Bleu.
From time to time in the seven centuries she had known him she had wondered about his name, but she had never caught it. She had never imagined it to be the one he had given to her though, but now she knew it, she felt it suited him somehow.
He warmed her and made her feel free as if she was flying in blue skies.
Blue skies that he no doubt knew.
She lifted her head from his bare chest, wanting to ask him about the mortal world, but the questions fled her lips when she saw his face peaceful in slumber, relaxed and more handsome than ever.
He needed to rest.
She had sensed it in their connection, the one he had forged by drinking from her, triggering the bonding process in an elven way.
She could still sense it in him now, while he was sleeping.
She needed rest too if she was going to be strong enough to face what lay ahead of her, but she couldn’t bring herself to close her eyes. It felt as if by doing so she would be squandering this moment of calm with him, this brief time when everything outside the cave didn’t exist and there was only the two of them without a care in the world.
She couldn’t remember ever feeling like this before.
She hadn’t thought it possible.
When lost to her memories, she had told him things she had sworn she would never reveal to anyone, fear of how they would view her forcing her to hold her tongue. In that spell of madness, awareness of what she had been doing had been stripped from her and she had let it all spill from her lips. She had told him everything.
But rather than turning away from her as she had expected, fulfilling her fear that no one would love her if they knew about her past and the things she had done, the terrible centuries she had somehow survived, he had done the opposite.
He had drawn her to him.
Instead of rejecting her, he had forged a stronger connection between them, bringing them closer together.
She still marvelled at that, feeling as if she had dreamed it all. It was going to take time for it to sink in, but even in his sleep he was taking steps to make that happen without even knowing it.
She gazed down at him, the way he held her close to him telling her something that slowly washed away some of the hurt in her past because his embrace was tender, filled with affection that she knew he didn’t want to admit to her. She could understand his reservations, because she had them too, was struggling with these new feelings growing inside her just as he was.
He mumbled something in his strange tongue, lyrical words that sounded as magical as many in Hell thought his kind to be. His lips smacked together, his nose twitched, and then he sighed as he relaxed again beneath her.
She lost track of time as she studied him, absorbing everything about him as he slept, unaware of her watching over him. Such a strong male. Fierce. Dangerous.
Possessive.
She had felt that last one in him when they had made love. It had run through her too, awakening her dragon instincts as his female and forcing her to respond to her desire by staking a claim on him and making it clear she wouldn’t accept no as an answer.
She had never surrendered to that instinct before, but she had let it overcome her in the moment, had embraced it and had seen the flicker of excitement that had brightened his eyes. He had liked her taking charge, exerting her strength and showing him how fiercely she wanted him.
Just thinking about it fanned the embers of desire in her veins, until she burned for him again.
Taryn tamped them down, aware that she would wake him if she continued to let her desires run rampant and unchecked.
They were bonded now, not in a permanent way but in one strong enough that he could sense things in her.
She could sense things in him too, but some of those things she didn’t need a bond to make her see them.
He felt guilty.
She had caught the way his expression shifted whenever he glanced at her throat, the flashes of guilt that crossed his eyes before he dragged them away and the shame and self-reproach that simmered in his veins.
She dimly remembered mentioning it to him when she had been lost in her memories and how wounded he had looked. She remembered it because she had felt bad, guilty about the barb she had thrown at him when he had helped her, had burst into the elven cellblock bare seconds after they had put her in a cage and had freed her from captivity.
Normally when the memories seized her as strongly as they had back then, she couldn’t remember anything that she did, relived her past so vividly that she wasn’t aware of anything else.
Was it his presence that had helped her retain enough of her consciousness to combat the memories and remain partially aware of the world and the things that were happening around her?
His presence seemed to trigger a lot of things in her, not only a strength to battle her memories or to see a vision of the future.
It triggered a heat in her too, a hunger that was startling in its intensity and felt as if it was impossible to sate.
Even just the feel of his bare skin against hers was enough to have her tingling wherever he touched.
The dark slashes of his eyebrows twitched into a frown.
“I can feel you staring,” he rumbled, voice a low drone that soothed her but stirred the heat growing inside her, fanning it hotter.
He lifted his right hand away from her bare back, ran his fingers through his tousled blue-black hair and yawned. No fangs, but his canines were still longer than a mortal’s would be, a sign that part of him was still on edge.
Or hungry.
He tucked his right arm behind his head, stifled another yawn and slowly opened his eyes. Pure amethyst. Sometimes she wished her eyes were like his, not strangely two-tone. None would stare at her or think her valuable if she had eyes like that.
“Come back to me, Taryn,” he murmured and she frowned at him, was on the verge of saying that she hadn’t gone anywhere when it struck her that she had.
She had been sinking into her memories again, thinking of all the horrible things that might not have happened to her if she had been like other dragons, a single and common colour.
Bleu raised his left hand and sifted his fingers through her hair, combing it back from her face, and cupped her cheek.
