“Mera,” Shadow rumbled, his voice even deeper in this form. His accent was slightly stronger too.
I examined the wolf god, finally realizing whom he reminded me of. The most epic version of Anubis, the Egyptian god, and I wondered if maybe Shadow had been rocking around Ancient Egypt to spread some rumors back in the day. God of Death would be kind of appropriate for Shadow, especially before he invented shifters and technically became a god of life.
“Mera!” he snapped this time, since I had spaced.
“Shadow!” I shot back. Dude better find some more words if he wanted me to understand.
“What are you doing? Why did you block me out?”
It felt a little like hurt threaded his anger; I’d shut him out and he’d not reacted well to it. He’d had to delve into his deepest energy to break through Midnight, and for me, he’d done that.
He also changed into the true beast form when you were hit with the scourge, Midnight told me. You missed it.
I wasn’t actually surprised by that, even if I was a touch sad to have missed it.
It’s okay, I told my mist then, noticing it was still blocking the others. Let them through.
It did, and at the same time, the energy binding me to my wolf and creatures eased, and I was able to return to my human form. The bond between me and all the things remained, though.
Angel rushed through first, her gaze darting briefly toward Shadow, and I saw her sharp look at his Anubis form. Shadow didn’t give her much of a chance to see it, releasing the fire and returning to his gorgeous man version. It happened so quickly, I was fairly certain only Angel even saw anything.
Ixana, who arrived a few seconds later, rushed straight to his side, glaring at me all the way. “Are you okay?” she burst out, running her hands across his chest.
Shadow, eyes like burning fields, didn’t acknowledge her. He just stared at me over her head, and there was a chokehold of emotion in his expression that I didn’t understand.
“Mera! I should beat the crap out of you!” Angel shook me, and I gave her the attention she rightfully deserved.
“I’m so sorry,” I got out in a rush. “Instinct kind of took over.”
She shook me again, with a little less force, and the abervoqs reared up behind us, clearly not liking her handling of me.
“It’s okay,” I said to them, sending soothing energy along our connection. “This is my family. Tresorana.”
This was a word from Honor Meadows, but it apparently translated. The creatures calmed almost immediately, and when I returned my focus to Angel, she looked taken aback. Her face… The depth of feeling there tore through me, and I hugged her tightly. “Please don’t die,” she whispered to me. “I can’t lose another member of my family.”
Jesus. Fuck. I wasn’t strong enough to stop the single tear from escaping, and I felt her sorrow. “I promise to do everything in my power to never leave you.”
It was a promise I had to keep. No matter what.
Shadow finally brushed his fussing mate off, after way too long in my opinion, and crossed to me. This got the abervoqs riled up again, clearly none of them forgetting what he’d been a few moments ago.
“Calm,” I said, and like freaking magic, they all just settled. Although they did move closer to my back, forming a very tall line of defense.
“You are exactly what I expected,” Ixana said, looking at me with something akin to satisfaction before she examined the creatures. “The moment I felt your power enter the realm, I knew you were the one who could tame the creatures.”
How fucking convenient that she would just feel and know me. My evil bitch radar was in overdrive, and even though she was Shadow’s mate, it was time for me to remind her that no longer would she be able to spread her malignancy in this land.
My wolf broke free briefly, her howl aimed directly at the ice queen. Ixana saw me coming and her energy snapped out at me, an attack of sorts, but it slid off my skin like I was covered in magic-repelling oil.
“What is wrong with you?” she snarled, panic crossing her features when it was clear she had nothing to stop me. “We’re on the same side. Have you lost your damn mind?”
Another snarl and howl. “You have built your world on the blood of these creatures,” I said coldly, my words echoing like I had a megaphone. “I will no longer let their sacrifices fuel your success. No more.”
Ixana spluttered. “I had no choice. If I didn’t create my world here, the royals would have killed me.”
I snapped out with a burst of energy, but Shadow intercepted it, and when he winced, I knew that would have really hurt Ixana. Still, why the fuck had he gotten involved? Trying to save his damn mate.
“You should have died rather than use and abuse creatures just trying to survive.”
Ixana opened and closed her mouth. “I don’t… I promise if you help us build the army to best the royals, we will no longer use their power.”
Easy promise to make since she expected to be ruling The Concordes with Shadow.
Shadow side-eyed her, and he was lucky I still wanted his ass around, or I would have blasted him again. “Royals need the creatures,” he reminded her.
