Chapter 23 | Magnus

Chapter 23

Magnus

"IT MIGHT BE PAINFUL ," I croaked, staring sidelong into Ravinica's beautiful face. "I don't want to put that on you."

Her golden-flecked eyes flashed, lips twisting with a snarl that boiled what little blood I had in me. "Oh, shut up, you stubborn fool," she chided. "A little pain to make sure you're okay? Sign me up."

I smiled weakly. I felt sticky with sweat, disgusting, yet her eyes never wavered, her lips never pinched with pity.

Ravinica was not going to let me wallow in misery, and I loved her for it. She was too strong for that, and knew what I had to offer when I was at full strength.

The blood-leechings had grown worse over the past few days, even before I'd joined the company to rescue my silvermoon. No matter how much the scientists in Fort Woden refilled my lifeblood before stealing more of it, the dark plasma they used was tainted and rotten.

My body had the ability to modify any blood source to make it my own. Regardless of the blood type, I could alter the genetic structure to make it safe to flow through my veins.

I had no idea how it worked—only that magical means kept me "alive." In that, I was like a vampire, always needing more after I Shaped with my blood or drained myself.

The best, most powerful source? It had to come from a living, breathing human. It was why draining Astrid had empowered me so greatly, and why the bags of slop they used in the laboratory withered me.

Currently, I was a shell of my former self.

Exactly how the academy wanted me.

I wished to tell Ravinica everything. She had barged in here like a bat out of Hel, yet I knew there were some secrets better left alone.

I was doing this for her , after all—to guarantee her safety once she returned to the academy, so she wouldn't have to always look over her shoulder for the nearest threat.

If Hersir Jorthyr stayed true to his word, the Warden of Vikingrune would not pursue my silver-haired mate thanks to me volunteering my blood to the academy.

They wanted it that badly. More than they even wanted information from Ravinica regarding the elves and whatever she had gleaned from them.

A wave of guilt passed through me. It was a foreign sensation, an emotion I wasn't used to carrying, like all emotions. Staring into Ravinica's face, knowing I was keeping things from her . . . it didn't sit well with me.

"What must I do, Magnus?" she asked, leaning her face closer to mine.

"First, you can kiss me," I said.

She paused, matching my smile. "Gladly." Her fair cheeks filled with color.

Closing her eyes, she slanted her lips over mine. Her warm breath and the softness of her touch ignited my soul, calling forth a deep well of need inside me.

Too feeble to do anything about the surge of lust, I simply moaned into her mouth as her tongue flicked and slid against mine.

She took great care to be gentle with me, cradling the back of my head in her warm palm, rubbing my neck along the lines of my tattoos and lifted scars. It was something I never thought I'd need from the warrior woman—or something she was even capable of.

When she pulled away, slightly breathless, our eyes locked again. "I have a sneaking suspicion that had nothing to do with what you need from me," she murmured close to my ear. "And I'm fine with that, you sneaky bastard."

My lips lifted in a lopsided grin. "Nonsense. I need everything from you, silvermoon. That was only the first step."

She chuckled, kissing my cheek and running her hair through the lank strands of my crimson hair. "Let me rephrase, then: I'm guessing that wasn't the painful part."

My smile faltered. I gave her a somber headshake. "If anything, it healed my pain, lass. I've been waiting too long to have your lips on mine again."

A roguish glint flashed in her smoldering eyes. "How about having my thighs on yours?"

I groaned, fighting against the new bolt of lust that thickened my cock and pushed the sheets over my body outward. Sighing, I said, "Sadly, I think I am too depleted to give you the ravaging you deserve."

Torrid memories of our time in Mimir Tomes played in my mind: tying her arms behind her, bending her over the table, folding her onto the ground as I pummeled her from above . . .

"Then let me help you, love."

The memories and her soothing words made me harder, more ravenous. The parasitic sensation of my bloodless state—my own body working against me—pulled my remaining energy to a cavernous hole in my stomach. The itch of my blood made me uncomfortable, and I groaned from an ache throbbing in my head and cock.

"You'll need to nick yourself," I croaked. "So I can take some of your blood."

With a shrug, she moved into action. She didn't ask how much I'd take, or for what reason I needed her blood.

Her clothes rustled as she drew her spear off her back and cut a small line into the top of her forearm, then set the spear down on the floor. "Like that?"

