Chapter 25

UNA

My entire body hummed with desire. It made no sense whatsoever. Goll had chased me through the woods, behaved like a barbarian and carted me away, and all I wanted was more of his touch, more of his hands, and his tongue, and his growling voice.

It was madness. He was right. This feeling defied sense and sanity. It was driven by a desperate, trembling need. And something else altogether that I couldn't identify or explain. So when he commanded me to take off all of my clothes, there was only one thing I wanted to do.

But my pause had caused him to arch a brow, his dragon eyes glowing in the semi-dark. "Take them off," he repeated calmly. "Or I'll tear them off."

A shiver of anticipation prickled along my skin. I unbuckled the belt holding my overskirt around my waist and tossed it aside then unlaced and shoved off my boots. I then went about efficiently removing the rest of my clothes. My trousers were already unlaced, so those were easily removed.

I took my time unhooking and untying the laces of my corset, thankful Hava had put them in the front so that I could do it myself. I was glad not to miss the expression transforming Goll's face from one of desire to one of unwavering, feral hunger.

My own fingers trembled as I finally unhooked the corset and slipped it off then lifted the short hip-length chemise over my head.

Then I stood before him completely nude. Yet again.

Except this time, there were no marching drums or raucous audience, or even the barrier of gold paint and black runes on my skin. Except there were actually. I twisted my inner wrists to face away from him, not yet ready to discuss what that meant. I wanted his full attention, and I seemed to have it.

His breathing was labored as he drank in the sight of me. Slowly, he unbuckled the belt and dagger at his waist.

He didn't wear full armor today. He hadn't since we returned to N?kt Mir. He wore simple clothing. Today, he wore a long-sleeved black shirt and pants made of soft leather, darkened to charcoal, a shade darker than his skin.

By the time he'd shed his last bit of clothing, the blue coal had heated the cavern while the sizzle of lightning and rumbling thunder continued to roll and beat violently down on Northgall. Drak slumbered, blocking out the storm. Here, our little world was toasty warm and colored in hues of blue and gray, the light dipping over his beautifully muscled form and his long, thick erection.

When his hand went to his length and he gave it a long, slow stroke, I gulped hard. My mouth was dry, but my cunny was wet. He inhaled deep, his chest puffing out and his eyes closing as he smelled the air. When he opened his gaze on me again, it was the dragon who looked back.

"Get on your knees."

I paused for only a second before I stepped onto the Meer wolf fur and knelt. He walked a slow circle behind me then lowered to his own knees. But when he touched me, his hands weren't where I thought they'd be.

He swept my hair over one shoulder, and then his fingers gently trailed the skin where my wings jutted from beneath my shoulder blades. He traced with tender slides of his fingers, easing his body closer to mine. The heat of him was a wall at my back, yet for a few moments all he touched was where my wings sprouted from my body.

"I know you believe these are useless, that they can carry you nowhere. But you are so wrong, Una." His lips touched the curve of my shoulder. I trembled as he slid his hands to my hips and his mouth up my nape. "These wings carried you to me." His grip tightened as he whispered against my skin. "Where you belong." Then his voice darkened. "Lean forward."

I knew what he wanted and what he planned to do. I'd seen a Pellasian stallion mount a mare before. And gods above, the image of him doing the same to me had warmth pooling quickly between my legs. I fell forward onto my hands.

His palm skated up my spine, between my wings to the base of my neck. "Lower," he commanded.

I bent my elbows, but he continued to press and guide me until my cheek was against the fur, my breathing quick and unsteady. Then he slid his hands to my hips as he shifted back.

Confused, for I'd expected to feel him pressing at my entrance, I jolted when I felt his warm mouth on my cunny. "Ah!"

He gripped my thighs, sliding his thumbs to open my folds, and groaned as he lapped at me. "Slick and wet for me, Una." He suckled my clitoris on a groan. "You're dripping." Another flick that made me jump and whimper. "Your body doesn't seem to hate me even if you do."

I curled my fingers into the fur, reeling too high from pleasure to feel ashamed of what he was doing to me, acknowledging that he was right. I might be furious with him, but I didn't hate him. Not anymore.

I couldn't understand the truth of it, so I let my body go, let myself experience the pleasure. He moaned and licked me intimately, his tongue sliding inside me, his lips closing on my clitoris where he sucked me hard.

That wondrous sensation of arousal spiraled higher, dragging incomprehensible noises from my throat. "Goll," I whimpered as my climax tore through my body, melting me with pleasure.

He growled deep in his throat, that familiar sizzle of his magick stroking over my skin. I tried squirming away, but he held my thighs and drank deep from me.

Then his mouth was trailing up my spine, between my wings where he purred against my skin, his magick sparking a tingly fire along my body.

He planted one clawed hand next to my head, and his face dipped low as he gripped my hip tight, "You were meant for me." Then pressed his cock inside me on a deep, savage groan.

