Realm Book Two - Shadow Slave

by K. A. M'Lady

  I knew what it was to have Jade’s hands on me. To feel the heat of his mouth skimming my body as I writhed with desire beneath it. I wanted to feel it again. Only this time Kieran wasn’t here to offer his permission, or his counsel.

  With the heat of Jade’s hands on my waist and the fire burning in the pit of my belly like some demon of the soul searching for a release from the hunger, it was almost more than I could bear. As the scent of him, the carnal hunger of his beast washed through my mind and soul, it tore a growl of need and hunger of my own from my lips. A need so feral, so animalistic that I didn’t even know I possessed such base and foreign desires.

  I leaned into him, pressing the fullness of my aching breasts against the unmovable strain of his arms, forcing myself into the wall of his chest until he had no choice but to allow the movement or squeeze my waist too tightly.

  “Rihker, stop. You don’t know what you are doing.” His voice was a rough whisper, pleading with me as I ran my tongue along the curve of his jaw, up the side of his throat and just past the tender flesh beneath his ear.

  This was the way a female would seek the permission of her male. Somehow I knew that. And I was seeking his permission. My body felt like a million bolts of lightning was exploding within it, my skin, as though it were a thousand degrees of burning flames and that if I tore my clothes off and sought the comfort of Jade’s flesh against my own, his flesh would somehow cool me. I thought that only his body and his beast would be a match for the beast that was rampaging through mine.

  For a split second my brain faltered on that one thought. That one small item lingering like the whispering voice of reason, for I knew deep within my soul that I didn’t have a beast. That it was impossible. Then suddenly, I could feel something inside of me, something sliding beneath my skin like a coiling snake. Something slamming around my insides as if it were trapped. Something trapped and seeking release from the confines of my flesh and bones. And only I had the power to set it—to set her—free.

  Jade was doing everything he could do; human and otherwise to refrain from my advances as I pawed and rubbed myself against him. I knew that he wanted me. I could feel it in the bulge pressed between us, smell it in the air that filled the small confines of the car. All of us could smell it.

  His arms were corded with the thickness of his muscles as they strained to hold me away from him. But somehow I continued to press the advantage, closing the distance between us and nuzzling the space along his neck. I nipped and kissed a line from his ear to his throat, from his throat to his jaw and the fullness of his bottom lip. Wanting him to feel the urgency of my desire. To feel my hunger and my need, and match it with his own.

  When my tongue swept along his bottom lip he growled, low and deep. The sound coming from the pit of his belly and I couldn’t help but smile, knowing I was winning some ground. His pale eyes closed, his hands now fisting into my hair, no longer at my waist as he struggled with both the need to take me, and the need to hold himself away from me.

  “Jade. Do not do this, Jade.” It was Ien’s voice traipsing through the haze of fire and rough desire burning inside me.

  But Jade couldn’t respond.

  I chose that moment to sweep my tongue into the heat of his mouth, gliding first along his bottom teeth, then a quick joust against the tip of his tongue before delving deep to taste the full heat of him.

  The dark, lush heat of him against my tongue was exhilarating. I could only groan the sound of this one small victory as the beast inside me continued to pound my insides; my body still continuing to burn like a thousand flames of death.

  “Rihker, Kieran will kill him if he takes you without his permission. You can’t allow yourself to go any further.” The voice of reason was pressing in on me as I clung to Jade, his hard body pressed against me. I could feel the ridge of his desire riding beneath me as I straddled him, and wanted nothing more than for him to be pressed full and deep inside of me as his beast took me.

  Tearing myself from Jade’s soft lips, I growled at Ien, turned to face him and even I did not recognize the voice that came out of me as my own. “Do not tell me what I want, Wolf,” I snarled, my voice so deep and gravelly that it sounded like it should hurt.

  “Holy fucking Prophet!” Garric exclaimed. “Look at her eyes! Do you see her fucking eyes?” His voice was pitched with worry as he clung to the back of the front seat, glancing in rapid movements from me to Ien and back again.

