C aduan’s guards tried to turn me away, but I refused to leave. I pushed past them, went to his chambers, and pounded on the door until he
answered it himself.
He hadn’t washed Nura’s blood off him, either. It dotted his cheeks. “What is it, Aefe?” he said, clearly in a sour mood.
“Do not ignore me.”
His expression was indecipherable. “I am not ignoring you.”
No. I was sick of this. He gave me affection, and then he pushed me away. He took my body, and then he abandoned it. He saved my life, and then refused to speak to me.
All while he waged the greatest war the world had even seen in my name.
He was already shutting the door in my face when I spat, “I thought we were done being cowards.”
He froze mid movement. The door swung open again, sharply. “Don’t you dare call me a coward.”
“Then stop deserving it,” I snarled, and then my mouth crashed against
his.
The kiss was nothing like before. It wasn’t gentle or shy. We threw
ourselves at each other like we were in combat. The door slammed closed, and he pinned me against it, his tongue claiming my mouth, the warmth of his body surrounding me. I didn’t know how to do this—I didn’t know what I wanted to touch, only that I wanted to touch everything. My arms wrapped around his neck, my fingers tangling in the waves of his hair.
The need from that night had never gone away, only lowered to a simmering heat that now roared back to life. Desire swept up the insides of my thighs, tightening at my core.
I didn’t want him to touch me the way he had before. I wanted more than that. I wanted to become intertwined with him. I wanted him to mark me.
The taste of blood mingled on our tongues. I yanked him closer, kissed him harder, closed my teeth around his flesh until it earned a hiss from him and a returning bite that sent a spark of pain through my lip.
I liked it. I liked feeling so many things at once.
We parted just enough for his eyes to look into mine. I must have had more of Nura’s blood on me than I realized. Crimson smeared his cheek, his throat, his hair where my hands had trailed through it.
“You asked me if you frightened me,” he breathed, then kissed me again, harder. “The answer is yes. You terrify me.”
His lips moved to my jaw. One of his hands slid down my body, making the need that rose to the surface of my skin nearly unbearable. My knees parted, offering him room—his hips aligned with mine, and the hardness there made my breath hitch.
I didn’t have the language to describe what I wanted, only that I wanted it, needed it, desperately.
His mouth brushed the soft skin where my jaw met my throat. “You terrify me because you make me want what I cannot have.”
Take it, I thought. Take all of it.
My hands were shaking. Even my fingertips ached for him—ached for his skin, his breath, his heartbeat. But I forced them away from him, to the straps of my shirt. I slipped one from my shoulder, and then the other. Then my trousers, loose enough to fall easily to the ground. I wore nothing beneath any of it.
Caduan’s nostrils flared.
“There is nothing you can not have,” I said, my voice weak, breathy. For all my boldness, for everything that blood and vengeance and power and death had instilled in me, I now felt almost… shy.
Time slowed. He leaned closer again, his lips ghosting over my skin— barely brushing me when I wanted them to seize me. His knuckles skimmed the curve of my waist, running up my ribs and pausing at my breast, where
his breath shuddered slightly, his thumb lingering at the hardened peak of my nipple.
“This is not true,” he whispered, voice rough against my cheek.
“It is tonight.” My hand covered his, gently trailing it down all the places I wanted him to touch me—down past my waist, my hip, my stomach, and finally, guiding him between my thighs, to that yearning emptiness that begged for him.
He groaned, pressing against me harder, his mouth again moving to mine but stopping just short of meeting it.
“We take what we want tonight,” I said, and kissed him—the kind of kiss that did not ask but demanded.
Caduan wanted.
His fingers tightened at my hips with enough force to leave marks on my bare flesh. His teeth marked my lip, my throat, my shoulder. The hardness of his length between us grew unbearable.
I wanted to feel his skin against me. My hands went to the buttons on his shirt, ready to tear them apart if I needed to, but his hand caught mine and wrenched it to the wall, pinning me there.
A wordless sound of protest escaped my lips, muffled by his kiss.
But so easily, it was forgotten. Because his other hand slipped between us instead, circling one too-gentle touch at my core—not enough, not enough—before working at the buttons of his trousers.
Seconds later, the rough press of clothing against me was replaced by the hard, smooth silk of skin.
I tore away from his kiss for just a split second, casting a brief glance down—at my parted thighs and him nestled against the place between them. I felt drunk, the world fuzzy. The desire was overwhelming. I tilted my hips, my movement limited by our position, but it was enough to make both
of us release ragged moans.
Caduan grabbed my face, hard, and turned it to him. Both of us were covered in blood. I distantly became aware that we must have looked ridiculous—smeared with human blood, me naked, him half undressed, both of us utterly undone.
“If you want me to stop, then tell me now,” he said. “I need you now.
Right now, before I think better of it.”
I kissed him and opened my thighs wider, angling myself so his tip prodded at my entrance.
“Yes,” I murmured.
It was all that he needed. He kissed me, his tongue plunging into my mouth, just as his hands grabbed my backside, lifted me, spread me, and then he impaled me.
The world dissolved. First, there was pain—this body was new, and his size stretched it in ways that were unfamiliar and painful and, yet, the greatest pleasure I had ever known, like he was searing himself into every inner crevice of me.
Everything disappeared. It took several long seconds before I returned to my body, as he groaned into my hair, “Aefe, you feel… you…”
His muscles trembled. Was he holding himself back? “Are you alright?” he asked.
