3. Cain

CHAPTER 3

CAIN

Her prayer tastes… delicious.

I lick my lips as my jaw aches, long canines poking through when my beast chooses to feed on a little blood with his dreams.

Before I can rein him in, the new worshipper continues as if completely unaware of the danger she's put herself in.

Because my beast wants her.

Not just to feast… but to fuck.

"If I do this, I'm going to do it for my mother. I don't want her to die. But please, please make it worth it."

"Cain?" Helia says with a sharp note of worry in her voice, but I'm not looking at her reflection anymore.

My vision has fluctuated as my beast's form crawls over my skin, making me grow in size.

I'm slipping into the Dream Realm. I'm powerless against the siren call that draws my beast like a moth to a flame.

There's a mirror in the room where she's praying, and my essence settles into it.

I can't see her, not yet. I'm fighting the frenzy threatening to descend on my beast if she continues to pray.

" Watch over me and protect me," she says, making my monstrous cock go rock-hard.

Fuck yes.

My beast consumes this part of her prayer, but more slowly than before, finally savoring the incredible taste of sun-kissed peaches mixed in wine.

With enough prayers to strengthen my beast, bolstered by her willing trust for me to protect her , a blurry view of the room she's occupying comes through. The clarity reveals two dark figures and a female bathed in red.

Is she on fire?

No, that's the color of her hair and her dress.

Beautiful, I think as she continues praying, allowing me to see the detail of her delicate frame and pushed-up breasts.

She's a Lady of one of the Elite families, but I've definitely never seen her before.

Because she's never prayed to me.

Not a believer? I wonder with amusement.

I like her already.

But I'm intrigued by what has her desperate enough to call for me. She mentioned something about her mother, but what is it she's going to do ?

"I'm going to need all the help I can get…" she continues.

Each word intended for my ears gives my beast more power to work with. Prayers are similar to dreams, and I've never tasted a dream as satisfying as this.

I'm in an almost drug-like state, content to listen to her speak until she finishes her sentence.

"… if I'm going to be Earl Rinhold's bride."

Glass shatters, and I realize I've destroyed the window in my suite overlooking the city. A powerful wind rushes into the room, sweeping my hair back from my face.

A roar rips from my throat as I'm cut off from the female who has decided to end her prayer. I'm taller now, fully extended in my eight-foot-nine frame.

"Cain!" Helia shouts in my face, startling me.

She's somehow here, having traveled from Monster City to my suite.

She formed a portal.

She shouldn't have done that. It's a unique power that I had almost forgotten Helia even possessed. She's one of the few powerful enough to have the ability in the first place, but it still severely drains her to use it.

It's why we have trains.

It's why we conserve resources and utilize reflections and mirrors.

"Helia, I'm sorry," I say as I curl my fingers into fists. My claws dig into my skin, drawing dark blood.

My vision wavers as my beast clings to the mirror he found in that room.

He doesn't want to leave her, but I know who she is now.

Because I created the blood contract that has made her desperate enough to pray to me for the first time.

And penning it might have been the biggest mistake of my life.

Because the blood on it is mine.

Binding me to its terms just as much as her.

"Who is Earl Rinhold?" Helia asks as she rests a hand on my shoulder. I'm slightly taller than her now.

It's a miracle my teeth haven't ripped into her throat to get her out of the way so I can scour the city for the female.

But I'm keeping a handle on my beast. He wasn't supposed to come out, and he only slipped for a moment.

I pull him back in, inch by inch, while he's distracted. Helia's portal ripped open magic energies, giving me a wave to ride.

Thank you, I think at her, even though I know she can't hear my words.

She doesn't feed on prayers.

My monster doesn't seem to notice as I slowly shrink in size.

And now he's listening to the female with rapt attention as he slowly sinks into the back of my mind where Helia's question rattles around like a bad omen.

"Who is Earl Rinhold?"

"A dead man," I growl, even though I know I can't kill him.

Not if this female whose prayers taste like peaches signs the contract.

It protects him for the duration of the courtship. And if she chooses to agree to the proposal after thirty days, the union will be permanently binding.

I can't have her.

She's not mine.