I watched the red nectar bead before dripping down the side of her glistening forearm. Salivating and working my tongue over in my mouth, I nodded. "Just like that, love."

There were two ways for me to siphon blood from a victim. The first was how I'd drained Astrid: cutting myself, cutting her, and then creating a pathway for her blood to seep into my veins. I could use her blood as a source, then direct her blood to me with Shaped runes, like an invisible bridge.

The second was much more direct and . . . intimate.

"Go ahead," she purred. "Do what you need to do to get your strength back, Magnus."

I nodded diligently, lustily scenting her rich blood and losing all logical thoughts. When I dipped my head forward, she presented her forearm—

And I greedily closed my lips around the small wound. I started suckling on her like a babe to teat. The rush of rich, coppery blood filled my mouth as I feasted, pouring down my throat.

This mode of energy restoration was what made bloodrenders like vampires of legend. Draugs, the undead—by themselves, they were nothing but cold bodies.

I was different. Blood powered every part of me. The warmth of it spilling down the back of my throat rejuvenated me with quickness. Colors became brighter, my world less muted. Ravinica tasted amazing, like the sweetest elixir.

She bit back a small moan as I held her arm gently in front of me and drank. It was a red-lipped kiss, and the more I drained the stronger I felt. I closed my eyes as a tingle of power inched up my spine and through my extremities.

The weak blood from before transformed into the stalwart blood of this goddess, inflaming every part of me.

Beneath the covers, my cock roared to life, painfully throbbing. When I finally pulled back with a soft smack of my lips, our gazes met. Fire danced in our orbs.

"W-Was that . . . it?" she asked, face flushed. "That wasn't so bad."

"Your blood is potent, love. I don't need much."

"Is there anything else I can help you with?"

A smile split across my cheeks, which already felt fuller, more suffused with color. I was always pale and deathly looking, but now I was positively alive .

"Perhaps you can help us satiate both our needs," I murmured.

Her eyebrows hopped, curiosity stealing her.

Slowly, I pulled back the sheets covering my body. I no longer felt sickly and sticky. Beneath, I was nude, and my cock speared over the edge of the bed, trembling from the hardness and fullness of my desire.

Ravinica took one look at the metal studs running up the length of my underside, and gave me a wicked grin. "Oh, you devious bloodrender. You didn't tell me you were naked under there."

My smile widened, lips still smeared with her blood. "Surprise."

"A welcome surprise indeed." With a languid sigh, Ravinica reached down and closed her palm around the middle of my length. When I hissed from the bliss of her touch, she said, "Gods, Magnus, you're as hot as a lit forge."

I swallowed hard, my throat now dry where it had been drenched just moments ago. Words wouldn't form in my mouth.

"Still feeling too depleted . . . to ravage me?" Her voice was a lustful purr.

On the contrary, silvermoon.

Ravinica slowly climbed onto the bed, looping her leg over me as she pressed me from my side to my back. My eyes widened at the sight of her crawling on top of me, taking control in the same way I'd wrested control from her back in Mimir Tomes.

Her hand never left my studded cock, even as she peeled herself out of her pants and straddled me. She rested her body lengthwise on top of me, sandwiching us together, guiding my manhood.

And then her warm, bountiful thighs closed around my length. I gasped from the softness of her, the diabolical heat and squeeze of her thighs around my cock.

"Does that make you feel a little stronger, bloodrender?"

Her thighs moved, up and down, and I realized what she was doing. As she fucked my cock with her thighs, my thoughts became lost on her face, and I craned my neck up to pepper kisses along her collar and cheeks and lips.

She smiled and kissed me back, more heated than the soft kiss she'd given me before.

"Fuck, silvermoon," I breathed. "You have no idea what you're doing to me."

"Oh, I know exactly what I'm doing to you, Magnus. You can't exactly hide it well." She wiggled her thighs to display her dominance—to show how I couldn't hide it well.

My cock javelined between the nonexistent gap of her fleshy thighs. She started moving faster, and my arousal spilled down the pulsating crown, trickling down every ridge of my studs until dripping on her blazing skin.

Unable to control myself, I embedded my hands in the soft swells of her ass and brought her body further south, so the top of my cock slid along the sopping-wet center of her.