Her breath hitched as his heat seeped into her, the softness of his caress warming her right down to her soul, and her heart picked up pace in response to the shiver that ran down her spine.
She stared into his eyes, losing herself in them and not wanting to come back to the world, not when it felt so perfect here with him. She felt so safe cocooned in the arms of this male she was falling in love with.
Had perhaps loved for longer than she cared to admit.
He loosed a little moan of pleasure as he stretched beneath her, his delicious body flexing and each muscle announcing itself in a way that had her hungry for another taste of him. She squeezed her thighs together and bit back a moan of her own as she throbbed, still pleasantly sore from their lovemaking.
Bleu shifted position, moving his right arm higher, so it supported his head. His biceps bulged and she cursed them for being such a wonderful distraction.
Together with the rest of him.
The gods had been cruel when they had built her mate so perfect.
She was surprised she had managed to resist him for this long, had been able to tear herself away from him whenever their paths had crossed. The last time, at the slavers market, had been the hardest. She had been so afraid in that moment, tired and battered, on the verge of collapse, and he had been such a temptation. She had wanted to surrender to him, even though she had known that he wouldn’t be gentle with her as she had needed, that if she gave up the fight and let him capture her that only death would have awaited her.
Bleu sighed and brushed his fingers through her hair. “I am losing you again.”
Taryn blinked herself back to him. “My mind wandered.”
“And where did it go?” A half smi
le played on his lips and she cursed the gods again, because now he looked even more perfect. Roguish. Gorgeous. A little bit wicked.
She pulled her gaze away from him, lifting it up to look over his head towards the mouth of the cave. It was growing lighter, bright enough that she could make out the distant peaks across the valley. He would want to go soon. That made her want to tense and hide, and she had to push herself to remain calm and trust him.
She did trust him.
He had rescued her from the elves who had put her in the cell and he wanted to help her stop her brother. He had promised she would be safe if she returned to the castle with him and met with his prince, and she believed him.
She also believed that he trusted her.
It was there for her to see in what he had said to her.
His prince would understand when they returned to the castle and spoke with him.
He trusted her to meet with the male who ruled the elves. A male she felt Bleu was close to and was more than a master to him.
“And there you go again.” Bleu’s deep rumbling voice pulled her back to him.
She smiled her apology. “There is much on my mind.”
He wriggled beneath her, his naked body rubbing hers in a way that threatened to have her getting lost in her thoughts again, more wicked ones this time.
“So tell me what you are thinking about,” he husked and she looked back at him, mildly surprised when he looked deadly serious.
She couldn’t remember the last time she had told someone what was on her mind, but she was sure she had only ever shared her private thoughts with Loke. Maybe her brother had been given that privilege too once, before he had grown into a male more interested in fighting in the arena than spending time with her.
“I am not sure where to start,” she admitted and his smile almost blew her away.
She really couldn’t recall ever seeing him smile and the lack of laughter lines bracketing his mouth said it happened very rarely indeed.
But she kept making him smile.
Her belly fluttered and heated.
Bleu’s handsome face turned serious again. “Have I done something wrong?”
She quickly shook her head.
He frowned. “You keep looking at me strangely… as if there is something wrong with me.”
Gods, she wanted to tell him that there was absolutely nothing wrong with him since the gods had made him perfect.
She smiled instead. “It is taking me a little time to grow accustomed to you smiling at me.”
He chuckled. “Fuck, you sound like my sister.”
It was her turn to frown. “You have a sister… and what is this ‘fuck’? You say it often.”
“I do, a younger one, and it is a mortal expression… ah… an exclamation of sorts to declare disbelief or shock… but taken from the profanity they use for what we… ah… did.” He waggled an eyebrow.
Her cheeks burned up.
Well, fuck, he certainly knew how to embarrass her.
Bleu tugged her closer, that wicked smile teasing his tempting mouth again. “Tell me about you.”
His violet eyes leaped between hers, intent and focused, his curiosity flowing through her in a way that made it difficult to deny him.
“Where do I start?” She leaned over him, resting with her left side on his chest, her breast pressed against his left pectoral.
He groaned when she ran her fingers in little circles around his right one, enjoying the feel of his compact muscles beneath her caress, power and strength that she found alluring. The wounds her brother had placed on him were little more than faint marks now, criss-crossing his smooth skin, and she followed the line of one down towards his pebbled nipple.
“You can start by stopping doing that. I cannot think when you do that.” He scowled at her hand and she obeyed, bringing her palm down to rest on his chest. His frown melted away and his eyes met hers again. “Tell me what happened seven centuries ago. I need to know if we are going to clear your name with my prince.”
There he went again. Talking about them going together, as if he couldn’t bear to part from her. She reminded herself that he had sworn to protect her and that might be the only reason he wanted to bring her with him when he met with his prince. It might have nothing to do with any sort of feelings he harboured for her.
Feelings that were impossible to detect even with the incomplete bond linking them.
