by Rhys Lawless
“What do you mean?”
“We’re not going to have sex thinking about the million lives we’ll be saving. If we’re becoming true mates, let’s have the best sex of our lives.”
Before I could agree to it, he came back up and kissed my mouth, his tongue teasing my lips, and when that became too much torture, he used his teeth to bite and pull until I had no choice but to forget the war brewing out there and to focus on the union between us.
I grabbed his butt cheeks, and he took both our cocks in his hand, palming them with slow tender movements, his thumb massaging our glans.
I pinched his nipples and twisted until he growled like a beast in my mouth, his sound reverberating down to my core.
That’s more like it, he said.
Shut up and take me.
Oh, don’t you worry. I’ll make you mine when it’s time. He bit down on my bottom lip until I let out a sob.
Take me now, I said, and he responded with a slap on my face.
I call the shots on this one. And if you have anything to say to me, you call me master. Understood? The air rushed out of me, and my dick in his hand pulsed.
Yes, I replied, and he slapped me again.
Yes, what?
Yes, master.
He growled and squeezed my face so that my lips puckered.
Wade sat up and moved to sit on my chest and forced me to take his length in my mouth. I let the tip in, and then he released the grip on my face.
“That’s it. Swallow it.” He grunted and pushed his cock farther in.
His tip massaged my throat, and my gag reflex made me choke, but he didn’t relent. Instead, he fucked my mouth, pinning me down to the bed.
His elation waved through me like ripples on a lake, and I instinctively reached for my own cock to rub it.
“Did I say you could touch yourself?” he shouted and pulled his cock out of my mouth to spit at me. Then he pushed it back in, harder, while I struggled to breathe and needed my own release.
I felt his orgasm again; it was rising and rising inside him, but before he could spill his seed again, he pulled out of my mouth and worked his way down my body.
He bit down on my nipples, licked my happy trail, and then took my cock in his mouth with a hunger I’d never seen in him before.
Yes, baby. Yes, master. Suck me, master. Please, I begged him and tried to grab his hair.
He didn’t let me. Instead, he kept both my hands at my sides while he bobbed his head up and down my length, making me lose my breath and my patience.
He didn’t give me a chance to climax because he let my dick go and pulled my hips up to lick my hole.
Don’t clench, he said and spat on me before returning his tongue to rim me.
I’d never been big on the whole ass-eating thing, but if there was ever a time to convert, it was here and now under Wade’s mercy.
I could get used to this treatment. Or maltreatment, to be more accurate. I’d always been too scared to take things to the next level because I didn’t want to scare him away, but after today, he couldn’t be scared away even if he wanted to. He was showing me more of his kinky side, and I liked it. I wondered what else we could try next. Could I convince him to learn the art of shibari with me so he could tie me up and use me as he saw fit?
He spanked me, and I looked at him.
“Focus,” he yelled.
“Yes, master,” I said, and before I knew what was happening, his cock was inside me, and I lost any control I had over my body.
He started slow, but soon he sped up, and all I could think about was how badly I needed my release.
It’s time, he said as he pounded me.
I reached for the knife next to me and held it in my hand over my arm. Everyone always thought the neck was more pleasurable to drink from, but my experience had been otherwise. Neck cramps and severe bleeding made it more dangerous than it had to be. The arm, on the other hand, was easier to suck from, and it didn’t give you a neck ache after. Or at least that’s what Jin had told me. I was about to find out if he was right.
As Wade hammered his dick against my prostate and his climax was close, he looked at the piece of paper next to me and then into my eyes.
“I give myself to you, to have and to hold, to protect and to defend. I bind myself to you for all eternity. Let my life force be your life force. Your blood, my blood,” he said, and at that, I dug the blade of the knife across my arm until the blood oozed out of the cut, and Wade came inside me.
Then he leaned down and placed his lips over the gush. He winced for a moment before sucking the blood. The pain made my skin tense and my ears ring.
“I take you and you take me, to nurture and to feed, to shield and to shelter. I bind myself to you for all eternity. Let my life force be your life force. Your blood, my blood.” I cried and grabbed my cock, which was tense, awaiting release, and palmed it hard until my cum shot out of me, and with it, all my strength as he continued to drink me.
With the knife still in my other hand, I cut Wade’s arm, but he didn’t budge or wince. I brought my lips up to him and reacquainted myself with the taste of silver and the thirst that had once been uncontrollable.
I might not have been a vampire anymore, but I felt the same thirst for him and he for me. It was like we were linked, glued together and couldn’t let go of each other even if we wanted to.
I could feel his heartbeat as if it was mine, every muscle, every pain, every trickle of sweat was felt as if mine. It was like I’d grown a second heart that someone had pulled out of my body and put inside Wade’s.
We’d mated. It was done. Now we were stuck together.
It was hard, but I forced myself to concentrate and remember the next part. The most important part.
I pulled my mouth away from his cut, the blood dripping down his arm, and yelled with all my might.
“Avalis, queen of passion and compassion, goddess of humanity and witchcraft, demon of despair, sister witch, I call you upon me. Your brothers and sisters need you.”
