The Nightshade's Touch: A Paranormal Space Fantasy (Messenger Chronicles Book 3)

by Pippa Dacosta

  I looked at that hand, at the open door behind him and the faintest smile flickering on his lips.

  “Run where?”

  “To the stars… if you can keep up.”

  Now there was a challenge. He had told me he would never hurt me and the bond ensured he couldn’t. So what awaited me if I took his hand? His smile, knowing it as I did now, sent a lick of illicit pleasure way down low.

  I closed my fingers around his, locking our hands together. Power tingled under my palm and sparked through my fingers. The power of Faerie, mine and his.

  Delight sparked in his eyes.

  “Run, my lana.” And with that, he turned and ran.

  Still wrapped in leathers and wearing boots not meant for marathons, I sprang forward, freeing my grip so I could fall into a racing stride. Light rippled through the walls, driving us on, beating with the same pace as my boots, my heart, and his. Talen let me gain on him, and then, ahead, the corridors appeared to swing around, and Talen sped away. I grinned. Of course the walls moved. He was the ship. He could shape our path however he liked.

  We ran, and just like during the Game of Lies, magic sparked to life, its electric fizz spreading through my simple saru flesh and bone, setting me ablaze. I ran, chasing the streak of silver ahead, and my muddled thoughts and fears fell away, clearing to a precise point. Chase. Catch. It was freeing, and exhilarating, and a gift.

  All too soon, Talen slowed. He barely seemed out of breath, whereas I had to work to fill my lungs with enough air to stop me from passing out.

  “She likes you,” he said, placing his hand on the shimmering wall. “Always has, since you defied Sjora.” There was a looseness to his smile, as though some of his ice had thawed.

  “It’s an… honor,” I panted.

  We strode on, entering sections of the enormous ship I’d never ventured down, and since we hadn’t passed anyone, I assumed few, if anyone, had explored this deep. There were probably whole areas closed off to passengers.

  Deeper and deeper we walked, until the air cooled and took on a flowery bite, reminding me of Faerie’s fresh nights before they lingered too long and grew stale. And then a room appeared ahead, its expanse a chamber of blackness.

  I jolted to a halt in the doorway as Talen slipped into the shadows. Glitter hung in the air like motionless snow. Where Talen walked, the sparkles shifted around him and settled back into place in his wake. Like a million wisps, I thought, but none moved unless Talen was near.

  “What is this place?” I entered and the bright speckles parted in front of me.

  “Navigation.”

  The specks of light were… stars? Whichever way I turned, the stars shifted, inviting me inward.

  “Each one of these specks represents a star,” Talen explained. “Each cluster a galaxy.”

  I tried to snag one, but it darted away, only to return to its spot once I’d stopped harassing it. “The ship is doing this?”

  Talen nodded. “It’s how a pilot navigates. Usually we don’t have to be here physically to pilot, but I wanted to show you. She wanted to show you.”

  I wandered, watching the stars shift and dance, delighting in their random shimmer. The more I drifted, the more I heard a distant sighing, so soft and quiet I could have imagined it. “The stars sing?”

  “You hear it?” His light chuckle was playful and a delight to hear. “Of course you do. Yes, they sing their forever song.”

  He was behind me and all at once so close. When I looked up, the mischief of the run was long gone, replaced by a deep sincerity. This time, when his fingers eased into my hair and his palm brushed my cheek, I leaned into the touch. How could I not?

  “You know me.” He drew me close and rested his forehead against mine, filling my world with him. “Like I know you. Like I’ve always known you.”

  He tilted his head and closed his eyes as though the touch was all he sought. His mouth brushed mine, his lips cool and soft and oh so tempting. I parted my lips and closed my eyes too, feeling the kiss travel deep, the touch spilling darts of magic across my tongue. And I kissed him back, tasting sweetness and light and power and how it all hung on the edge of fear. He was afraid, just like I was.

  He called to the part of me born of the earth, to the practical saru in me devoid of all magic and all things mystical. I had dreamed of being among them, of being loved by them, of pleasing them, of serving them. But I had never dreamed something as bright and untouchable as Talen would look at me as he did now, as though I was the beautiful one, the divine one, the one worth all the stars in the sky.

