by Raven Dark
“Master…” I didn’t know what I’d wanted to ask for, but it didn’t matter. He’d lifted my hips up and driven into me before I could figure out what I’d wanted to say.
There was so much pain in him, so much raw emotion, I felt it in the way his fingers dug into my hip, in the shaky, growled rumbles from his throat that accompanied his thrusts.
I wanted to save him from such torment; if this was the only way he’d let me in, I’d take it—take it and consume it.
He savaged me without giving me a chance to acclimate to him. I loved it.
He pulled my arms up behind my back, pinning them with one fist.
I loved that, too.
His other hand gripped my hips, controlling them while he took his pleasure. “Who owns you?” His voice was unrecognizable.
“You do, Master.” The men around me had probably heard that. I didn’t care.
“Who else?”
“Master Hawk, Master.”
“Who else?” he demanded.
“Master Pretty Boy and Master Steel.”
“Good girl.” His hips slapped mine, his thrusts hungry.
Wanting to give him more of myself, I tried to lift my shoulders, but his hand pressed my cheek into the rough blanket under me. My need exploded, and a scream ripped from my throat while I bucked into him.
He hummed his approval, then sped up. A roar tore out of him as he pounded me a handful of times before he spent himself inside me.
Sheriff sighed, his arms closing around me, his breaths hard and heavy in my ear. He smoothed my hair back. “My perfect woman.” He kissed my shoulder, squeezed me one more time, and then released me.
Hearing him get up, I rolled onto my back, watching him run his hand down his sweat-slicked face. Enjoying the satisfied look in his eyes, the laid-back smile as he did up his pants.
For the moment, he wasn’t a General whose past and pain kept him at a distance, but a man who’d enjoyed his woman and who liked that she’d enjoyed him.
I liked this side of him.
“Clean her up, Hawk.” He gave me a lingering look that was both approving and warm, and then clapped Hawk on the back.
Before I could see where he went, Hawk, who had already sorted himself, scooped me up naked in his arms. “Come on, Kitten. Let’s get you a bath. We’ll come back to the party after.”
The breeze felt cool on my bare skin, and I clung to him, letting his warmth seep into me.
I wished I had a better handle on how Sheriff felt about us, about where we stood now, but if anything, I was more confused than ever.
Chapter 13
Julian
Early morning light flooded through the small window cut out of the stone wall in the bedroom portion of my cave, jerking me from sleep.
Lying across a second bed mat I’d set up in the corner of the room, I lifted my head, looking across to the mat I usually slept on. It was occupied by what had to be the most beautiful sight I’d ever seen.
Setora lay on her stomach, covered up to her waist in my thin crimson bed sheet, the only covering I used most of the time. The blanket had molded itself to the gorgeous slope of her ass, leaving her slender back and the curve of her shoulders exposed to the light that kissed her skin, making it look almost alabaster. She was facing me, away from the window, her eyes closed, while her back rose and fell with the slow rhythm of sleep. Her arms were folded under her head, leaving a hint of one breast visible where it was flattened to the leather mat.
I sat up to get a better look at her. She looked so peaceful, with that pale purple hair of hers splayed across the folded cushion at the top of the mat that served as a pillow. Bathed in the first few moments of early sunlight, her skin almost glowed, like an angel.
A primal possessiveness heated my belly, like the hunger for a good meal after a ritual fast. That hunger turned my cock to a rod of iron until I nearly marched over, rolled her onto her back, and plunged into her right there. Need for her burned like fire, as if I’d gone weeks without her.
Except I hadn’t. Far from it.
After Sheriff and I had taken her at that party, I’d carried her off to a bath. We’d cleaned up, and I’d taken her again. We’d washed off, and I’d brought my Kitten back here to my cave. We’d gone through the usual meditation before turning in. I’d given her tea with cama powder, the drug Doc had been using to keep her dreams away, along with her iris root. After, I’d meant to lie with her for a while until she fell asleep, then carry her to Sheriff’s room where she was safe. Instead, I’d taken her again, letting her drop off only after the beast in me had finally stopped clawing for more of her.
