“No, Torin Kerridon!” The Oracle’s screech rose behind him. “You’re wrong. Your blood feeds the death of the heart and only your blood will nourish the heart’s savior!”
He shut the old woman’s insane cries from his head, rounded the bend and headed for his ship. There was work to be done. There were preparations to be made. And when it was over and he would wipe his hands of Kala, the Sun Sword, the whole insane farce. Regardless of what the Oracle insisted.
Regardless of what his heart desired.
***
Helios Blade sat silent as he crossed its entry hatch, a sleeping deep-space craft capable of phenomenal speed and power. He’d spent most of the last solar cycle within its form, and never had it felt like a punishment until now. Now, it was an inescapable reminder of everything he was and everything he could not ever be.
He moved through its belly, stripping his jacket from his body as he did so. The leather clung to him, already growing stiff with drying blood, and he threw it aside with disgust. It had been a long time since he’d been so coldly violent in his actions. The Ie’en’s blood crusting on his clothes, his flesh, only served to highlight how ruthless and vicious he could be. After decades of the Old Seer’s calm guidance, he’d thought he’d left the savage brutality of the Sol’s training behind. But then he’d seen Kala in the Ie’en’s vile embrace, the bastard’s hand stabbing between her legs, the Andovian looming over her, his dick in his hand, and it all came back to him—the bloodlust, the icy fire in the pit of his belly devouring his control, his humanity. The instinctual calling for ruthless pain that had elevated him to command warrior status before he’d even grown hair on his jaw.
Torin raked his fingers through his hair, the Oracle’s words taunting him: You taint the air with the death that surrounds you.
He quickened his pace, denying the ache in his soul. He had no time for self-pity. He had to get to P’Helios. He had to get Kala to the…
He faltered to a halt and closed his eyes.
Syunna, at the mere thought of her his body erupted in yearning heat. Every molecule, every fibre in his being strained for her, no matter how much he willed it otherwise. He could feel her very presence on his ship, a source of life and energy that called him with more potency than all the need for bloody revenge. He didn’t need to check the internal bio-scans to know she was in the training room. He could feel her there, waiting for him.
Go to her.
He ground his teeth and shook his head.
Go to her. Tell her.
Tell her what? That the reason for her existence was about to come to pass? That the life of every living being in every universe awaited her?
That you are sorry. For everything. That you love her.
Torin bit back a curse and began storming toward the cockpit. He would not tell her that. P’helios’ second moon was two hyper clicks away. The fate of the future hung in the balance. Like it or not, he was the last of the Sol, the keeper of the Sun Sword’s truth, a warrior created to do one thing and one thing only and he had work to do.
Numb resolution squeezing his chest, he stepped into the cockpit.
And found Kala standing there. Looking at him.
His gut knotted. “I thought you were in the training room.”
“I was.”
He stared at her, the pulse in his neck rapid. At some point since leaving him on Ati’aina she had showered and the clean scent of her skin filled his every breath. His nostrils flared and a low groan caught in his throat.
She swallowed, her eyes unreadable. “You are angry.”
Torin’s pulse quickened. “Yes.”
Kala nodded. Once. “With me.”
“No.”
The word passed Torin’s lips in a blunt growl. He turned his head to the side. Stared at the stars beyond Helios Blade’s viewscreens. He could feel her. Feel her breath heat the air, feel her heartbeat disturb the cosmos. By the gods, why could he feel her so powerfully when he could not have her? Why did he—
“Make love to me.”
Kala’s soft command snapped his stare back to her face.
“Make love to me, Torin,” she said again, just as soft, just as commanding.
He shook his head. “You don’t know what—”
“Yes,” she cut him off, taking a step toward him. “I do.” She took another step, her heat reaching for him. “I know what I’m saying. I know what I’m doing.” She stopped before him, her thighs brushing his, her palms pressed to his bare chest. “I want you to make love to me until time ceases to exist.”
A wave of something elemental and undeniable rolled through Torin. His throat grew thick, his flesh grew hot. He looked down into Kala’s face. Saw a future forever beyond his reach in her eyes. Saw her desire. Saw her pain.
