Page 109 of The Curse of Golden Blood
Her orgasm tore through her with devastating force. She screamed, her nails raking down my back hard enough to draw blood. The pain mixed with pleasure, driving me wild.
I followed her over the edge, my release flooding her in hot pulses. But I didn't stop moving. I fucked her through it, prolonging both our pleasure until she was crying, until I'd given her every last drop.
When I finally stilled, we were both shaking, both covered in sweat and marked with evidence of our claiming. I stayed inside her, not ready to lose that connection. I was still achingly hard, and the urge to breed her was almost unbearable.
Miralyte's eyes were closed, her breathing ragged. I ran my hand through her hair, soothing the damp strands away from her face.
"Sweetling," I murmured. "Are you all right?"
She nodded, the motion jerky and stiff.
"Can you open your eyes for me?"
She did, blinking up at me through the shadows. "Hi," she said softly.
I smiled, brushing the hair away from her face. "Hi."
She tried to lift her hand to touch my cheek, but her arm shook. I grabbed her wrist before it could fall and pressed a kiss to her palm. "You did so well. So good for me."
She let out a breath, smiling. "That was intense."
"Too much?"
She shook her head, licking her lips. "No. Just right."
But something felt wrong. Not in the obvious way, not in the way that would have me reaching for water or loosening bindings. Something subtler. Something in the way her eyes didn't quite focus on mine, or the way her smile seemed to take a fraction too long to reach her face.
I cupped her cheek, studying her features more carefully. Her pupils were dilated, which was normal enough after whatwe'd just done. Her breathing was evening out. Her skin was warm, flushed in all the right places.
Yet.
There was something beneath the surface. A wrongness I couldn't name.
twenty-nine
Gilded Silence
Miralyte
InalltheweeksI'd been here, through training sessions and council meetings and stolen moments in dark corridors, Zydar had never once covered his chest. He dressed for formal events when protocol demanded it, but the moment he returned to his chambers, he ripped it off.
It was a point of pride for him, I'd realized. The way fae displayed their power through their bodies, their wings, their unmarked skin that spoke of centuries surviving what would kill mortals in days.
So when he'd kept his shirt on last night, even during lovemaking, I'd known something was wrong.
He'd been careful about it. Redirecting my hands when they wandered too high, keeping the fabric between us even when everything else had been stripped away. At the time, I'd been too lost in sensation to questionit. Too caught up in the feeling of him inside me, around me, consuming me completely.
But after, when he'd finally fallen into restless sleep, I'd let curiosity win.
I'd been gentle. Slow. Easing the fabric up just enough to see what he'd been hiding.
Black veins.
They'd carved across his chest like lightning frozen in flesh, spreading from his heart in a web of corruption that made my blood run cold.
Each marked a countdown toward death, spreading like poison through the only person who'd ever made me feel whole.
The rot. I knew those marks. Had watched them consume Riden until there was nothing left but hollow bone and bitter regret. Had seen too many fae succumb to the same creeping darkness that now claimed the man I loved.