Ixana, fear still pulling at her features, choked out a reply. “We don’t. The way you have bonded with the mists is how we will continue to rule. That was the old way, at least according to all the research I’ve done over the years. The royal’s bond to the creatures became a quicker way to achieve it, since they are born directly from the Nexus. But it doesn’t have to be that way.”
I released my power, and she started to splutter. “This is my mission now,” I said. “To help you rebuild the power structure of this world, so there’s no need for the use and abuse of the shadow creatures. The Grey Lands will one day flourish again.”
And I would be keeping a very close eye on her until that came to fruition.
Wrapping my hand around Angel’s, I walked off, bringing a dozen creatures with us. “You were born to change this world,” my friend said with conviction. “It was that odd energy I felt about you from the start. It’s creation energy. Mist born.” She shook her head, like she couldn’t believe it. “If I hadn’t thought it impossible, as no one has been to this world for thousands of years, I would have seen it immediately.”
This time, I didn’t bother to argue with her. “Now that I’m here, I feel a potential that has been locked away. Waiting for me to become what I was always meant to.”
I didn’t understand how it all worked, or how I could still be a shifter and have a true mate in Torma pack. Two worlds had collided in a way that had formed whatever I was. And yeah, I didn’t know how, but maybe the Nexus would hold answers.
Shadow was quiet, but he never took his eyes off me as we continued on through the land. It was a depressing journey, and I was furious when I saw the abervoqs near starving, having to dig into the dead ground to try to find sustenance. How many of them had perished this way?
“Can they die from starvation?” I asked quietly when we stopped to let them forage. “Like, a lack of nutrition or water?”
“No,” Ixana said. “They will be weakened, but it’s not going to kill them.”
Even better, they got eternal suffering.
“We need to find sustenance for them,” I said with enough force in my tone that they knew I would not be swayed. “Is it blood they need?”
Shadow looked between the creatures and me again. “They’re sustained now through you,” he said slowly, his gaze drifting along my body before he followed the ground between me and the creatures. “It’s a clear connection.” There was a flash of fire in his eyes. “You must not let them take too much and drain you.”
I was feeling a little exhausted, but I’d thought that was a normal part of this journey. It had been lingering on and off since I’d made it to The Grey Lands.
Ixana scoffed. “She won’t. It’s a relationship that goes both ways, a circular bond. Mera will gain as much as she loses.”
“She should lose nothing,” Shadow snapped, and Ixana was taken aback. Pretty sure he hadn’t shown her his more growly side yet, and if her expression was any indication, this was an unwelcome introduction.
I didn’t care about some loss, if my creatures were okay. And sure enough, as time went on, their color started to darken up until they were all in shades of blue-black. It was then that I understood that the browner tones had been weakness.
When we finally reached our campground for the night, we rolled out small padded mats on the ground. It felt good to rest, and I spent my time snacking on a few cocoa flavored energy bars, drinking water, and watching as the others did their “absorb energy” thing.
In a land already dying, it wasn’t ideal, but they had no choice.
Maybe by the time I was done with them, they’d find themselves a lot closer to humans in how they recharged their energy. Unless all of them could bond to the mists, like Shadow had.
Which made me think… Are you helping sustain me and the creatures?
Midnight drifted down from where it had been up high. Always floating above the land, which made sense for an ether mist. Of course. I finally understand why we’re bonded. You called me because you needed my strength. And now it is yours.
Thank you. I’ve taken your strength for granted, but I am so grateful for you and our bond.
Warmth traveled along to me, and I knew that was the closest a mist could get to human emotions… It made me feel loved.
Sleep came quickly, and since Ixana felt fairly certain we wouldn’t be accosted by creatures here—still too close to her city—I slept solidly. At least I did until I felt a hand brush across my body. It was a familiar touch, one that had woken me in a garden in Faerie what felt like a million years ago.
This time, I opened my eyes in an instant, looking for Shadow. Pushing myself up, I saw Angel in her stasis-like sleep beside me as she recharged. Other than Angel, I was surrounded by a circle of abervoqs, who slept in a wall of protectiveness between me and the outside world.
They hadn’t been like that when I’d gone to sleep, and to see it made me a little emotional. Once I moved past my new buddies, with their bullish snores, I found myself searching for him again. It took more than a minute, probing the semi-darkness that had fallen across The Grey Lands. Not a true night, but some sort of twilight, which I’d been told would last a few hours.