He saw it all and wrapped his arms around her body. Drew her closer still, until there was nothing between them, not even the shadow of their destined paths, and kissed her.
She kissed him back. Unreservedly and completely. Her lips parted and her tongue slipped into his mouth, tangling with his, mating with it. Torin groaned, fisting the snakeskin of her vest at the small of her back and pulling her harder to his body. He tasted her mouth, her tongue, nipped at the soft fullness of her bottom lip, flicked at the smooth evenness of her teeth. She whimpered in reply and slid her hands up to his shoulders, curled her arms around his head. Her fingers buried in his hair, pulling his head down. He felt her body tremble, felt her nipples pinch hard against his chest.
He groaned again. She was so small, so tiny. Perfection and furious strength all at once. He could break her with his two hands and she could break him with her lips.
Raw pleasure surged through his body at the giddy thought. He dragged his mouth from hers, scored a line of kisses down the bowed column of her throat, back up to her chin, her jaw, her lips again.
She traced the edges of his mouth with her tongue, slow strokes that harbored no hesitation or doubt. Another tremble claimed her and he felt her rise up onto the tips of her toes, her hands turning to tight fists in his hair, her body pressing harder to his.
With a harsh groan, Torin tore his mouth from hers, scooped his arms under her legs, her back, and lifted her from the floor.
She gasped and he caught the sound with his kiss, holding her to his chest as he strode from the cockpit. Helios Blade’s corridors and passageways were ingrained into his psyche and he moved through his ship without the need for sight. Kala curled in his arms, her heat mingling with his, the taste of her lips teasing his thirst.
He wanted all of her. He wanted to taste every inch of her body, her soul.
Cool air blew against his hot flesh as he crossed the training room’s threshold, rippling his arms and legs with a delicious chill. His nipples pinched hard and he moaned, louder again as Kala slipped one hand from his hair to his chest, capturing the puckered tip of flesh between her fingertips.
Gods, yes.
The silent cry echoed through Torin’s mind and he came to a halt, knowing exactly where they stood in the large area without needing to tear his lips from Kala’s. He dropped to his knees on the central mat, its cushioned expanse taking his weight, redistributing its impact. Muscles straining, not from exertion but from mounting pleasure, he gently lowered her to the floor—bottom first, then legs, back and shoulders. He slid his arms from beneath her, moving his lips over hers, touching her teeth with the tip of his tongue as her head came to rest on the floor.
She played her fingers over his hard nipple, gripped the hair at his nape with fierce strength as he rose above her, over her. He placed one leg over her thighs, his cock so hard hot pain speared into his balls and the pit of his stomach. She shifted beneath him, aligning her hips with his, her tongue delving into his mouth with hungry urgency.
He could feel the energy of her desire thrumming through her body. It called to his, charging him. His blood seemed to surge through his veins like liquid fire. He pressed his palms to the floor on either side
of her head, keeping his torso from touching her body. If he were to experience the sensation of her breasts crushing against his chest now control would be lost. He wanted to claim her. Fuck, he wanted to not just claim her, but take her. Possess her. Despite the scalding urgency of his desire her words from a lifetime ago haunted him—the men would always find me. His chest squeezed with a gripping pressure and he skimmed one hand over her jawline in a gentle caress. She’d experienced so much horror. Her pleasure was what mattered. Not his. She had given him this moment and he would give her everything she’d never had. True pleasure in physical connection. True connection in physical pleasure.
Even if it drove him mad fighting his own longing need.
He stoked her inner thigh with his knee, nudging her legs apart. The air filled with the delicate musk of her sex and Torin’s head swam. He wanted to lift his head and gaze into her eyes, but feared the loss of her lips against his.
A soft moan sounded in her throat and she moved beneath him, parting her legs farther. He took his weight further on his hands and arms, pressing his knee to the junction of her thighs, rubbing it slowly against the curved mound of her sex.