Refusing to endanger her by sleeping with my woman, but unwilling to have her away from me, I’d quietly set up a second bed at the other side of the room, where I could watch her until I dropped off.
Use of the Don-shi method was supposed to keep my nightmares from coming when used right before sleep, but so much had happened in the last few weeks, I hadn’t been willing to take the chance it wouldn’t work. I’d done too much, taken too many lives, gone too far into the darkness too often. That made me too dangerous. So I’d allowed her to remain in the room, but slept at a distance, where there was no chance of attacking her in sleep.
I rubbed my eyes and watched her a moment longer, watching the daylight grow brighter until it surrounded her in a halo of white, like an angel.
She was an angel. Pretty Boy had been right; Setora was heaven embodied in a living form, giving of herself to the point that she put aside her own fucking well-being to keep others safe.
She deserved better than a killer, better than a man so savage that he needed to lock his mind in a Fortress of steel while he slept to keep from hurting her. She deserved a man who could give her his whole heart. Instead, she had a master whose only chance of keeping her completely safe from his own darkness was to ascend to a level of near-mystical discipline, where emotions were beyond him. Where he couldn’t love her.
The choice loomed before me as I truly considered my feelings for her. How deep did they go? Did I love her? If I did, then I had to choose. I had to choose between giving her that love and making her mine the way Steel planned to do, or ascending in the Yantu order to that level that forbade emotion. That forbade even fucking her.
I scrubbed my face with my hands and sighed. No. There had to be another way to protect her. Another way without having to put her at such a distance that I didn’t even really have her anymore.
Unwilling to wake her just yet, I went to her and slipped carefully onto the mat next to her, laying her body over mine. Wrapping her in my warmth.
Setora murmured something unintelligible in sleep and slid her arm around my waist, nuzzling her face in my neck. My cock twitched between her legs, brushing the wetness already there. It hardened again, pressing almost into her core.
Instead of sating myself inside her, I let my hard-on linger, enjoying the way my muscles bunched in need, enjoying the hint of near pain that pulsed in my dick.
It was a strange thing. I liked being hard for her, liked that moment between being sated and needing her so much that I couldn’t ignore the sensation. It tested my self-control, built the anticipation of being with her, making the final moment when I was inside her that much more powerful.
Letting my cock twitch against her, I kissed her forehead and held her tighter.
Yantu ascension.
A life with her in the kind of love she and Steel shared.
Damn it.
If there was a way to have both, I’d have given anything for it.
Wings of the fucking Maker, I was getting ahead of myself. I didn’t even know if she loved me. Did I?
I’d seen something in her eyes that fit the label. When she thought I wasn’t looking, when she watched me meditate or practice battle. Her adoration was unmistakable. But was that love? The kind a woman whispered to a man in the days of the Old World? The kind I’d thought I’d heard her express to Steel?
> It bothered me that I wanted complete and total love from her when I knew I might not be able to return it. It pissed me off more that I wanted to return it, that wrapping myself in the cloaks of a fifth level master didn’t seem as important as it once had. Not when weighed against her.
My cock twitched again, unrelenting. As if it sought to make the decision for me. Mocking the obligatory celibacy I’d have to embrace if I chose to become a tai dan, a Yantu warrior of fifth level or higher.
Setora stirred against me, making me look down. Face turned up to me, her eyes opened, blinking in the room’s light. Her soft lips curved in a sweet smile.
“Morning, Master.” Her voice was throaty from sleep. It made me think of the way her screams had sounded by the third time I’d fucked her. Hoarse and raw.
How the hell could I spend my life never having her again?
“Morning, my Kitten.” I stroked her slender chin. I’d have kissed her, but I didn’t know if I could have managed it without ravaging her.
She jerked her head up, her thin, sculpted brows knitting with worry. “Have you been up all night? Did you sleep at all?”
I knew why she was asking that. I never slept with her, so she assumed I’d had to stay awake to hold her. Her concern for me made my heart jump.
