Page 28 of Fate Unchained

Kyril closed his eyes and pictured changing.

A dull tingling spread throughout his body, like a static charge pulling at his fur. His eyes flew open, and he looked down at his feet. Toes without claws. He ran his hands down his chest. Bronze skin with little hair. His trousers hung a little lower on his hips, but they stayed on. He tugged his waistband open and peeked inside.

Good—his cock was still the same size.

He dragged a hand through his hair. It was maybe a couple of inches long, and the hair was silkier than his fur. He glanced at Lilah, still sleeping in his bed. Would she like how he looked?

He rubbed his face absently. When he’d been a teenager, before he’d taken his permanent vulk form at twenty, many of the female peltwalkers in his clan pursued him. Mostly the older ones.

He was the troublemaker, the one always a claw away from fighting; however, some women seemed to like it. Not librarians, though. Although Lilah kept touching him, so maybe she did want a little vulk in her.

He growled and scrubbed a hand over his face. Great, now he was picturing her under him. Clawing at him as he wrung pleasure from her all night long. His cock thickened, pressing against his trousers. He glanced at her as she remained sleeping. Would her eyes darken as she became completely unwound?

He growled again and turned away. It was best if she remembered he was a vulk. Someone foreign and undesirable. Though the rune paired them together, they wouldn’t be compatible in any way, least of all in bed.

He stalked as close to the cave entrance as the cage would allow. His steps were shorter and jerky, and the air seemed thicker as if it took more effort to move through.

Delightful—he was going to be as slow as a troll in this form.

He stopped and listened. The wind still whipped, a dull roar in his ears. It wasn’t going to blow itself out anytime soon.

He inhaled, but it was as if he had a blanket over his face, masking the nuances of the air. Pitiful, really. Humans had such limited senses.

He waited for some kind of sensation inside. Maybe a kick of excitement at finally shedding his vulk form after centuries. Nothing. Not a lick of anything.

He shrugged. Not much of a surprise there. Before he’d turned twenty, all he’d wanted was to finally turn fully vulk, and when he had, not once had he ever wished he was back in his human skin. Not even during the times when it would have been easier to blend into the crowd and walk amongst the towns and villages.

He stretched, his muscles bunching and flexing in a way that was too tight. Foreign. As if he was coiled and ready to attack, but had nowhere to leap. This form made him feel clumsy and muted his connection to the forest. A connection that was always there and until now, he’d never quite realized just how much it threaded through him. Without it, everything felt wrong. He shook his head and changed back to his vulk form, where he could hear the wind’s anger howling across the cave mouth fully.

Returning to the interior of the cave, he strode to the fire and tossed on another log. He’d kept it steady all day to keep Lilah warm, and because he’d dried out the rest of the venison to make more jerky. It wouldn’t be particularly flavorful, but they’d need some stores if they headed to Coromesto.

He slid under the sleeping skins with her, leaving room between them. Placing his hands underneath his head, he lay on his back, staring up at the smoke whipping through the hole in the roof.

Lilah murmured and stretched. She settled back under the blankets and inched a bit closer to him. “Don’t you sleep?” she asked.

“I don’t need much sleep.”

“Is that normal for the vulk?”

He turned his head. She was still on her side, staring up at him. “Are you going to write a book about me?”

She squinted slightly, studying him. “No, I’m no writer, but I read a lot of books with secret information about the immortals. There was never much information about the vulk.”

“What do you mean books with secret information?”

She took her time before answering. “At night, I can see which books aren’t what they seem. They glow slightly. There’s always a trick to make them show what’s really written on their pages.” She got a smug kind of expression on her face. “Even magicwielders can’t see it. Many times, I’ve activated a rune, but not like,” she gestured at his chest, “our rune.”

Our rune. His chest grew warm.

“Many of those books have information about Ulterra, immortals, or sometimes magic, that the writer wanted to hide for whatever reason. To others, they seem perfectly normal, and they usually have a rather dull topic as a decoy. The titles they pick are kind of funny, and some of them are a code.” She smiled, and his heart skipped.

“What do you mean?” Maybe her answer would make her smile like that again.

Her cheeks pinkened slightly. “Well, there was this one called A Bird in the Hand is Worth Two in the Bush. When you read it without the rune, it’s a birdwatching book, but when you activate the hidden words, it’s about handling something quite different.” Her lips curled upward a fraction. “It’s a how-to guide about having fun in the bedroom. It mentioned the different immortals and how you are all different, too. I wish there had been illustrations.”

She had his attention. He rolled onto his side, and now they were mere inches apart. “Maybe I’ve underestimated the joy of reading. Pick up any tips?”

“Some. I tried a few things with my neighbor, Norville, but I stopped after he kept asking me to marry him.”

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