Chapter 12

Raz left me to go out and double-check the perimeter, running his hand down my backside in a way that told me he actually didn't give a shite about the perimeter.

The bedroom already had a fire burning in the hearth, and someone—probably Tristan—had filled the tub, wisps of steam rising into the air. I left my leathers in a pile on the floor and sank into the heat, scrubbing my sticky arms, my face, running my fingers through my tangled hair.

I really should cut this, I thought, examining the frayed ends and the snarled knots.

Short hair would be easier to take care of.

Wouldn't get tangled around everything. But somehow, finding scissors seemed like too much effort, exhaustion seeping into every crevice. My bones felt too heavy, eyes slipping shut every time I leaned my head back on the rim of the tub.

Exhaustion gnawed at me, stiff fingers barely able to drag the towel around me when I got out of the water, too afraid I'd slip beneath that surface and never come back up.

I stumbled on my way over to the bed, falling headfirst into Tristan's arms.

"You're so tired, you can't even walk. What was Raz thinking leaving you here?" he scolded gently, turning around before he lowered me to the mattress. My breath caught at the look on his face as he stared down at me, his gaze darting between me and the door.

"I should go," he finally said. "Help Zor with tonight's watch."

The fire picked up the red in his hair and the outline of his strong, lean body beneath the loose shirt.

"What if…I don't want you to go? Besides, Raz is already out there and three's a crowd." The words tumbled out fast, exhaustion taking a back seat when I realized…we were alone.

We were safe.

"Stay," I whispered, reaching out my hand. "Please, Tristan. I want you to stay."

He looked toward the door one last time then stripped his shirt over his head, back muscles bunching, toned arms flexing as he tossed it to the floor. His skin turned to burnished gold in the fire's glow, smooth as velvet, flecked here and there with pale scars. Suddenly I wanted to know the story behind each and every one.

Who had marked him.

What he'd done to them.

"I've waited a long time for you, Anaria." His swallow sounded so loud against the quiet. "Longer than anyone else." Shadows flickered in his eyes, and there was a careful hesitation before he said, "I watched you, that day in the glen. I saw everything."

I went still at the desire tightening his face, the doubt now clouding his eyes.

As if he thought I'd say no.

As if I could ever say no to him.

"I'd never seen anyone more beautiful than you that day. I wanted to worship at your feet, to be a part of everything." He spoke so quietly I had to strain to hear. "But I couldn't."

"What stopped you?" I asked, curling my fingers around the sheet, pulling it up. "Tristan, if I did or said something to?—"

"No. It was never you, Anaria." He laid his hand over his heart, covering up the mark.

"Everyone I've ever loved was taken from me. I've spent my life alone because allowing myself to feel something…to fall in love with someone…I was always too afraid they'd become victims of the king. And even after he was gone, I realized that losing you would destroy me."

"But all those weeks afterward…you never said anything." You never joined us, either, I wanted to add, but I'd only come off sounding petulant.

His wistful smile tugged at my heart. "I decided I couldn't have you, but I couldn't leave you. Couldn't stand the thought of leaving. So I decided…" He blew out a shaky breath. "I decided that just seeing you every day would be enough."

His darkness and pain leached into me as if they were my own. These past weeks at the Keep, days and nights when we'd tumbled in and out of bed, had been joyous for the rest of us.

But they'd been torture for Tristan.

I opened my mouth to apologize, to say something to ease my own guilt, but he cut me off.

"But then I realized something."

When my eyes flicked back up to his handsome face, his lips curved into a wicked smile, those eyes glittering. A low, needy fire started burning in my belly when his fingers ever-so-slowly followed the trail of dark hair that disappeared into the waistband of his trousers.

"You offered me a gift, Anaria. I wasted my chance, that day in the forest, and I've regretted my choice ever since." His eyes were clear and focused. "I'm not going to waste tonight. If you want me, then I'm yours."