  I felt the car lurch forward as Ien replied, “I see them.” His voice was so deadpan and cold that it had Garric turning back to face him. “Garric, get on your cell and call Kieran. Now.” The command in Ien’s voice brought my head around enough to catch a glimpse of myself in the rear view mirror. My eyes were the darkest shade of crimson I had ever seen, each one spiked with swirls of black and brown in their centers, the silver completely gone.

  Just then my body was racked by spasms, my back arching, my arms contorting. I reached for Jade and he wrapped his arms around my middle to keep me from bending backwards. I clung helplessly to his shirt and with horror watched the muscles in my forearms slid beneath my skin. It was as though my bones were moving beneath my skin and my flesh was stretching to accommodate it. But my bones didn’t actually move, for nothing popped or slid out of its normal human form.

  Then my fingers started to flex of their own accord, clenching and unclenching onto the meaty flesh of Jade’s shoulder; this time my knuckles popping as I dug my fingers into his skin. I stared at each digit in a sort of macabre wonder, the insane horror and visual intensity of the moment so incredible it was completely beyond my understanding.

  “How far are we?” Jade asked. I turned to look at him. As I did so, the lust resumed and intensified as I met his ice-blue eyes. I suddenly found myself reaching for him, my hands grabbing handfuls of his long hair as I pulled the heat of his mouth to mine.

  I vaguely remember hearing Ien saying something about ‘on our road and Kieran being unavailable′, but I didn’t care. I had Jade’s mouth on mine again, the heat of his tongue dueling with my own and I was about two seconds from ripping his shirt off.

  It was the tearing of cloth and the first deep rut that stirred my movements on. I could feel the beast inside me, pacing wildly as I ran my hands up the soft flesh of Jade’s now naked chest. I repeated the circuit on a downward motion and he grabbed my wrists, stilling my movements. All while I kissed him, nipped and nuzzled and growled like the animal inside me wanted me to do.

  I was burning up with heat and hunger, and he was fighting me. It was beginning to piss me off. “Stop it,” I growled, prying his fingers from my wrists. The shocked response in his eyes made me smile. I caught something then in Jade’s eyes that I hadn’t seen before—submission. Somehow that one small feat had shown him I was serious, and he was backing down. I could hear the beast within me howl with delight.

  I took him by the shoulders and pushed him down on the back seat, all while he watched me do it. While he willingly allowed me to do it. His eyes were hooded, his chest was heaving, but he didn’t fight me. He didn’t try to stop me.

  I knew he shouldn’t be allowing me to do this—hell, I knew I shouldn’t be doing this. But something was raging inside of me. Something thrashing and burning and hungering for release. Something older and darker than the very earth itself, and only I could give it to her.

  The how or why of it I didn’t understand and at this moment, with Jade’s tan, warm flesh now resting beneath mine, so willingly there for my taking, I was going to take it.

  I felt myself smile down at him; wicked, sexy and full of all the nefarious sin I felt. My body itself had a raging beast rampaging through it, seeking an escape through my flesh, flesh that was unable—or unwilling—to give. Flesh that wanted nothing more than to be pressed against the warm, hard body laid out like a gift before me.

  I leaned forward, ran my tongue up the center of Jade’s abdomen and felt his body quiver beneath my lips. The car slammed sidew
ays before lurching to a sudden stop. My beast chose that precise moment to try to rip its way from the center of my body and slam itself into Jade’s.

  The impact of both the car’s sudden halt and the creature trying to tear its way from my body was so intense that I fell into Jade, screaming. As soon as our bodies touched I felt his beast, his Wolf, answer the call.

  “Get them out of the car. Now!” Ien was yelling. Hands were pulling us apart. I felt myself fighting, scratching and flailing as large arms clutched me in a vice-like grip.

  “She carries a beast within her. Somehow it is there, and it is looking for release.” It was Jade’s voice, distant from me, yet I heard it and my body stilled just a little, my head turning to catch the direction.

  “What has happened to her?” A voice I knew, the voice clutching me, keeping me a prisoner was asking.