“A little, over there.” I nodded to the other mat.
Setora relaxed and snuggled against me. “Have you sent that letter to Master Leif yet, Master?”
I nodded. “The day after we got back. I meant to tell you that, but everything got so busy the last few days, I forgot.”
She ran her hand along my chest. “How long will it take to get a reply?”
“It could take a few days. My order is almost two weeks from here, but by pigeon, it’s a week there and back.”
“Pigeon?” She lifted her head again. “The Grotto has a pigeon post?”
“Yes. We have falcons, too. I’ll show you the coop sometime. It’s faster than by vehicle.”
“What do you think Master Leif will say? About my dreams? About the things I can do?”
The worry in her voice made me pull her closer. “I have no idea. But whatever happens, we’ll figure it out. Okay?”
She nodded.
The trust in her gaze made my bones feel like damn putty.
“Did you have any dreams last night?” I pushed her hair over her shoulder.
“Not one.”
“Good. In a day or two, you’ll have to skip the drugs and let your mind go where it will. Not dreaming too long can cause problems. We’ll have to rely on the Don-shi to keep the bad dreams at bay. But if the nightmares come, we’ll deal with them.”
Fear flickered across her face, but she nodded her understanding. I knew she was thinking of that man without a face, and I wanted to reach into that head of hers, find him, and cut him in two, whether he was real or not.
I’d once thought he was nothing more than some strange manifestation of her thoughts. Fears given flesh, if only in her mind. But since our discussion in Lord Falnar’s garden, I knew there was more to it. More, but what? Surely there couldn’t be a real person behind what she saw, terrorizing her while she slept.
Higher level tai dan were said to have abilities to link themselves to the minds of others, not unlike she did, but Master Leif and others of his rank in the order refused to admit to such skill outright. Even if there were Yantu who could, no Yantu would do something like that. And other than her, if the rumors were to be believed, they were the only people I knew of who could.
Setora’s mouth opened like she meant to say something, but then closed.
“What is it, Kitten?”
“Master…you didn’t take me to Sheriff’s last night.”
“Do you wish I had?” I teased.
She shook her head, her eyes warm. “I liked that you let me stay with you.”
Her teeth worried her lip for a moment. My cock jumped, the urge to bite her bottom lip the way she was now making me lick mine.
“Master, can I ask you something?”
“Always.”
“Why did you do that?”
I assumed she was still referring to her staying in the room with me while we slept. “I didn’t want you away from me.”
“No…I mean why did you take me…with Sheriff there? That’s not your thing, is it?”
I grunted a laugh. “Ah.” I put my head back on the pillow, looking at the ceiling, considering. “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
“Master.” Her eyes twinkled, catching onto my evasiveness.
“Yes.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“Yes, it is.”
“No, it isn’t.”
I grinned. The expression felt almost alien to me. “I was drunk,” I said, toying with her. “Alcohol does things to a man’s mind.”
She chuckled and sat up, straddling me. Her head cocked to the side. “Please tell me.”
I sighed and met her probing gaze. How did she make me want to give her the world on a fucking silver platter? I cupped her perfect hips in my palms.
“I promised myself I’d never pull away from you when things got bad, Setora. Not unless I really had to. You deserve better. So I lost myself in you instead. Sheriff must have realized part of me was still trying to hold back, or he wouldn’t have done what he did.”
Half-hearted annoyance with him for taking over both of us mixed with enjoyment at the memory. I still didn’t know why I let him do it.
“I liked what he did, Master.” She bent, putting her face close to mine. “I don’t think you would have let go completely if he hadn’t made me suck you off.”
Her wetness coated my dick, letting me know exactly how much she liked it.
“You just liked seeing me lose control.” I gave one of her perky nipples a pinch.
She whimpered. Her sex slicked even more. She put her face inches from mine. “I did.”
I growled and grabbed her head, mashing her lips to mine. When I released her, she didn’t pull back. Instead, her eyes stayed on mine, filled with phenomenal warmth.