"I do. Want you." Of all the emotions warring inside me, that one was the strongest. The need to take Tristan in my arms, into my body, make him mine.

Keep him forever.

Gods, he was gorgeous. My mouth watered as he unbuttoned his trousers, flicking them open one by one with maddening slowness, stomach muscles flexing, need burning in his face like glowing embers. I ran my tongue over my lips, and he made a rumbling sound, one of those wyvern growls, deep in his chest.

The mark on his chest was darker than the last time I'd seen it, thicker and more defined, and my heart started thundering. Oh gods, what if…

"We're not thinking about that tonight, Anaria," he murmured sternly. "Tonight, we're not going to worry about anything except me making you feel good. Would you like that?"

"Yes." I writhed between the cool sheets, needing the friction, needing to feel something against my heated skin. "I would like that, Tristan." Get in this bed before I combust, please.

"You're so fucking beautiful. I…We don't deserve you." His voice turned ragged as he flipped the last button open and slid his pants off, kicking them to the side before prowling closer to the bed, the breath hissing out of my lungs.

I'd seen Tristan naked plenty of times.

I'd cradled this male against me in a dusty chamber, with not a shred of clothing on. Flown on his back across an entire realm. But this…I swallowed, running my eyes over all that powerful, hard muscle, his cock standing at full attention, face tight with need.

"Decide, Anaria," he said through sharp, gritted teeth. "Because if you keep looking at me like that, I won't be able to hold myself back. I want this too fucking much."

Internally, I purred at the demanding growl in his voice, was already wet between my thighs and he hadn't even touched me yet. "Yes. A hundred times, yes. I want you, Tristan DeVayne. I want everything from you." I tossed the covers back, nothing between us now except a towel.

He leaned forward, running his finger between the top edge of the towel and my skin, his fingertip brushing my nipple. My entire body jerked in response, and he lunged, taking my mouth in a fierce, claiming kiss, his tongue sweeping in and erasing every thought in my head.

He tasted like fire. He was fire.

Kissing Tristan DeVayne was like being inside a volcano, pure, burning power flaring through me every time our tongues met.

Then the towel vanished and Tristan rolled my nipple between his thumb and forefinger, his weight settling between my thighs. His other hand cupped the back of my head, fingernails digging into my scalp, giving me no quarter, kissing me deeper, his free hand skimming down my side, sliding beneath me to cup my arse and move me further onto the bed.

Tristan broke away, something feral in his expression as he looked down at me. "Fuck, Anaria. I can't…stop." Neck straining, he arched back, pressing his cock against me, all that delicious pressure right where I needed him to be.

"I don't want you to stop." I put enough challenge into the words his hips swiveled against mine, pressure turning to demand as he shifted his weight, pinning me beneath him. "I want this…"

I reached between us, wrapped my hand around his cock, and pumped his impressive length while he dropped his head into the hollow of my shoulder with a groan.

"I want you inside me." I dragged my lips up the side of his corded throat but never stopped working him, drinking in every husky, needy groan that came out of his mouth. "I want you fucking me, Tristan. I want to feel every inch of you inside me. Because I've been waiting too. Just as long as you have." He angled his hips, dragging the blunt head of his cock through my drenched folds.

I moaned to the sound of that dark, carnal chuckle before he thrust inside.

In one deep, sure stroke, he slid home until the pressure was too much, too overwhelming for me to take, but he didn't stop, pushing deeper and deeper until our hips were flush, his hand cradling my head so I stared directly into his eyes.

"Anaria," he breathed, our chests heaving as one, hearts pounding, hands tangled together.

"I always thought love was too fragile to survive in this world." Tristan didn't break our stare as he pulled out, the head of his cock dragging and dragging against me with deliberate, maddening slowness.

"That the world was cruel, and if I ever dared love anyone again, darkness would come and claim them."

He drove back into me, hard and claiming, his hand squeezing mine. "But now I know that's a lie I told myself to convince myself I didn't need to feel ever again. That I didn't need to trust anyone ever again."