"Sign the fucking contract," a male voice says, making my beast snarl with unfiltered rage.

He wants to kill the owner of that voice.

Badly.

Whereas I want to kill Earl Rinhold.

No one should be able to hear my beast from the Dream Realm, but the occupants in the room all shift their attention to the mirror he is hiding in.

What the fuck is going on?

Before I have time to process this apparent new ability to cross realms, pain slices through my heart when the female stabs her finger. Her name scrawls out in front of my vision in perfect clarity written in her own blood.

Scarlett Nightingale.

I struggle to retain my human form before my beast takes over completely and does something that could kill us both.

She's not ours, I tell my Dream Eater half.

It's too late.

He growls in return, not caring about rules or contracts.

But I do.

If I lay a hand on Earl Rinhold, I am forcing the contract to prematurely end.

And anyone who interferes with a blood contract will die.

"Cain, I need you to talk to me," Helia says as she gently squeezes my shoulder.

She towers over me now, and I look up at her monstrous form, which is rippling with spent energy. "I'm in control," I assure her.

I'm definitely not in control, but at least I'm keeping my beast tucked away in the Dream Realm instead of transforming my body again.

Or maybe he's staying there willingly, waiting for the delectable female to pray to us again.

Helia grimaces and drops her hand, then she does something she very rarely decides to do.

Or is rarely forced to do. Her monster is a difficult one to tame, but Helia has always rationed her energy reserves carefully.

Now, it melts into her skin as if trying to take over. Helia growls in response.

Her body shimmers and shifts as she shrinks, transforming into her human figure. It's one I've only seen on a handful of occasions when she overextended herself.

She'd rather give up her monster than be controlled by it. In that regard, we are the same.

Purple shadows mist over her as she changes. She flutters her long eyelashes as she exhales, pushing away her natural form. Nipples develop on her breasts, and her horns recede as her long, luxurious hair grows even longer, draping over her shoulders. Her skin is lusciously dark but shimmers with purple hues in the right light.

The powerful wind through the broken window rips over her, making her hair fling over her body.

Normally, I'd be interested in this form of hers.

But all I can see is the redhead lingering in my dreams.

She glances at me and doesn't seem to like what she sees in my eyes. "You're not in control. The Dream Eater is," she says as she snatches up a blanket from one of my couches. It's large enough to wrap around her now small frame. "I suggest you focus on finding yourself a mate before it's too late, Cain. And since you just forced me to accelerate my timeline, I'm going to have to find mine."

She marches to one of the guest rooms that no female has visited in quite a long time, but she remembers where I keep the wardrobes for guests.

Or gifts.

She emerges after a few minutes with a skin-tight dress, a stringed corset I have no idea how she got into by herself, and a feathered hat with a long, fluffy black feather to match.

She pulls on black lace gloves that go all the way to her elbow while her silvery eyes narrow on me. It's the only part of her that gives her away.

"When does the train leave?" she asks.

"Three days," I say, knowing from memory that's how much time my mate has until she must begin her courtship.

Not mine, I remind myself.

Some trains will leave in less than two days, but the one Helia needs to promptly return to Monster City is still waiting on new cargo.

New selections .

Helia gives me a subtle nod as the wind threatens to rip the hat off her head. She grips the end to prevent it from flying away. "Then I'll spend the night to recharge and portal myself back in the morning. If you need me, you know where to find me." She raises a dark, elegant brow. "I suggest you pay a visit to this Earl Rinhold before your Dream Eater does, Cain."

I swallow back my beast's growl.

"A visit," I repeat, wondering how I'm going to manage that without ripping into the male's throat.

Perhaps a visit to the female would be safer. It might subdue my other half enough to make that possible.

One-on-one with the female sounds much more appealing anyway. But I can't meet her in reality. I'd be too tempted to take what isn't mine.

I could meet her in her dreams, though. It wouldn't violate the blood contract because any acts performed in the Dream Realm wouldn't be real.

But they would feel real.

As long as she prays to me again, I'll have access to her mind.

She's done it once. The act can be addictive, so I'm certain she'll pray to me again.

See you soon, little star.

In your dreams, at least.

You're mine.

For now.