The Darkening (Dawn of Ascension)

by Caris Roane

  He removed his fingers then rose up to fold away his kilt and battle sandals. “I loved feeling all that happen to you, the way your body moved as I sucked your breast.”

  She nodded and when she realized he’d lost his clothes, she sat up on the edge of the bed and placed her hands on his thick, heavy pecs. She started to play with him then had a new idea: again, turnabout’s fair play.

  She met his gaze and saw the soft smile on his lips. “What do you want from me, Vela? Tell me. I’ll do anything you want.”

  “I want you on your back. You game, warrior?”

  He seemed to lose focus for a moment then took her hand and drew her to her feet. “Let’s get rid of the comforter first.”

  She watched him fold the comforter back in thirds then flip it off the end of the bed.

  But as he turned and looked at her, he stopped all movement, a beautiful Greek statue in the moonlight.

  His gaze drifted slowly down her body then back up. She had intended to order him onto the bed, but the look on his face, of utter reverence, stopped her, at least for the moment. He drew her into his arms. Feeling the length of his body pressed against hers as he kissed her deeply, as he held her in a tight embrace, warmed something deep in her heart, something that had been cold and vacant for a long time.

  This was love, being held and savored, cherished.

  Her heart expanded, all that warmth flooding her, filling her, easing her.

  His hands stroked her wing-locks and she returned the favor. Her fingers grew wet as she went from one to the other, teasing and rubbing until he was firm against her body. She parted her legs so he could slide all that wonderful girth between her thighs.

  “So, what did you have in mind?” he asked.

  Vela tried to remember, but now he had both hands on her ass and was pushing harder between her legs, arching his hips.

  She drifted her hands over his shoulder and down his pecs, then her earlier idea came back to her. “Wait,” she said. “I remember now.”

  She stepped away from him, took his hand and led him back to the bed. “In the center, on your back, please.”

  He crawled and flopped, grabbing her arm and tugging in such a way that she fell on his chest.

  She came up laughing.

  If the specter of the breh-hedden rose in her head to worry her, she repressed the thought. Right now, she had only one job, to enjoy her man.

  She slid off of him and positioned herself on her knees beside him. “You have the most beautiful body,” she said, letting her hands express all that she felt. She fondled the hard muscles of his biceps, up to stroke his shoulders, then down to his pecs. She leaned over and swirled her tongue over his nipple, flicking fast. Without giving him warning, she released her fangs, struck, and at the same time, released the potion. His body jerked but she held him down.

  He grunted. “Oh, shit, that feels good.”

  She sucked him, just as he had sucked her. Using her other hand, she explored his abs, playing with his body, teasing his navel and slowly going south.

  But she didn’t have to go far until the crown of his cock was in her hand, his sturdy thickness causing her to throb deep between her legs.

  She shifted jobs and swung her body in the direction of his groin, sucked the head of his cock several times then switched back to his nipple.

  His legs moved restlessly. She held his cock at the base and worked him just a little, teasing him, as she continued to suck his nipple. Every once in a while, she dipped her hand just a little lower and rolled his balls with her fingers.

  He breathed hard and his head rolled on the sheet back and forth.

  “Oh, God, the fire is moving down my chest.”

  She could easily take him the distance, just like this, finishing him off with her mouth or even riding him.

  But as she debated which to do, Samuel changed things up. He rose suddenly, which popped her mouth off his nipple. He slid his arm around her waist, turning her at the same time to flip her on her back so that he had her beneath him.

  “I need your blood.” His eyes glinted in the moonlight. “I need it now.”

  She gave a cry, because she knew what this would mean, the pleasure that his fangs would give her again. There was nothing like donating blood. Or taking it.

  Without preamble, she spread her legs and he entered her, gliding easily into her wetness. She took him in, surrounding his back with her arms and wrapping her legs around his thighs. Best sensation in the world.

  He groaned heavily as she leaned up to sweep her hair away from her neck. He dipped down and licked her vein until it rose, which didn’t take long.