Even without penetration, without the utter heaven of Ravinica's pussy wrapped around my dick, I was about to unravel for her. The bed creaked as our naked legs pressed together and she bounced on top of me.

Then she slid a hand back, behind her, between her legs, and she blindly guided the slick ridge of my cock, curving it toward her. "There. I think you're ready," she whispered.

We inhaled in unison when I breached her tender lips and sank inside her. My eyes rolled and I made a sound in my throat that was inhuman.

Reeling my head back in the bed, she took the opportunity to kiss the sweet erogenous zones of my corded neck. She slowly gyrated into my hips with her weighty body and sank deeper down my shaft.

I could feel every bump and prod of my piercings against her walls, throbbing as she tightened around me and squeezed the life out of my cock.

"Odin fuck me," I croaked, "you're going to destroy me, silvermoon."

"Odin isn't the one fucking you, Magnus. I am. I'm your destruction."

With her voice slightly rising, she slammed her ass down hard on my lap.

The bed groaned from the thunderclap of our flesh slapping together. I bottomed out deep inside her with that single plunge into the deep-end. The feeling of Ravinica wrapped around me was unholy, and even in my rejuvenated state there was no way I'd last long.

She moved faster, bouncing her ass with loud claps of her skin against mine. I grabbed handfuls of her ass and moaned as she pushed off my chest and sat upright.

Ravinica rode me with a fury we hadn't had in a month—with the need and necessity demanded from both of us. I was trapped beneath her, no other place I'd rather be in the world, staring up at the silver-haired goddess as she lost herself to a surreal state of ecstasy.

She rested her hands on my chest, close together, pressing her breasts with her arms. Her nipples prodded the fabric of her shirt, hard and wanting. Her body ground into mine, moving with expertise I hadn't expected from the gorgeous woman.

My body traced the curves of her—those wide hips, those milky thighs. I watched in awe as my thick, long cock speared into her and pushed a slight swell to her belly.

"Say ‘Queen' if I'm being too rough with you," she said with a devious grin, calling back to our first time together and our safewords that never made their way out of our mouths.

I wasn't going to relent. This was everything I'd wanted and more. I had gone from weak and frail and miserable to powerful, lustful, energized.

And it was all because of Ravinica Linmyrr. The woman who calmed my aching soul and brought thunder to the lightning of my blood.

I bucked my hips and she moaned, rolling her head back. "Right there, Magnus, fuck. You hit me so deep with your big fucking cock."

My hands dug into her waist above her hips, and I started to control the narrative, bouncing her on top of me.

She quickly took back control, grabbing my hands by the wrists, surprising me. With a sharp inhale, she took my wrists and slammed them over my head on the bed, pinning me in place.

Our eyes locked. She leaned forward, ravaged my lips with hers, and rode me with mad abandon. Her weight on top was nothing, her kiss was everything, and I felt myself losing control. Unraveling at the seams.

I groaned in her mouth, loving the dominant way she had turned the tables on me—becoming just as ravenous and uncontrollable as I had our first tryst together.

Her ass moved faster, rippling against me. The claps swelled in volume, just as my cock swelled in size.

I tried to endure, but I couldn't fathom restraint. A part of me was still weakened—I hadn't drained enough blood for such a strenuous exercise as this, because I hadn't wanted to harm Ravinica. Never that.

Body going taut, veins distending, I bit her lip to taste more of her. She yelped and I manhandled her hands on my wrists, breaking free. My hands went to her ass in a hurried instant and I lifted, withdrawing—

Just as ropes of hot cum launched from my cock to her backside, painting her ass. She stayed in place while I unloaded, trembled, and came to a rest.

My body calmed, my soul sang.

"Gods save me," I muttered breathlessly.

She stayed on top of me, purring with a chuckle and resting her head contentedly against my neck. "Was that everything you dreamed of having again, Magnus Feldraug?"

"I only made you come once, judging by your tightening around me."

She laughed lightly in my ear. "Is that a failure in your eyes?"

I nodded gravely against her cheek. "Next time I will accept no less than three climaxes."

Her head lifted, an impressed pout on her face. "I'll hold you to it, bloodrender."

A smirk bit at the corners of my lips, and she kissed me before I could finish smiling. Our lips melded together and we sank into each other, content.

Then, a moment later, she said, "Now then. Enough fun. Tell me why you've been drained—and I don't mean your cum, you filthy bloodsucker."