I kissed him, my teeth nipping at the wound I had opened there, making him flinch. My legs closed around his waist, and his fingernails dug harder into my backside.
“More,” I moaned.
He let out a long, shaky breath. Tension snapped.
He obeyed.
His hips shifted in one abrupt thrust, spearing the rest of his length into me. Pain and pleasure claimed me in an overwhelming burst, but I didn’t have time to catch my breath, didn’t have time to do anything but cling to him. His thrusts were fast, rough, wild, like he wanted to claim every angle of me.
But I still wanted more. I wanted to fall apart until I didn’t know my own name anymore.
My fingernails dug into the hard muscle of his back, earning a hiss and brush of teeth against my ear, as I whispered against his skin a demand: More.
This time, there was no hesitation. Caduan’s movements were smooth and calculated. He withdrew from me, and barely gave me time to mourn the loss of him before he spun me around and bent over me, pressing his hand over mine against the wall. When he pushed back into me from behind, I no longer had the presence of mind to clamp down the strangled cry that escaped my throat.
Whatever final dregs of self-control I had were now gone.
I no longer cared who I was, or the fact that I didn’t know. I no longer felt alone in this body—how could I when he was reshaping it so thoroughly around him? How could any body feel empty and dead when it was being filled this way, touched this way, loved this way?
“Caduan.” I hadn’t meant to say his name, but my lips needed to form something, and the only thing I could think—would ever think again—was him.
Pressure was building, building, within me—like what I had experienced the night of the festival, but so much more. With every stroke, he filled me deeper, his movements growing more vicious.
I moaned his name again, asking for something, and at the sound of it he let out a ragged groan and slammed into me hard enough to push me flat against the wall, his body braced behind me, the warmth of him trapping me there.
It was too much. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. I needed release.
“Yes,” he murmured, the need in his voice sending a shiver up my spine. His hand slid between my body and the wall, wrapped around my waist, pulled me closer to him as he thrust into me at the same moment his teeth closed on the skin of my ear.
“Now, Aefe,” he murmured, and as he commanded, I fell apart.
Every muscle went taut, the world shattering into annihalation except for him and the place we were connected. He drove deep, holding there, and I felt myself fill with him—distantly, in what little coherent thought I had left, I thought of how much I liked being full of another person.
An age seemed to pass with us like that, our muscles straining together, lost in our shared ecstasy.
When it faded, the first thing I became aware of was his lips softly kissing my neck. The second thing I became aware of was our heaving, trembling breathes. I had no strength. His arm around my waist, firm, was the only thing keeping me standing.
He kissed me one last time and gently, so gently, released me. I collapsed slowly to the floor, panting. I was covered in sweat and smudged flecks of human blood.
When he withdrew from me, when the warmth of his embrace was gone, I suddenly felt so empty.
“Aefe.”
I loved how he said my name.
I looked up to see his hand outstretched. I was naked and trembling—he was standing, and still fully clothed. He took my hand and drew in a sharp breath.
“You’re shaking.” I nodded.
I didn’t know why. “Come to the bed.”
I obeyed. My legs barely carried me. After two steps, Caduan scooped me up and brought me there, laying me down tenderly over silken emerald- green sheets.
“Do you need anything? Water? Food?” I shook my head.
“Are you cold?”
I shook my head again.
His brow lowered over those magnificent eyes. “Did I hurt you?” Again, I shook my head.
His expression was indecipherable. He brushed his lips over my sweat- slicked forehead and began to stand. “I’ll go get—”
Panic spiked in my chest. I grabbed his wrist, hard. “Don’t go.”
He looked down at me, the wrinkle on his brow deepening.
And I could not even bring myself to be self-conscious as I said—as I
begged—“Don’t leave me. Stay.”
My body felt as if I had been turned inside out and emptied. My mind felt fuzzy and overwhelmed, as if the closeness we had just experienced together had thrown my entire brain into shock. And my heart—my heart simply felt suddenly terrified for reasons I could not understand.
Caduan’s expression softened. Still, he did not move for a moment. “Please,” I begged.
Everyone had always left me.
When I was Aefe, each body I shared my soul with was gone by morning. As Reshaye, each soul I shared a body with was ripped away from me.
I had the sudden, horrible feeling that Caduan was going to leave me, and at the same time, the sudden, horrible realization that I could not survive it if he did.
“I’m not.” He closed his hand over my grasp in gentle affection, then got into the bed beside me, clothes and all. I sank so easily into the warmth of his form, my head lying on his chest, ear pressed to his heartbeat, my bare legs twining around his clothed ones. His arms encircled me, holding me firmly—one hand stroked my hair, and the other laid over mine. My fist closed around the fabric of his shirt, tight, not to allow him to escape.
“I am not going anywhere,” he said again, his lips passing over the top of my head.
We had lain there for several minutes, when he finally murmured, “I’m sorry. For how I behaved after… the festival. I was…” A long, shaky breath. “I was afraid.”
I did not need to ask, afraid of what? Because I knew, here as I melted into his pulse, exactly what was so frightening about this.
“I don’t care,” I said, and I meant it. He was here now. His flesh had become a part of mine. And I was here, intertwined with him, as intimate as sharing a body with another soul.
We did not speak again. I just listened to his heartbeat all night long, and for the first time since I had opened my eyes into this strange body, I did not feel lonely at all.