  Vela. That’s all he sent, then his fangs struck.

  She shouted into the room. The pleasure was so intense, like a wave of touching all down her chest that kept flowing and repeating as he removed his fangs then sucked down her blood.

  Her body clenched hard.

  Vela, I’m so close. The fire of your potion is almost to my cock, and I want this to be it. Can you be ready?

  Yes. Give me your wrist. Completing the breh-hedden required a mutual exchange of blood, full on intercourse, then deep-mind engagement and she was so ready. All her nerves had eased up; Samuel had taken care of that.

  He held his wrist over her mouth. She licked and felt the veins rise. She struck quickly then formed a seal over the wound and began to drag his Samuel-flavored blood into her mouth.

  All the sensations combined to send her into an altered state: the feel of his cock plunging steadily into her, his mouth sucking at her neck, drinking her blood, his powerful body moving over hers as she drank his blood down her throat. Pleasure poured through her brain like a drug. She might have been moaning; she couldn’t tell.

  Your blood has hit my stomach. Oh, God, Vela, the power that’s flowing. My grayle wants out and I’m going to take us into the air.

  She felt the levitation of both their joined bodies, surprised that the bed wasn’t a necessary counter-friction as he continued to drive into her.

  Power.

  Samuel’s Grayle power, as his body shed all that smoky mist, swirling around her, thickening his bitter chocolate scent. She felt drunk on so many sensations.

  I’m going to enter your mind now, he sent.

  Do it.

  He pushed and her shields fell, or maybe they were already lying flat, just waiting for him to come to her.

  * * * * * * * * *

  Samuel had never been here before, suspended in the air, thrusting into a woman, sucking down her blood and with a potion in his groin readying him to fire off like a rocket. His grayle power had come online, giving force to his muscles as he pumped into Vela. He felt one with her and for the first time was truly at ease with his power.

  But being inside Vela’s mind shifted everything into a new gear that revved up his heart at the same time.

  This was the full expression of love.

  He was with the woman he loved, who had come to mean the sun, moon, and stars to him, who had taken him out of his darkness and brought him into the light.

  Her mind was beautiful, full of goodness and worth, of kindness toward her friends and full acceptance of his warrior state. He felt whole and complete, well-loved, his body saturated with pleasure so that with each thrust he came closer to a serious explosion.

  His balls were tight and ready, his cock hard and she tugged on him with every rock of her hips.

  Now flow into my mind, he sent. Let’s take this thing all the way.

  Yes. Her mind crossed back into his and at that moment, the breh-hedden struck like a gale force wind, pounding down on him and her, because her mind was within his and he could see all that she was experiencing. Her pleasure became his and his became hers.

  The fire of her potion struck at the same time.

  He drew back from her neck. His body arched. His orgasm burst through him and pleasure flowed like nothing he’d known before. He shouted into the air and at the same time felt her ow
n ecstasy streaking through her, exploding deep inside her well.

  Her pleasure. His. Back and forth.

  “Oh, God,” he shouted, because a second eruption took place and this time he writhed on her body. Somewhere he knew she was screaming as well, and pushing back against him.

  Damn, Samuel. How you please me. Damn.

  Yes. Oh, God, Vela. But his mind could say no more than those few words. His body felt on fire, into every muscle, tissue, and bone.

  He continued to thrust and she kept pushing back at him, riding the immense wave of the breh-hedden. A third orgasm rushed out of him and once more he shouted and again she screamed as ecstasy flowed and pummeled and drove his sensations through her mind and hers through his, a complete and utter sharing.

  When the last wave passed, and he settled his body against hers, as he took the levitation back down to the mattress, Samuel relaxed against her body. But he could feel what his cock felt like for Vela, within her well, what his hands felt like against her breast, his lips against her skin. All was a dual sensation, unending.