  The kiss ended, and it felt like we’d been standing there forever, surrounded by galaxies, and yet like no time at all.

  “I see you battling every day.” His thumb brushed my bottom lip. His next words settled where his thumb had tracked. “I see you fighting a war inside, one of loyalty and of a love you have no control over, and I admire how you dare to change your design. Kesh, Wraithmaker, Messenger, Mylana. You have a light in you, one you rarely let shine. Most don’t, won’t, or can’t see it, but as the darkest creature in all of Faerie, I do. Whatever name you choose, you are my star.”

  He had shown me all of him, and I wasn’t running, not anymore.

  I kissed him again, with no barriers and no regrets. He came alive beneath my touch, taking everything I gave. We stood among a million stars and came together like stars might. Sliding his hand down my back, he walked me backward, his touch hastening, mouth seeking more and more of me. His kisses roamed down my neck, each one freeing shivers and ramping up my need to touch him, feel him, taste him. His mouth, somehow hot and cold, scorched where once a collar had held me under control.

  I became dimly aware of my back against a wall. My fingers dug at all the laces and buckles holding his jacket closed, locking him behind his armor. When those ties refused to unravel, I pushed my fingers down the front of his pants and yanked him close. An unadulterated growl rumbled through him. He caught my wandering hands, lifted them, and pinned them to the wall. There, he held me, the smile on his lips broad and tantalizing like something forbidden. Trapped, I wanted to nip at that smile, to take it and own it. I pushed my shoulders off the wall to reach him. He teased away, his smile growing. He liked to tease. Wasn’t he just full of surprises.

  “I’ve wanted you since I saw you.” His eyes flicked up, shrewd beneath their fine lashes. “Wanted it more since you first had your hands on me.”

  I’d stolen many forbidden touches, but the one that stuck with me the most was when Devere had brought him to me, out cold and covered in blood. I had lain next to Talen after cleaning his wounds, my hand in his. “You were aware of me?”

  “Always.”

  It was my turn to smile. “And while you were bathing after Sjora tried to bond you with the ship, nothing but a wisp of a curtain between us, do you remember? Were you aware of me then?”

  “Always,” he whispered against my mouth.

  I laughed, turning my face away. “You have a mischievous streak.”

  He pressed in, all of him, so I had no doubts about how much he wanted this. “No more secrets.”

  “No more secrets,” I echoed, feeling somehow exposed but strengthened in this new freedom. He ran a hand down his jacket, pulling open all the frustrating little buckles I would likely have torn free. He shrugged the garment off and tossed it away. Then, as I watched keenly, he crossed his arms over his shirt and pulled it over his head, whipping his hair with it, until the shirt was also gone and I saw those entrancing circular patterns on his chest and how they interlocked and wove over the curve and flow of fine, sculpted muscles. Some swept up, over his pecs toward his shoulders, while others dipped low, riding the abs, funneling toward the defined v and vanishing beneath the waistband of his pants. And I took it all in like a typical saru, by staring and losing my thoughts in a merry chase around the gift he presented.

  Those marks weren’t pilot markings. They were unique to him, to the Nightshade, and I couldn’t
think of anything I wanted more than to trace each and every one with my tongue, as low as they could go.

  But I wasn’t moving, and he was there, within reach, waiting, and I still had my back against the wall and my hands off the goods.

  Talen cocked his head, accentuating that wicked gleam in his eyes. “You don’t need my permission. Have your way with me, Kesh.”

  His words had power, and they quickened my breaths and heart and tightened my core. “Be careful what freedoms you allow, fae. I might take them all.”

  “I might just beg you to.”

  That was all the permission I needed. A single long step brought me close against him. Warmth radiated off his naked skin, urging me to touch. I placed a finger on the largest mark over his right pec and trailed its path to where it looped beneath his nipple, and there I leaned in and ran my tongue along the rest of its curve, hearing Talen hiss inward.

  I roamed my tongue lower, tasting his sweetness. Almost sinking to my knees, when he caught my hand and pulled me upright. “You don’t go down on your knees for me.”