Finally, I found the beast himself, standing in a mist of shadows. It wasn’t Inky. It was the literal smoky energy that formed Shadow. Carefully stepping over the creatures, I crossed to where he was, and even though his true mate was sleeping nearby, I couldn’t help but meet him in the middle when his mouth descended to mine.
He swallowed my moan as he jerked me up against him, my legs wrapped around his body, and we kissed like it was the last fucking time.
Again.
It was dangerous, kissing near his true mate, and I’d feel bad about it, but he’d been mine when he’d gotten here, and that hadn’t seemed to lessen yet. There was one thing I had to know first…
I wrenched my mouth away, my lips feeling bruised. “Have you fucked her?”
“No,” he murmured, his lips on mine again. “I told you, this time with Ixana is so I can figure out what her game is, and more importantly how to get my fucking stone back.” His smile was brief as it curved the corner of his lips. “Even if it wasn’t, there’s no room for her in my head when a certain redhead is dominating every damn thought.”
My pussy spasmed. Like legit tried to jump out of my clothing and onto Shadow’s cock.
But there was apparently one more thing I had to know. “Will you help me save the creatures?”
“I will,” he murmured, and that was all I needed.
Shadow moved, with me still wrapped around him, and we faded back into the darkness, Inky swelling up around us as a protective shield. “It will block noise from the others,” he told me, his tone a normal rumble. “Don’t hold back.”
I had zero plans to do that.
Shadow stripped our clothes off in a rush of magic, and when I reached for his cock, the beast stopped me before I could get a good hold. “You first,” he said against my skin, his lips kissing a path down my throat. “I need to taste you first.”
I was panting. One would be embarrassed by that if one wasn’t too fucking horny to see straight.
“I knew you touched me in the garden in Faerie,” I huffed as he slowly lowered my feet to the ground, his lips following the path of his hands.
“You looked so perfect, sleeping,” he murmured against my skin, “surrounded by Len’s plants. I couldn’t not touch you.”
I moaned as he kissed my stomach, on his knees before me. He was so close to my aching center that I started to rock my hips, needing some relief. Just as Shadow’s lips skimmed my clit, he lifted his head and stood again.
“Wait, what?” I complained, but the rest of my words were cut off as he wrapped one arm around me and jerked me higher. He kept a tight hold on me, and using his free hand, parted my folds, finding the moisture already pooling there. Sliding one finger inside, followed by another, he curled them up in the most delicious move that allowed him to rub right along my g-spot.
I’d never felt that particular angle before; it was not one I could really reach myself, and as he started to slide his fingers in and out, slowly, over and over in a relentless assault, my arousal near covered his hand.
And I was about to scream.
Over and over, the buildup achingly slow, but the intensity was beyond anything I’d felt before. It was almost too much, my thigh muscles quivering so badly that if I’d been holding my own weight, I would have collapsed.
“Shadow, please,” I begged.
He just kissed me, devouring my lips, while his fingers destroyed my pussy. The quivering in my thighs increased, and as a whimpering scream escaped, he slowed his assault and removed his fingers.
Breathing was hard as I struggled to fill my lungs, and as he gracefully dropped to his knees, one hand went under me to keep me standing, the other returned to my pussy, those long fingers finding my g-spot once more.
As I cried out, his mouth landing on my clit. He was always a fucking genius with that tongue, but this time, he had a new move. He sucked that ball of pleasure into his mouth, and without allowing any break in pressure, worked me with his tongue, while his fingers stroked inside.
Low, sobbing cries fell from my mouth as I lost all ability to stand or control myself. The buildup was powerful, so different to anything I’d ever felt before, and I had the weirdest thought that I was about to do something embarrassing. Shadow sucked my clit even harder, stroking his fingers inside, and in the same moment, the ball of intensity building in my body detonated.
I came.
But it was like no orgasm I’d ever had before.
Cum literally shot out of me in a gushing load, and I was about to freak out, but Shadow’s chest rumbled, a pleased tone emerging from him as he removed his fingers so he could bury his face in my pussy, licking and cleaning up every fucking last ounce of my pleasure. In that time, I managed to orgasm again, and it was nothing short of spectacular.
“Holy fuck,” I said when he got off his knees, one hand remaining on me—the only thing keeping me standing. “I didn’t know I could come like that.”
His smile was predatory. “You will come like that every fucking time now, Sunshine.”
For once, this was a command I was more than willing to obey.