She moaned again, louder, stronger and this time Torin could no longer deny the need to see her face, to see the pleasure in her eyes. He tore his mouth from the kiss and gazed down at her, his heart slamming against his breastbone, his breath ragged in his chest.
He should not have done so. The sight of her obvious rapture—parted lips, half-lidded eyes, flushed cheeks—was too much. He growled, his cock flooding with scalding desire, and took her mouth again.
She met his hunger, thrusting her hips from the floor to grind her softness to his knee, her tongue fighting with his as she did so, conquering, surrendering, willing. Her hands stole to his shoulders, tugged on them. He resisted her, knowing he was not strong enough to withstand the touch of her body completely under his. There was so much more he wanted to do before he surrendered to his own release. So much he wanted to make her feel.
Dragging his mouth from her lips, he charted a languid course along her jaw, down her neck. She hitched in a shallow breath and sank her nails into his shoulders, pushing her sex harder to his knee. “Please…”
Her plea sent a ripple of something primitive through Torin. “Kala.” His voice was as ragged as his breath. “I want to take this slow for you. I want to show you how pleasurable—”
She shook her head. “I don’t want slow, Torin.” She lifted one leg and wrapped it around his thigh, drawing his knee harder to her heat. “I’ve had six months of slow. Every moment I’ve been with you has been building to this.” She arched her back, her eyes closing as she ground her groin to his knee again. “Please.”
Torin closed his own eyes, drawing a deep breath into his lungs. The need to tear his trousers from his body, tear Kala’s from hers and sink his hard, aching cock into her sex surged through him. His shoulders bunched, ready to propel him into an upright position to do just so, but he stayed as he was, partially suspended above her by the coiled muscles of his arms and the tenuous strength of his willpower. The vivid memory of Kala’s last orgasm, the fear in her eyes, the terror in her voice, haunted him with too much power. He had to fight his desire.
Syunna, are you really that strong?
A hot ball welled in his chest. For Kala, he would be.
He gazed down at her. Gave her a small smile. “Trust me, Kala Rei.” He lowered his lips to her mouth and placed the softest of kisses there. “I will show you what it means to be the One Who Burns.”
He slid his knee from between her legs, his smile turning to a grin at Kala’s whimpered protest. Ignoring her attempts to pull him down to her body, he pressed his mouth to her throat, her collarbone. Maneuvering his weight onto one hand, he released the front clasps of her vest, parting the snakeskin garment with a gentle nudging of his fingers until it slid open, revealing her breasts to his caress. He scooped one up, worshipped its perfection with his hand, his fingers. Kala gasped, the sound followed by a hitching moan as he rolled his thumb over her nipple.
The tip of flesh puckered instantly into a rock-hard nub and liquid heat pooled in Torin’s groin. He suppressed a growl, dropping his head instead to take the pinched nipple in his mouth, flicking his tongue over it, nipping it with his teeth before suckling on it with gentle force.
“God!” Kala burst out, her nails raking at his back.
He drew her nipple deeper into his mouth, sucked harder. She whimpered again, her hips bucking from the floor, her hands gripping his back.
Torin’s head swam. His cock pulsed. With more control than he thought he possessed, he dragged his mouth from her breast, rained a slew of tiny kisses over the slight plane of her chest and then captured her other nipple with his lips.
Kala cried out, a tremble in her voice and body. “That feels…that feels…” The rest of her words became lost in another moaning cry. Torin suckled harder, nipping with increasing pressure. She writhed beneath him, her hands scratching at his back, his shoulders. “Please, Torin.” She tangled her fingers in his hair and tugged. “Please. I want to feel you inside me.”
Lifting his head, Torin pulled a steadying breath through his nose. “True pleasure comes from giving, Kala, just as much as taking.” He let his gaze roam over the sight of her flushed breasts, the glistening sheen of his saliva on her right nipple almost pushing him over the edge. “I have longed to do this for a lifetime.”
Her eyes fluttered closed and a soft choke caught in her throat. “But I can’t wait any longer.”