As with four weeks ago when we’d woken up because of the energy blast surging from the ley lines, a bolt of lightning struck through us both, pulsing, vibrating, and making us feel more alive than we’d ever felt.
Wade coughed and removed his lips from my arm, too, but he didn’t let me go. He opened his mouth and dust of all colors of the rainbow suffocated us, and the room lit up with fire and chaos, light and darkness.
I didn’t know what was happening, but one moment, I was watching Wade have an overwhelming outburst of power, the residue of the spells he’d consumed, and the next, I knew exactly what was happening.
Why did you call me, brother? a voice said inside my head. A voice so serene it almost put me to sleep.
We need your help, Avalis. Your parents are about to destroy everything.
Sixteen
Wade
Being with Caleb on that level felt equal parts terrifying and exhilarating. I’d thought the whole blood drinking would have creeped me out, and it had, at first. But as soon as the first drop had hit my palate, I couldn’t stop myself. I’d wanted more. Needed more. And when Caleb had drunk mine, it all finally made sense.
We weren’t just doing a disgusting blood ritual for the sake of invoking Avalis. We were coming together as one. My blood becoming his blood, and his blood mine. We drank each other’s life force until we didn’t know where I ended and he began.
Was this what Winston had felt when he’d first set eyes on Hew? Or had Caleb and I come together on a whole new and different level than anyone ever before? I wasn’t surprised when Caleb pulled away from me and the cut on my arm was no longer there. Neither was his. In their places were red scars—a circle like a burn mark that I knew we’d both carry forever.
“Did it work? Is she here?” I asked.
“Oh, she’s here all right,” Caleb said.
I was surprised he didn’t sound different. Both Christian and Hew had sounded…possessed. Caleb soun
ded like Caleb.
“What is she saying?”
“She can feel Ealistair and Rhafnet. She can feel their hatred. She can take us to them,” he said and gritted his teeth as if he was in pain.
I grabbed his arm, the one with the scar, and with my other hand lifted his chin.
“Hey,” I said. “Are you okay?”
He winced but nodded.
“She’s just…loud.”
“Is there something I can do to help?”
“No. You can help me dress, though.”.
“Of course. Anything.” I helped him sit on the bed. “Here.” I slipped his underwear back on and then put his T-shirt over his head, and he put his arms through the sleeves at the same time. His limbs were heavy like lead.
“Why am I not feeling like you?” I asked. “Other than being able to hear your heartbeat without even touching you, I feel...normal.”
“You don-you don’t have a whole other entity inside you. Nothing to do with…with mating,” he said, finding it difficult to articulate.
“If he let me take control, he wouldn’t be suffering.” A female voice spoke through Caleb’s mouth. He groaned, and when he spoke again, it was in his own voice.
“What was that about?” I asked him.
“It’s Avalis. She wants to get in the driver’s seat. But I’m not letting her. I don’t want her to take me over like Rhafnet took over Hew. She said she put him to sleep. I don’t want Avalis doing the same to me.”
“But isn’t she supposed to be here to help? What was the point of invoking her?”
“Damn right, what was the point?” Avalis said through Caleb.
“We need to go,” Caleb said. “We need to find the demons and the high council before it’s too late.”
“We do. I’ll call the others. Where are the demons?”
“Tower Bridge. They are about to infiltrate the Tower of London and steal the Crown Jewels.”
After calling Winston and asking him to get everyone and head to Tower Bridge, I got dressed, gave Caleb a caffeine hit, and we made our way to the city center in broad daylight.
If those demons were willing to rob the Crown Jewels in broad daylight, then their plans couldn’t include caring much for the human authorities. They’d made a threat to wipe out the humans in London, and they were going to make that a reality sooner rather than later.
“Why are they going after the Jewels? I thought they’re demons. They can do anything they want,” I said.
“No,” Caleb said. “Avalis is saying there is a limit to their power. Ealistair feeds off war, and Rhafnet feeds of death—“
“That wasn’t in the book.”.
“Yeah, because that book is part reality, part fairy tale. Those two need chaos to survive, and what brings more chaos than the destruction of an entire race? But in order to do so, they need a spell that will amplify their power and reach.”
“I’m scared to ask what that means.”
“It means if they get their hands on the Crown Jewel they’re after, the spell they need, they’ll be able to kill everyone at the click of their fingers.”.
“What?”
“Well, not the literal click of their fingers. We wouldn’t want a copyright infringement on our asses, but you get what I mean. If they use the Jewel to amplify their powers, for every human they knock down, a hundred more will fall.”
That certainly didn’t sound good.
“How do we stop them?” I asked.
“We don’t. Avalis is.”
If he lets her. I wanted to tell him that, but I was afraid he’d take it personally. It was best not to upset him now, right before battle. Why was he keeping the demon goddess at bay when the whole point of us performing the sex ritual and mating for life had been to bring her here so she could help us rid our world of her parents?
We took the train to Tower Bridge, but our trip was cut short when the train operator announced there had been a signal failure while we were still seven stops behind.
