offered his own.
Humoured when a curl caught on her long, dark lashes, he brushed that one back as well. Contentment from doing even this simple act vibrated through him.
Especially when she arched like a naughty little female who wanted to be petted, even in sleep.
If only I didn’t need to right everything once more first.
He would’ve given her exactly what she sought.
November 21st, 1908
I can’t take it anymore.Lindiwe mentally groaned, ghosting her hand down her abdomen.
Lying on her side, she peeked open her eyes to check on the smouldering coals of her dying campfire, its light low and its heat faded. Nearby, the lake she’d washed in earlier trickled in the distance, a gentle cascade of nature’s music.
The waxing crescent moon offered muted light, but it barely reached her under the shadowy protection ward she’d placed around herself. She was safe, her scent masked under a magical cloak, and she was hidden from unwitting interlopers under the dome and her blanket.
She burrowed further under the thin material until just the top of her head was exposed, then dipped her fingertips into the waistband of her underwear. Doing this out in the open was nerve-wracking, but a woman had to take her opportunities when she could. Especially when she was tired of the ache that constantly pestered her.
This wasn’t the first time Lindiwe had sated her lust sinceWeldir’s return, but the longer it went on, the harder it was to resist the temptation.
Especially when she had his deep, body-tingling baritone in her ear constantly, including right before she’d drifted off earlier this night. She always found it harder when she was falling asleep, as twisted, heated images flickered behind her closed eyelids. They bled into her dreams until the hot pulsing thrummed in her nipples, her clit, her very blood.
Times like now, when she woke to find herself panting and needy, she desperately wanted to call out to the one being she desired to take care of it.
But she couldn’t yet.There’s still barely anything of him.What Weldir recuperated, he used almost instantly. That was okay, kind of. She’d done this dozens of times now, both during and after his disappearance.
Lindiwe lifted her leg so she could wedge her hand further within the tight material. When her fingertips touched soaking flesh and her sensitive clit, she shut her thighs and rocked the throbbing bud against them. She let out a soft expire as she moved her fingers side to side in a hard and lazy motion, then bit down on her lips to muffle her noises.
She reached into the low neckline of her dress, accidentally exposing her breast, and kneaded it. She pinched her nipple between two fingers, sending a jolt down her body that coiled in her belly and made her core clench.
I’m so horny. All the fucking time. Her touch-starved body hungered like nothing else. She’d rather have the need to eat than the aching, pestering need to be stretched open by his shadowy girth and pounded into until she lost consciousness.
I want to be bitten,she thought with a whine, remembering the feel of inhuman canine fangs nipping hard and mean.I want to feel his claws against my skin.Like little threats that could doso,somuch damage, and did nothing but send her skin tingling until she was frantic for them to cut deeper.