He stirred too many emotions in her that his mingled with, blending together, that she couldn’t easily pick them apart to discern which belonged to who. She wasn’t about to lay her heart on the line after one night of passion by asking him about his feelings though. She had lived long enough to know that wasn’t a wise move.
“Seven centuries ago,” she started and frowned at his chest, trying to get the story into order to make sure she didn’t miss anything vital. She wanted to clear her name too, but not with his prince or the elf kingdom. She only wanted to clear it with him. “I need to go a little further back than that, to where it all began. My brother… we did everything together growing up… but he grew increasingly obsessed with gaining power. It was a poison, one that corrupted his mind and his heart.”
“It will corrupt the best of people,” Bleu said, his voice a soothing drone in her ear, and brushed her hair behind her right ear.
She nodded. “Tenak began to spend his days planning, searching for a way to achieve the ultimate power and rule Hell. I sometimes think his battles in the arena knocked something loose in his mind. He grew convinced that all would bow before him and that it would be wonderful… and that I would stand at his side and we would have everything we had ever wanted.”
She closed her eyes and sighed as sorrow swept through her, a familiar cold and numbing feeling that had been a constant companion when she had been around her brother in the decades leading up to his attack on the elf kingdom and in the centuries that had followed it.
“I only ever wanted Tenak to be at my side and be happy.” She opened her eyes and raised them to meet Bleu’s beautiful violet ones. The concern and compassion in them warmed her heart and chased away the cold. “I knew that the dark path he had found himself on would tear him away from me and drive him mad.”
Bleu looked as if he wanted to say something but she shook her head, not wanting him to speak yet. She had started to talk, to tell him her story, and she had to get it all off her chest because it felt like a weight on her heart, one that was lifting with every word that left her lips.
“Tenak found old writings about an elven sword and grew determined to steal it. It was a treasure. One he could not live without. He had to possess it. It is the bane of our species,” she said and his lips twitched at the corners, the sparkle of mischief in his eyes warning her that he wanted to tease her about it.
It was strange being with him like this when she had been running from him for so long. If she had let him catch her, had told him the truth back then, could she have had this bliss for the past seven centuries? She sighed and idly traced patterns on his chest again, not wanting to think about what might have been when her future was hardly secure. Tenak was coming for her, and she would arm her mate with all the information she could in order to help him succeed and survive.
“The sword was the key to gaining the ultimate treasure in his eyes—the position of ruler of Hell. He told me often when I asked him to give up his quest because it was destroying him that the sword was everything. It was power. It would be his.” She cast her gaze down at her fingers and heaved another sigh as she recalled how Tenak had looked at her back then, his eyes bright and shining with something that she now knew was madness. He had lost his mind before she had noticed it, too slow to see it to stop its spread. “Each hour we were together, he constantly talked of how the sword would bring all of the realms to their knees before him. It frightened me… but I was too afraid of him to say anything… so I sought the help of a witch.”
“A witch?” Bleu frowned at her. �
��I had not realised you had assistance. All this time I scoured the lands for you, seemingly asked everyone in the realm about you, and not once have I heard you had the help of a witch.”
She shrugged. “He was very isolated from everything.”
“He?” Bleu’s handsome face darkened in a way she found she liked, a shadow of envy flitting across it and through his blood too.
She smiled at his behaviour and walked her fingers across his bare chest. “He.”
Bleu snarled, flashing sharp fangs. “I will kill him if he touched you.”
That pleased her even more, but she concealed it from him, not wanting to encourage his violent behaviour.
“He did not touch me. He wanted a stone in exchange… something about an experiment.” She shook her head again, dislodging her lingering curiosity about the witch and his reasons for desiring such a rare gem. “I had one and I offered it to him in exchange for him casting a concealment spell on me. It rendered me invisible to all, undetectable. I followed Tenak and tried to stop him from stealing the sword, but I was too late.”
His eyebrows pinched. “But if you were concealed, how did we see you and not Tenak?”
“The spell wore off shortly after I fled the castle. I was shifting to pursue my brother when your team found me.”
He sighed. “And attacked you.”
She shrugged again. “I am almost identical to my brother when in my dragon form. It was a mistake. Knowing how angry the elves were with my brother, I should have remained in my mortal form and slipped away from the realm before risking shifting. I was in a hurry though.”
He twirled a strand of her hair around his fingers and thumbed the tip, flicking it back and forth. “I am glad you escaped.”
“Probably not as glad as I am.” She managed a smile and then it faded as she thought about what had happened next. “I found my brother and he did not suspect me at all. He was quick to tell me the full extent of his plans and he forced me to go with him to a demon village. I thought he was going into hiding… I did not expect… he used the sword there. When I saw him cutting down hundreds of demon warriors with it, I knew what I had to do. I waited until he was asleep and I stole it, igniting his rage and shattering his trust.”
Possessed by a Dark Warrior Page 27