  “My, God, Samuel. I could feel you come and it made my own orgasm so intense. Oh, the pleasure you experienced.” She stroked his head and kissed his neck.

  He could do little more than lie there, taking it all in, relaxing maybe for the first time in his life. She was still in his mind, an extraordinary and peaceful presence, an easing of a hundred years of harsh, male living.

  He sighed deeply.

  “You’re at ease.”

  “I am.” Incredible.

  “I can feel what it’s like for you to have your cock deep inside me. It’s so male. A penetration, a conquering, and yet so much more.”

  He chuckled. “Yes, it feels like that, like I’ve done what a man is supposed to do.”

  She kissed his neck again. “I hope we get to do this a lot. Do you know that because of the breh-hedden, I can feel what my lips feel like against your skin?”

  “Yes, I can tell that the stubble right there, at my jaw-line, prickles your lips.”

  “Uh-huh.” She kept kissing him, small teasing bits of pressure against his cheeks and nose and finally his lips.

  He kissed her for a long time, exchanging a dozen thoughts on what the breh-hedden felt like for each of them.

  “More than anything,” she said, drawing back and smoothing her hand over his cheek then pushing her fingers into his hair, “I feel connected to you, very deeply. And I know you, how you think. I even saw some of what happened to you in Honduras, but the memories felt distant, even removed as though they existed in a former life.”

  He met her beautiful blue gaze. “It was a former life. You’ve come to me now, bringing this tremendous gift that joins us.”

  She chuckled and kissed him. “You’re wrong. You brought this gift to me. I’d set up a reclusive life for myself and you made me look at that, at my deepest truths. Maybe the breh-hedden brought us together, Samuel, but you showed me things that I’d never wanted to look at before. No, you brought this gift to me.”

  “I feel the same way about you.”

  With that, he kissed her and because he caught her floral scent, still an enigma, and because he could feel the pleasure his cock gave her, he began to move once more inside her, rocking his hips in a rhythm as old as time.

  * * * * * * * * *

  Long after even Horace had declared Duncan’s body fully recovered, Duncan remained in the hospital, lying on his side, unable to leave the trance-like state that had held him prisoner since his rescue.

  Part of his mind functioned rationally; he knew when the nurses came and bathed him, when his friends approached his bed and spoke to him, and even when Rachel arrived and wept over him until her brother, Gideon, took her away.

  Above all, Rachel caused the most distress. He’d loved her for decades and had been her lover for part of that time. But Rachel held beliefs so different from his own that when neither would compromise, they’d broken up permanently not long ago.

  He wanted to give comfort and to explain, but he couldn’t because a running film of images kept him trapped, in which a woman called to him almost continuously, sometimes singing to him, sometimes speaking in a low seductive voice, but always engaging his heart, like a powerful call to ascension.

  The woman lived on Third Earth and needed him desperately. He had never seen such a beautiful woman before, her auburn hair in a beautiful curly mass around her face, cascading past her shoulders, her complexion glowing and pale, and her voice like an angel.

  She told him that at exactly the right hour, he would rise from his bed and he would come to her, something he longed to do more than anything else in the world.

  She had told him something else as well: that Rachel must die…

  * * * * * * * * *

  A week later, Vela took a long look around at the exquisite Parisian opera house, an unusual and rather ornate place for a Warrior of the Blood induction ceremony. She sat in a box beside Madame Endelle, a place of honor, since all European Two royalty inhabited the remaining first tier boxes the entire distance from one side of the room to the other.

  Jewels glittered and each tux in the theater no doubt represented every famous Mortal Earth or Second designer in two dimensions. Samuel had chosen Hugo Boss, even though Greaves’s had favored him. All he’d said, while adjusting his white cuffs was that he intended to change the future. As simple as that. “Besides, why should Hugo Boss be punished for something that monster did?”

  She’d smiled as she smiled now.

  The experience had become far easier than she’d imagined because no one paid her the least attention. Why would they when she sat next to Endelle?