I breathed through the tight sensation, panting with pleasure. Only the pleasure this time. There was a brief moment of discomfort when he seated himself fully, but it lasted only seconds before there was nothing but ecstasy.

He pumped with long glides in and out of my body. "You are my mizrah," he breathed into my hair, his forehead pressed to my shoulder.

His words felt as desperate as his body, stroking and stretching me, trying to communicate some indefinable message that he wasn't able to articulate clearly enough. He grunted in frustration then wrapped his arms around my waist and chest and sat back on his haunches, bringing me upright with him. I cried out at the jolting sensation of sitting fully on his cock, digging my nails into his forearms to hold on.

He reached one arm across my chest to the opposite shoulder, holding my back tightly to his front. He slipped his other hand between our legs and stroked with the pads of two fingers, the ones still filed short, and massaged my sensitive sex where he entered me.

He didn't move, simply held me pressed tight against him, inside me, his mouth at my neck as he gently spread the slick from my sex through my quim and around his cock.

"I'll never let you go." His fingers worked me while he remained buried deep, unmoving. "Do you understand?"

It was a king's command, a promise. It was no use to tell him yet again that I hadn't been trying to leave him. He wanted it abundantly clear that I was his and would always be so.

I brushed my palms up his forearms, arousal tightening where he speared inside me. If he was giving commands, I could demand a promise of my own.

"Vow to me," I whispered, turning my head to find his glowing gaze by the blue-coal, "that I will always be your mizrah." I nuzzled my nose alongside his, our breaths mingling. "Your one and only female. Even after I give you your heir."

I'd seen all manner of expressions on Goll's face. His was a beautiful face to study, and I'd given in to that guilty pleasure more times than I'd care to admit.

But this visage I gazed upon now—both soft and sharp, gentle and violent, adoring and savage—this was the face of the man who'd stolen a piece of my soul the night he carried me, bleeding and terrified, out of the dungeon of N?kt Mir. He was also the king who demanded my submission in all ways to save my people.

How could my heart long for both the tyrant of Northgall and the young prince who'd saved me? Perhaps it was because his dominance wasn't a barbaric whip. It was a seductive promise of protection and devotion that was as hard and impenetrable as the obsidian walls of Vixet Krone. He was my fortress, and I wanted his promise that he would always be so.

"Vow to me," I whispered against his mouth before I licked his bottom lip.

His arm at my shoulder slid to my throat as he raised partway on his knees, grinding slowly and deep. His grip at my throat was gentle but firm as he brushed his mouth against mine.

"I swear upon Vix himself, I will keep only one mate—my mizrah. For as long as I draw breath, there will only be you." He held me tighter, eyes slipping closed as he whispered, "Only you."

That was all I needed to hear to fall farther, the farthest, into his keeping. No matter that his vow said nothing of love or the pretty promises of a moon binding, it was enough for me. More than that, it was enough for my heart, for I felt it beating faster and harder for him, devoted solely to him.

The submission of my heart and soul to Gollaya Verbane felt as right and as true as the stars.

"Yes," I murmured, rocking my hips in rhythm with his own.

He groaned and began to pump in and out with deeper strokes, his mouth sliding to my shoulder. "Yes," he agreed. "You are mine ." Then he sank his fangs into my skin.

I jerked at the sudden pain, which somehow rolled into more intense pleasure, my cunny squeezing his cock as he thrust deeper. I curled one hand into his hair, finding one horn, holding him there while he claimed me the way he was supposed to—as a mate, not his whore.

He thrusted hard and deep, his fingers circling the sensitive bud between my legs. He licked at the bite then brushed his lips up to my ear. "You are so fucking beautiful, Una." He pounded me harder, still holding me upright in his strong grip, his body curling around me. "You are," he paused, his cock swelling inside me, "everything."

Then he groaned and held himself deep, his seed pulsing inside me. The throb of his cock within me and his attentive fingers sent me careening toward a second climax.

"Yes, my mizrah. Come on your king's cock."

I wasn't exactly proud of the fact that my body always wanted to obey Goll. But in that moment, coming as he commanded sent my spirit into heady oblivion.

He growled into my ear, squeezing my throat and stroking my quim, grinding deep as he continued to fill me up with his seed. My body welcomed it, welcomed him. His dominance. His aggression. All of him.

I'm not sure how much later, for I felt suspended in that place of ecstasy, he lay me gently down on the fur and pulled from my body. I was so tired, overcome with the anxiety and emotions of the day—of the past weeks, if I were truthful. My eyes slipped closed while the rumble of thunder drifted farther away.

I felt him curl around me and a blanket of some kind drape over us. He pulled me closer into the curve of his body, lifting my head to settle on his bicep. I hummed a wistful sigh, my mind already drifting.

"Sleep, Una," he coaxed in a soft whisper as he cradled me close.

His warm body cocooning mine and the sound of the distant storm and the sensation of feeling safe sent me straight to sleep.