  “The Werewolf at the jail fought her. He cut her up pretty badly, somehow tearing through her belly before she finally killed him. Now...” he said with almost a laugh and a groan of disbelief. “Now she’s somehow been tainted. And I don’t know how the hell it is even possible, but she is now carrying her own beast within her.” This from the one who drove. From Ien. His voice was so strained with worry, panic and fear lacing each word as he stared at the tall one, wringing his fingers in a silent plea for help and understanding.

  My brain was on overload as thought processes were getting harder and harder to maintain. Names were slipping. Thoughts were slipping. All but one. Hunger.

  “How the hell is that possible?” Anger from my keeper. Rage. I could feel it deep within my soul like a knife wound, piercing and sharp.

  “We don’t know.” The other Were was speaking. The middle one. The one named Garric. Angst and hesitation filling his voice as he looked to the Ogre for understanding of his own. Hoping that he could somehow make sense of it all when they could not. “It shouldn’t be happening at all. She is Fey. A Fey does not become a Were. And even if they did she shouldn’t turn until the full moon.”

  They all looked at each other then, as the silence stretched. Then as one, they turned and looked at me. I was still in my keeper’s arms, but I was no longer fighting him. I lay still in his arms—watching. Watching them all. Watching one in particular.

  “Why is she looking at Jade like that?” Gimlit asked as he followed my line of sight.

  “She is changing,” Jade whispered. “Her beast, even now, is in heat and is seeking a mate.”

  “I’m afraid,” Ien said, “that it’s already chosen.”

  The silence stretched for a moment longer as his words sank in, my Ogre clinging to me, more for his own protection than mine. Then, like a whispered vow or portent of doom, he stated, “This is so not good.”

  If I could have formed a thought of my own beyond the lust and the hunger, I probably would have agreed.

  Chapter Eleven

  For human nature’s daily food;

  For transient sorrows, simple wiles,

  Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.

  And now I see with eye serene

  The very pulse of the machine;

  A Being breathing thoughtful breath,

  A Traveller between life and death

  From She Was A Phantom of Delight by William Wordsworth

  In Gimlit’s arms my body seemed to still, the battle raging inside me beginning to lessen and I could almost feel a small amount of my brain function returning as he carried me into my house. My head felt like an ocean of sand was slowly receding, one wave at a time as my eyes began to open on the night around me.

  “Where’s Kieran?” I asked, my voice sounding distant as Gimlit carried me to my bedroom, the Werewolves hard on his heels. There was no way they were letting me out of their sight. Not after all they had witnessed on the drive home.

  Gimlit looked down at me, an almost pensive, reluctant light in his eyes as he replied, “He has risen, Rihker. He is not here.”

  “I can see that, Gim. He’s never here after he first rises. Where the hell did he go?” At that moment, another particularly hard spasm ripped through my belly at the same time Gimlit was laying across my coverlet.

  I clutched the silk of the scarlet comforter in my hands as I began to thrash against my mattress, my back once again bowing as the heat began to radiate through my limbs once more. I was getting agitated and with each wave of anger, I could feel the creature inside me begin her pacing anew.

  “We have to cool her off now. Because if she is going to change, it is going to be violent and deadly if we can’t get her cool.”

  Jades’ voice, as he stood at the end of my bed in nothing more than jeans and his shoes, turned my attention towards him. Just hearing his voice slowed the angst of the rushing beast within me. I could almost feel her pause as she too turned in his direction; as she cocked her head, I was shifting mine. She began to pace towards him and I was on my knees, stalking forward. One single-minded thought in each of us.

  “What is she doing?” Gimlit asked, worried as he watched my eyes slide from red with liquid silver to dark crimson bursts of black fire.

  “She is seeking her mate,” Ien stated casually, taking a step away from Jade so not to irritate the beast within me. He had seen an alpha female only once before, when he was not much more than a pup himself. She had been strong, fierce and as capable of death as the males of his species. He knew a female on the hunt was not something you wanted to interfere with.