I skimmed my lips over the scars on his cheek and down his throat, his tendons straining. "You can trust me, Tristan. You can always trust me."

Tristan's hips moved against mine, his thrusts slow and deep, head lowered as he looked down the length of my body to where we were joined. I arched up, wanting more. His lips traced my jaw, trailing down my throat in that slow, calculated way.

I realized then Tristan wasn't taking his time.

He was holding back.

I dug my heels into his arse. Rocked my hips against his but he just pinned me down and kept up that slow, languorous rhythm.

"Our love has survived an eternity." He lifted his pleasure-blown eyes to mine, the golden rim around his irises glowing like the sun. "We have lost each other and found each other countless times. Our love transcends realms and worlds and even time itself. We are forever, Anaria."

"Forever," I repeated before he claimed my mouth again and I lost myself in that wave of wild want, mindless with tumbling need and sensation. I gripped Tristan's shoulder with my free hand, digging my heels deeper into those tight, flexing muscles.

"Stop holding back. I want you, Tristan. All of you. Wyvern and Fae male and High Lord and whatever else you are. Give me every last piece. Give me everything."

"Fucking finally," he growled, and then he unleashed himself on me, plunging in and out, his lips nibbling, teeth scraping and nipping, pinches of sensation and clenching muscles and delicious friction igniting that coiling pressure.

His pace was relentless, brutal, grinding into me with an edge of desperate hunger that bordered on animalistic, a purr building in his chest, his lean, powerful body flexing against mine.

When Tristan's eyes met mine, there was nothing Fae in them.

They burned red as rubies, aglow with primal possessiveness. Every muscle went taut when Tristan's mouth dropped open and a rumbling growl came out followed by a burst of sparks. He plunged in deeper, long, glorious strokes that made me burn, my last vestiges of composure crumbling until there was nothing but sensation and carnal pleasure.

Tristan reached between us and brushed his thumb across my clit. Once. Twice. He pressed down hard then rubbed, my channel clenching around his length as everything inside me imploded.

Light flashed, bursting so bright I was momentarily blinded, then release slammed into me, crashed over me, and I was sobbing Tristan's name over and over, muscles shaking as I came apart beneath the crushing onslaught.

Tristan never stopped moving, pushing me higher and higher until I broke all over again, stars dancing against my closed eyelids, my body spending every last ounce of energy to come apart one final time, my hands slipping from his shoulders, body rocked by aftershocks.

"Gods, you are the most beautiful creature I've ever known," Tristan breathed, then he dropped his head and thrust into me one last time, his body shuddering as he came, my fingers digging into his hard arse as he emptied himself into me.

He collapsed half on and half off me, both of us too spent to move or even care.

Months of pent-up want and need sated at last.

"I love you, Tristan," I murmured, eyes slipping closed as his hand stroked up and down my side. He was still inside me, one leg wrapped around mine, arm and shoulder covering me, his lips pressed to my ear.

"And this time, we'll get that happily forever after, I promise."

I openedmy eyes to find myself nestled between Tristan and Raz, Tristan curled around me as sinuously as his wyvern and giving off enough heat to warm the entire palace.

The room smelled like woodsmoke and musk, and I buried my nose deeper into my pillow, ferreting out the faint scent of pepper and cloves, ice and pines. Everyone had been in and out of this bed tonight, making sure I was safe.

My heart caught fire knowing I was so treasured, so protected.

Never in my wildest dreams had I imagined I'd be loved so fiercely by one person, let alone four.

They'd saved me. In every way, they'd saved me.

"Four hours until dawn." Raz tugged me against him, his corded arm looping around my waist. "I'm just resting my eyes for a few minutes." He burrowed against me, and I smiled into the darkness.

I didn't know what lay ahead of us, but I was absolutely sure of one thing.

They may have saved me, but I would save them right back.