And something else. Something a man like me didn’t deserve. Selfishness had me wanting so much more than her body or the adoration I could see there. It had me wanting her heart.
Before I could consider my actions too deeply, I threw her off me onto the mat and rolled on top of her. She squealed in delighted surprise. I pinned her arms above her head, crushing her wrists into the mat.
Setora spread her long legs to either side of my hips, welcoming my cock where it nestled against her sex. Perfect submission filled her eyes.
The words growled out before I could stop them.
“How do you feel about me, Kitten?”
Her brows went up and her mouth dropped open before her gaze fell to my throat. Away from my eyes. She looked like a woman caught treading too far into a forbidden room.
Fuck. This made things so much harder. It made my choice much more complicated, and yet, I couldn’t shut down the need to know. The need to hear it for myself.
“Kitten. Look at me.”
Her chest shook on a sigh, but her eyes obeyed my command, meeting mine.
“Tell me how you feel about me.”
“I…I think you know, Master.”
My heart simultaneously clenched and exulted. I settled more firmly into her curves and ran my hands down her arms, molding them to the mat without releasing them.
“Say it anyway.”
Her chest rose and fell on a bigger sigh. Fear—fear that I’d pull away, or something else?—clouded her eyes. When she spoke, her voice was so soft I barely heard her.
“I love you, Hawk. More than life itself. Every bit as much as Steel…”
I closed my eyes and buried my face in her neck, moaning in my throat at her confession. Her words washed over me, slicing at my heart for what I couldn’t give her, even while it healed a part of my soul my own demons refused to release.
But unspoken words hung
in the air. She’d trailed off like she’d meant to add another name after Steel’s.
She loved another one of us, but which one? Pretty Boy or Sheriff? I’d have bet my Yantu rank as a fourth level master it was Pretty Boy. Sheriff was too…Sheriff to allow her to open herself to him that much yet. She probably still didn’t believe me when I said he loved her, and by her hesitation, she hadn’t told Pretty Boy.
I lifted my head. “How long have you known?”
She looked away for a moment. “Since that night in your meditation cave.”
I rested my forehead on her shoulder again, unsure what to say. Never in a million years would I have thought a man like me would ever have such a precious thing as a woman’s love. My hands clenched in hers. She winced, and I loosened my grip, massaging them.
“I’m sorry, Master.” Her voice was still soft. “I was hoping you’d never know.”
I lifted my head. “Why?” The word came out a lot sharper than I meant it to.
“Because. I know how the Yantu feel about emotion. Perfect enlightenment is a state beyond emotion. My loving you is a weakness.”
I knitted my brows. “Is that what you think? You think because I am Yantu, I see your feelings for me as a bad thing?”
“For you, it is. Isn’t it?”
The fear in her eyes, the fear of loss, tore at my insides.
I shook my head and laid myself beside her, pulling her into my arms. Tilting her chin up until her eyes were on mine.
“Listen to me, Kitten. You are not Yantu. My beliefs are not yours, and they never have to be.”
“But I am yours. A slave should be the best woman for her master. I can’t shut my feelings off like you can, but I want to be strong for you. What you need. You need a woman who isn’t given to weakness.”
Her need to please me pushed the air out of my lungs. I let out a half laugh. “No. Don’t ever do that. Do not change who you are for me. I love that you respect and appreciate and even admire my ways, but never become something you aren’t for me. It’s true, I can never love you the way I want to. If I ever become a fifth level Yantu, I won’t be able to give you what you deserve. But we aren’t there yet. If you truly have love for me in here…” I covered her heart with my hand. “…then feel it. Let it fill you up until it becomes you. I love hearing it. Tell me all the time. Every time you need to. Love is not weakness. For someone who is not Yantu, it is strength. For you—for someone who thrives off of giving, off of the salvation and caring for others—it’s strength. Especially when you feel it for men who live in darkness. I may not be able to love you, not as you know it, but I will always protect your heart and cherish what is in here.” I tapped her heart with my finger.