A smile pulled at Torin’s lips and he smoothed his hand down to her belly, skimming his fingers under the waistline of her trousers. “Tell me this doesn’t feel as good as you want it to feel and I will stop. I will move right on and bury my cock to the balls between your legs.”
Kala’s stomach dipped, her hitching breath and lifting hips heating his already molten blood. “Yes…no…” She opened her eyes, rolled her head to the side, pushed her hips higher to his touch. “I…”
Torin lowered his head to her stomach, pressed his lips to the flat perfection just below her navel. “Let the pleasure take you, Kala.” He touched the tip of his tongue to her flushed skin. “Let it consume you.”
“Oh, God.”
Her groan rumbled through her belly. Torin felt it with his lips. It fueled his own pleasure. With every breath he took, he could smell her juices growing wetter between her legs. She was more than ready for him to fill her, more than ready to have him bury his length into her creamy heat, and yet he knew she could feel more. Knew he could give her more.
With a quick flick of his fingers, he opened her fly, marking the newly revealed flesh with his mouth as he smoothed her trousers down her hips and arse. Kala moaned, her hands dropping from his hair to scramble at the mat beside her. She knew what was coming next. The fresh musk scenting the air told Torin as such.
Lifting his head slightly, he watched his fingers feather over the glistening folds of her sex, watched them circle the tiny nub of her clitoris. A surge of tension flooded his groin, turned his straining cock into a throbbing shaft of want, but he held onto his control. “I am going to taste you now, Kala.” He sucked in a slow breath through his nose, his stare fixed on her cream-sodden pussy. “I am going to make love to you with my mouth, bring you to climax with my tongue.” He stroked her damp folds with his fingertips, marveling at her velvet beauty. “And then, as you ride each peaking wave of pleasure, I am going to break my solemn word I gave six months past and sink my cock into your heat and take you even higher still.”
Kala’s choked whimper caressed his ears as he lowered his head to the junction of her thighs and delved into her pussy with his tongue.
“Oh, God!” Kala cried, her hips bucking upward, slamming her sex to his face. “God, God!”
Torin plunged his tongue past the drenched lips of her pussy, stabbing into her tightness. She tasted just as he knew she would—salted honey and musk. H
e could drown in her flavor and it would be a good death. He licked at her clit, flicked its swollen form with the tip of his tongue, sucked it into his mouth and nipped it with his teeth.
Kala cried out, her hands grasping at the mat, her hips jerking in thrusting jolts. Her juices flowed from her sex, wetting Torin’s chin. He drank in her pleasure, smoothing his hands over her legs, the firm strength of her inner thighs adding to the exquisite sensations flooding through him. Everything in his life had led to this moment. Everything. The Sun Sword, the Sol Order, the prophesies, all insignificant to this one stolen moment of shared pleasure.
His body ached, thrummed with a building tension he knew he would not be able to constrain for much longer. Rational thought began to escape him.
Rolling his tongue over Kala’s clit, he curled his hands under her arse, cupping her cheeks with a pressure he hoped was gentle but knew to be not. Slipping. He was slipping.
Syunna, she tastes so good…so good…
He plunged his tongue back into her folds, wriggled its length deeper. Kala bucked again, her moans growing faster, shorter. With a quick tug, he jerked her hips higher and pressed his mouth to the tight hole of her anus, stabbing at the puckered entry with the tip of his tongue as he dipped one finger, two, three into her pussy. Kala’s moans turned to gasping cries. Her sex squeezed his fingers, warm cream slicking his knuckles as she bucked into his penetrations.
“Oh, Torin, Torin.” His name fell from her lips in breathless pants. She thrust harder into his hand. He wriggled his fingers, stroked the sweet spot within her sex and then replaced his hand with his mouth again, lapping at the wet product of his touch.
“I’m going to…I’m going to…”
He closed his lips tightly on her clit, sucked hard. Flicked the tip of his tongue over the tiny button, before plunging his tongue into her centre once again.
“God, Torin!” Kala cried, “I’m going to…to…to…”
The Sun Sword Page 9