  He swept an arm under my legs, and before I could squeal a protest, he scooped me up into his arms. No one had carried me this way since I was a little girl, and I laughed at the insanity of a fae carrying a saru.

  “Amusing, am I?” That voice licked at my desire like his tongue might.

  He unceremoniously dropped me on a bed. We were in his chamber. How…? The wall behind him sealed around a hole he had carried me through. “That’s how you get around so fast?”

  “Is that really what you want to focus on?”

  There was a shirtless fae lord at the end of the bed, his long hair gathered to one side and twisted into a loose ponytail seemingly of its own accord. He looked every inch the prime male specimen with eyes of violet and a body that wouldn’t quit. But the most alarming part was that he was all mine. And he was waiting—for me.

  I propped myself up on my elbows and wondered how far he would go on my word alone. “Strip.”

  He wet his lips with the tip of his pink tongue and untied his pants laces. The leather fabric strained around his arousal, leaving little to the imagination.

  A saru aroused him. I aroused him. How was that even possible?

  It shouldn’t be.

  It was wrong.

  This was wrong. But by-cyn, I had never let wrong stop me.

  Talen left the laces loose and approached the bed. He moved like molten silver, and my saru heart beat so fast at the sight of him approaching I couldn’t decide whether I was afraid of the punishment for observing all this, or if it raced in anticipation.

  He braced an arm either side of my legs, then a knee, and prowled up my body until we were eye to eye.

  I struggled not to drop my gaze, not to spread myself before him and beg his forgiveness for daring to look and admire and want what was forbidden.

  “You aren’t saru with me,” he said. “Stop thinking like one.”

  I hooked my right leg around his and pulled, shifting his weight to one side. I shoved him over and pinned him down beneath me. Now I had his wrists locked under my hands and his firm body pinned between my thighs. “You’re not nearly naked enough.”

  “And you’re still fully dressed,” he observed, his eyebrow permanently arched.

  That was fair. I sat up and tore my waistcoat off, leaving a loose cotton vest. Not at all flattering, but easily dealt with if he wanted it gone. I planted my hands on either side of his shoulders, fixed over him as though he were my prey. “I have something in mind.”

  “You do…?”

  After a quick glance to my left at the shower behind the drape, I faced him again, catching the approval on his face.

  “Naked and wet?” he asked.

  “I want you in every way, but mostly wet.”

  He brought his hands up, touched my hips, and then rode his hands beneath my vest, brushing their warm solidity over my stomach. It might have been the first time I’d felt his hands on parts I normally covered up and I couldn’t help the small groan that fell from my lips. Then he kissed me, flipped me on my back, and scooped me up again, all in one swift, blurring motion, delivering me to the shower before my head had a chance to stop spinning. Warm water cascaded from above. Its pitter-patter soaked my shirt through and plastered his hair to his face and shoulders. Talen set me down on my feet and skimmed his hands up my back, sending tingles through my dark warfae markings. He couldn’t possibly see them, but he knew exactly where they curled and swirled because his fingers traced their lines. Need throbbed low. A need to be close, to be filled.

  I threw my arms around his shoulders and yanked him down to my level, kissing him like this was the only moment we’d get. His hands dove and cupped my ass, roughly jerking me against his hard bulge. There were still too many layers between us.

  Everything we had done, every kiss, every touch, had been asking permission, testing boundaries, but I wanted more. I wanted the real him, raw and in my hands. “I’m not sure I can do this gently.” I already sounded wrecked.

  “I know I can’t,” he growled low in my ear.

  He pulled at my pants fastenings, tearing some. I lost track of where I had my hands, my mouth. I just needed to feel him closer than this. My vest was gone, and then his warm hand found its way inside my undergarments, stroking and teasing. I only had to think how I wanted his tongue there, and in the next gasp, he was on his knees, water pounding us both. He yanked my pants down over my hips, clasped my thighs in his hands, and swept his tongue deep, but slowly, oh so slowly, over the most sensitive part of me. A few more sweeps and his tongue quickened, swirling lightly, teasing in the same way the rest of him did.

  You don’t deserve this.