“She’s getting impatient,” Caleb growled as the train came to a stop at the next station, and we, along with lots of other passengers, decided it was better to walk the distance than to wait a century underground.
“Well, if Avalis has a better idea of how to get there, she’s more than welcome to try,” I told Caleb, hoping she was listening.
Caleb smirked but then touched his head as if someone had knocked him with a hammer.
“Follow me,” he said and took my hand, walking us to the end of the platform. While passengers were busy following the “way out” signs, we stood in front of the marbled wall of the station like tourists trying to decipher a map.
Caleb took a peek behind him and a step forward and then put his index and middle fingers together and drew a circle on the wall, mumbling something under his breath that wasn’t quite human.
The wall sizzled, and the circle he’d drawn became a surge of fire and energy that all swirled in the middle in a chaotic mess. Caleb stepped back and gestured towards it.
“After you,” he said and grinned.
It felt weird not trusting Caleb, but I couldn’t. The way he acted and the way he spoke was off, even when Avalis wasn’t speaking through him. Was this what it was like being possessed? Or was I being paranoid?
“I’m not trying to kill you. Go through,” Avalis said and rolled Caleb’s eyes, and for a moment, I could have sworn it had been a united act between the two.
I stepped through the circle and it felt as if the cells of my entire body were pulled apart and then put back together as I got out into the grounds of the Tower of London. I looked behind me and Caleb walked through the empty wall of the White Tower as if there was a door I couldn’t see.
This was the second time I had teleported, and it seemed the more I did it, the less I liked it.
“Great, now what?” I asked.
“Now we find Winston and prepare for war,” Caleb said and scanned the area.
A few tourists were staring at us, and who could blame them? They had just seen us appear from thin air. I’d be staring in their place.
Caleb sprinted towards the exit, and once we were out of the tower grounds and onto the riverbank, we ran towards the tunnel under the bridge. We didn’t get a chance to climb the steps as we found a group huddled together.
I pulled my hilt out, ready to extend the blade at any strange or rapid movement, but Caleb continued, charging right at them. I picked up my pace to get there at the same time as him, but when Caleb got close, the group all turned, their swords shining under the limited lighting.
“Win,” I said and pushed the blade back in. He did the same. “You’re here already.”
Behind him, I saw Lloyd’s and Ash’s faces. Graham was staring at Caleb and walked towards him, pushing everyone out of his way.
“What’s wrong with you?” he asked Caleb.
“Nothing’s wrong with me. What are you talking about?” Caleb slapped Graham’s hand away when he reached out to touch him.
“Your aura is…different. Stronger.”
“Ah, yeah, that. Nothing to worry about. It will help us take them down,” Caleb said.
I didn’t know why he wouldn’t tell him the truth, but we didn’t have time to talk about it because we heard an explosion from up above.
The screech of cars swerving penetrated my ears, and I had to cover them to protect them. From the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of a car falling from the bridge, right into the middle of the Thames.
“We need to hurry,” Winston said.
I put a hand up to stop him, and with that, the rest of the guys paused behind us.
“Are you guys sure? This is going to be dangerous. We might not make it out alive,” I said.
Ash stepped forward and pushed past Winston.
“It’s too late for that. We’re here now, so let’s make it count,” he said and ran up the steps.
Winston followed suit, and the rest of the remaining hunters and high
council members barreled up the stairs ready to sacrifice their lives for the common good.
Caleb, Graham, and I were the only ones that didn’t move. I had to make sure Caleb was going to be all right. And so did Graham.
“Caleb, you’re scaring me,” Graham said. “What’s going on? What have you done to yourself?”
Caleb gave me a quick glance and avoided Graham’s stare.
“I did what I had to do, Graham. I called on backup.”
“Backup? What kind of backup?” he asked and looked behind us.
“The divine sort,” Caleb answered and rushed up the steps.
Graham took a moment to look at me, cocked his head to the side with a narrowing of his eyes, and after a deep breath followed behind Caleb.
When I got to the top, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.
The entire traffic on Tower Bridge was pushed to the sides, the people inside the cars banging on the glass, begging for their lives, and pedestrians taking cover behind them.
In the middle of the bridge, Christian, Hew, Danielle, and the witches of the high council were making their way through. I looked behind me and hooded witches closed in on us. No spellbooks were on sight. This wasn’t going to be a fight of wits and skill. This was going to be a battle of strength and power.
The other hunters didn’t fail to notice the company behind us. All swords came swooshing out of their hilts, glowing in the daylight. The humans I could see behind the witches gasped and covered their eyes, a lot of them filming the action on their phones.
I took a step towards the witches when a woman, a BLADE recruit that had joined only months before Christian’s fall, put her hand on my chest.
“This one’s not your fight. We’ve got them,” she said, and she glanced at the bigger guns behind us.
She was right. If I could help stop the demon nightmare back there, then there were more chances to save her and the others’ lives.
Caleb, Ash, and Graham walked towards Ealistair and Rhafnet and the army behind them. Winston walked with and a few others a few feet short of Caleb.
I made a start to catch up with them when a flock of giant ravens flew past me and within seconds turned into humans in a cloud of smoke and lightning.