  But Ien also knew that for Rihker to take Jade, there was the great possibility of it costing Jade his very life if Kieran did not answer his summons and give his permission. Ien was not yet ready to lose his brother; he’d already lost so much at the hands of the Death Stalkers and Others. This he was not yet willing to trade.

  Ien suddenly stepped in front of me, blocking my way and I felt my hackles rising. I felt my body pulse with the killing need, the overwhelming desire to tear out his throat. The growl as it was wrenched from the pit of my stomach quickly followed. “Get out of my way, Wolf,” I told him.

  As my anger increased, so too did the heat and quickly following on its heels, I felt the popping of my knuckles as my fingers tried to shift. As claws tried to emerge where there were no claws.

  “Rihker, you cannot do this. If you take Jade, Kieran will have no choice but to kill him. If we don’t try to stop you, he will have no choice but to kill us as well. You are his and he does not share without permission.”

  I could feel the way Ien’s words tasted in my mind as I rolled them around like a piece of hard candy. I had become a possession. It was a possession I did not deem to be true. I was no man’s property. Least of all, the property of a Death Stalker.

  I did not need Kieran’s permission to take what I wanted. To go where I wanted to go, to do the things I wanted to do. He did not own me. Not now. Not ever.

  The glare I sent Ien must have been enough, because he began to step away. But as he did so he stated, “I shall abide this command, but know this, Rihker Tennai of the Ivy Tennai. To accept your beast is to be as one with the earth. To walk the hollows and the hills, listening to the pulse and thunder of a land many have never known exists.

  But to claim another Werewolf as your own, you not only give your body, but your soul to the earth and the creatures who have walked this place for a millennium and more. For in your heart will lay the fealty of many including the one you take as your mate.”

  It was then, as his words fell away, I felt my beast shudder; her warm coat brushing against me as though she were telling me that everything would somehow be okay. That this was the Way and Light. That to become, she would guide me and protect me. Her and the Wolves that stood before me would be my brethren and together, we would be as one.

  As this tumult of thoughts ran through me I felt myself sigh my acceptance, my soul somehow understanding and partaking in this silent affirmation, older and more meaningful than even I would ever be able to comprehend. It was then, only after my silent ag
reement that the Wolf inside of me slid silently within my soul.

  At first it felt calm and soothing, like she had burrowed herself in her den—my body—and lain down for a rest. Then, a shudder like a shaking of the fur began to wrack my body as it flowed through my limbs. At first my arms began to shake, then they started to flail. Then the spasms erupted through me until I was convulsing, slamming me repeatedly against the mattress.

  Arms were reaching for me, trying to hold me down. Voices began shouting, “By the Prophet!”

  “What the hell is wrong with her?”

  “Someone hold her arms.”

  The only thing I remember is Jade’s voice telling them to move as he lay down on top of me, the warm heat of his body encompassing me as he called my beast to him.

  At first it was like a warm brush of heat and fur running along my oversensitive skin as sparks peaked like small currents; flash fires within the darkness of my heavy soul. Then a sudden blackness filled my mind in a splotchy haze before I could start to see the glint of silver fur traipsing in and out of my vision like a specter.

  Softly and oh so quietly at first, I heard the distant echo of my name. It sounded like the wind whipping along a tree line before sound broke through the fog and I could finally understand that he was calling my name. The whisper of his beast’s own howl calling me back as knowing hands caressed me.

  I remembered the feel of those hands on my body, remembered the desire they wrought and the temptation that ensued. Slowly, like a lingering kiss upon the nape of naked flesh I felt his touch and my body stirred, my beast lifting her head in the darkness as the gentle nip of teeth nuzzled the pulse at my neck, just beneath the lobe of my ear. A nip, seeking permission, a lover’s request. A mate’s request.

  My body had stopped thrashing at some point and the hands holding me fell away. I remember opening my eyes and seeing Jade, feeling him straddling my body, his face but a breath from my own. I saw, not only the luminous shine of his human eyes, but the quick silver of his beasts’ lurking in their shadows. It was a gaze seeking permission and so much more.