  The Supreme High Administrator of Second Earth wore a turquoise sequined gown cut to her navel and split up each thigh mid-hip. A necklace of chunks of white crystals weighed down her chest. But it was her headpiece that caught everyone’s eye: a massive crown of peacock feathers backed by white ostrich feathers.

  Vela loved it, the constant irreverence of Endelle’s absurd fashions, the way she basically said, ‘fuck off’ with every turn of her head, every hard laughing cast of her eye in the direction of a disapproving royal.

  “You love this, don’t you?” Vela asked.

  Endelle turned her head slowly, her strange wood-lined eyes meeting and holding Vela’s gaze. “What do you think?”

  “I think you’ve learned to make do in a way that keeps your head straight.”

  She nodded, the feathers sweeping back-and-forth with the slow movement. “You have some understanding then, because you called it exactly right. We’ll need their alliance in the future, these royals I mean. But I want you to see the truth, so watch what happens.” She waved her hand in the direction of the audience, a more formal turn of her wrist than Vela would have expected from her.

  Since all eyes were on Endelle anyway, a smattering of applause began, then more and more, until one after the other the audience rose to its feet, each person turned toward her, clapping vigorously.

  Vela admitted she was surprised, and making use of her newly gained powers, she extended her senses and felt the truth that Madame Endelle wanted her to know: these people loved her and valued her, despite her absurdity.

  Vela rose to her feet as well and added to the flow of admiration.

  After a good long minute, Endelle waved her hands, indicating the ruckus should stop, and just as the last sound of applause died away, the lights dimmed.

  “Endelle.”

  Vela turned and gasped.

  Braulio.

  “Well, where the fuck have you been?” Endelle asked, keeping her voice low as the orchestra conductor took his place in the pit.

  “I’m on my three-minute clock again, my sweet, on a new assignment and the council only allowed this one visit because I refused to take another step without at least talking to you.”

  “What’s going on?” Her voice much softer this time.

  He reached toward her and
put his hand on her shoulder. Leaning down from behind her chair, he kissed her once, then met her gaze. “You probably already know since you’ve just felt the initial rumblings of trouble.” He glanced at Vela, then back.

  Endelle’s shoulders sank low. “Third is revving up.”

  “About ready to explode. We’re in it again, but be patient.”

  Endelle snorted. “Do I have a choice about this?”

  “No more than I do.”

  “You can’t stand up to the council?”

  His gaze shifted away.

  “That’s what I thought.” She sounded resigned.

  He kissed her again and Vela leaned away, trying to give them some privacy but the chairs were smack dab together.

  She focused on the film crews in three stations around the theater. When Endelle made mewling sounds, Vela concentrated on the beautiful mural of the Superstition Mountain monolith, with a starry night sky, that extended across the back of the stage. Apparently, Endelle had insisted that if she had to defer to those stick-up-their-butts that still called themselves European royalty in this modern age, then she wanted a mural of what she loved best about living in the desert.

  When at last he pulled back, he apologized to Vela for being so rude.

  To Endelle, he said, “I’ll come back to you as soon as I can.” He started to lift his arm, and as though just remembering, he narrowed his gaze at Endelle. “And you tell that asshole, Merl Tuttle, to stay away from you or by all Six dimensions, I’ll cut off his jewels and feed them down his throat.” Then he lifted his arm and vanished.

  Vela put a hand over her mouth. The imagery alone had left her shaken.

  She glanced at Endelle who blinked a couple of times then met Vela’s gaze. “Well, that was a surprise.” But a soft smile curved her lips.

  The conductor lifted his arms, baton in hand, and a full orchestra started playing Holtz’s ‘Mars’, a dynamic piece that reflected the extraordinary Warriors of the Blood.

  All the What-Bees were present under one roof. Vela might have been worried about security, but Colonel Seriffe and his staff had the event well-in-hand and with Sharav dead and the Illinois Seers palace destroyed, Vela had confidence in the safety around her.