  Nothing girl.

  I turned my head away but couldn’t banish the voice. I had been here before, with Talen on his knees in my dreams, and Eledan had taken him from me. Or Talen was Eledan and I’d let him have all of me, because I’d wanted so badly to be loved and touched like I was worth something to them.

  Talen’s mouth on mine pulled me back from the memories. His body, wet and hard, smooth and trembling, anchored me to the moment, and the Dreamweaver’s wicked laugh faded beneath the sensation of Talen’s touch. I dropped my hand, cupping the smoothest, hardest part of Talen. He bucked and braced an arm against the wall over my shoulder. His racing breaths fluttered against my ear.

  This impossible myth of Faerie legend was mine. And I planned to never let him go.

  I pulled on the loose fastenings of his pants, freeing all of him, and slowly rode my thumb over the sensitive tip. He twitched in my grip. Raw, naked desire flashed in his eyes, sending a heated throb between my legs. Sweet cyn, if I could make him look at me like that, what else could I do? He knocked my hand aside and lifted me against the wall. My pants fell free. He hooked my thighs around his hips and paused—his arousal nudged almost home. I clung to his shoulders and bit my lip to keep from demanding he thrust in deep. He had more control than I did. I sank my nails in and tilted my hips. His hardness pushed in and he was in my arms, his body moving with mine. Power and magic sang, coming to life beneath my skin and his. The black warfae marks spiraling around my arms moved and the circular ink painting his chest shifted too. Or perhaps I was losing my mind, because his exquisite rhythm was undoing me as he seated himself deeper and deeper, touching more than my body, lifting me up, making me bright and so very alive. The bond thrummed between us, power galloping alongside the rapid thumping of our hearts. It was madness and magic and Faerie and everything I’d wanted but could never have dreamed I’d have.

  Pleasure broke over me, emptying out my mind, singing through my skin and beyond, reaching inside him as he pumped higher and faster, his desire as wild as he was. When his pleasure crested and slammed over him, freeing his cry, his magic and ecstasy poured through me, lighting me on fire with green licks of wispy life magic.

  Talen’s eyes blazed silver, and reflected in them, my dark eyes swirled w
ith power too.

  He was mine and I was his, and screw Faerie, and Oberon, and the wrongs they championed. Nobody could take this from us.

  Chapter 24

  A light finger traced my warfae markings, wandering over my shoulder, across my collarbone, and down between my breasts. Talen had tucked my back against his chest and encircled me in his arms. He’d been silently exploring my marks since I’d blinked awake. The touch of a single fingertip became several. They circled the lower plain of my belly, and then dallied across my hip before sneaking across my thigh. I knew where I wanted it to go next, but infuriatingly, the touch skipped back to my belly and followed the trail of warfae markings roaming my opposite side. By the time the fingers found my neck and skipped up to my bottom lip, my nipples were hard and the rest of me as primed and wanting.

  I nipped at the finger and heard Talen chuckle—an actual chuckle. I hadn’t known he could chuckle. Turning in his arms presented the delectable sight of a mussed-up fae. He lay stretched along my left side, head propped on a hand, his hair somehow everywhere and artfully poured across his chest and waist, like someone had spilled silver paint over him.

  When I’d first seen his tribal markings, I’d wanted to lick him all over. I’d lived that fantasy multiple times in the past few hours, but my desire hadn’t waned. With a gentle shove, I rolled him onto his back and trapped his hips beneath me. His long look beneath pale lashes demanded I continue. Who was I to argue with a fae lord?

  I nipped at his shoulder and ran my tongue along the inked outline of the first small circle. He kept his gaze on the ceiling, so I saw up close how his throat moved when he swallowed. Another lazy lick and his cheek twitched. Oh yes, I’d found my fae’s weakness.

  “Are you never satisfied?” he asked, his voice wrecked. I did that.

  The saru in me purred. “Never.”

  I mixed the licks with a few achingly light kisses and roamed the defined landscape of his chest. All mine. And then I flicked my tongue lower, into the dip at his waist, delighting in the sound of his short intake of breath when I found the little trail of permanent ink at the start of the v that guided me downward.