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“I want you to use me,” I say quietly.

“Say it again. Say it like you mean it.”

“I want you to use me. I want it hard and rough. I trust you, and I need you to take me,” I say, nearly begging now.

With no warning, Daemon covers my mouth and slams into me. I scream out of instinct, but it feels so fucking amazing when he starts fucking me harder and harder, pounding me into the ground. I stiffen and tremble through every orgasm that he pulls out of me. He is barbaric in the way he pushes in as deep as he can.

“Does my little witch like being fucked like a whore?” he grunts in my ear.

“Mmmm,” is all I can manage.

“Fuck, you’re so tight,” he growls. I whimper as an orgasm builds in my belly again. As I start to tense up again, he pinches my nose closed, and my body immediately panics even though I know he won’t hurt me. He thrusts harder and forces an almost violent orgasm out of me as I fight against his hold. Stars flood my vision suddenly with the lack of oxygen. Daemon growls and bites down on my neck as he releases me. I suck in a breath, and the feeling of oxygen rushing through my brain thrusts me back into an orgasm, and my arousal floods out of me while I scream into my hand.

Daemon pushes deep when he comes and then doesn’t move even after he pulls out, he doesn’t get up. He kisses down my back while I catch my breath.

“Dear Gods, that was amazing,” I pant. He chuckles and moves away.

“I thought for sure you were a goner,” Kael laughs. I lay there and let them clean me up as well as everything else we made a mess of.

Once we are dressed and ready to take on the day, we leave the tent. The party is just finishing up packing, and they don’t seem to be bothered that we just had what could only have been loud sex. I wonder if Leli had an extra enchantment placed on our tent to make it soundproof. I giggle at the thought.

I feel better this morning, oddly. Maybe it’s a post-sex high, or maybe I just feel more confident now that I can tap into my magia. Everyone starts in high spirits as we begin our trek to Midavor. After a few hours, as we get hungry and realize we have nothing else to eat, people are getting irritated.

“Let’s just stop here for a while,” I say. “Maybe try and fish in this river.”

“That’s a great idea,” Striker says with a sigh. We all stop on the riverbank and get out fishing poles and bait.

I try for almost an hour, but every time I get a bite, nothing hooks. No one else is having any luck, and it’s starting to get aggravating. I cast out the line, and it immediately gets caught on some brush across the river because I cast out too far.

“Godsdammit,” I growl. “I’m going to go somewhere else before I lose my fucking mind.” I throw my fishing rod down and storm off to sit by myself downstream. I am close enough so that everyone can see me but far enough that it’s silent. I lie back in the grass and close my eyes to enjoy the warm sun on my skin.

I have an irrational fear of vines coming out of nowhere and wrapping around me. I know that won’t happen, but my brain is trying to convince me otherwise. When I hear rustling nearby, I gasp and sit up, expecting there to be someone standing there in front of me. Instead, it’s a pile of fish.

“What the fuck?” I murmur.

“How in the hell did you do that?” Daemon asks as he walks over. “Where did you get the fish?”

“I….” I stare at the fish, not knowing what to say, shrugging. “I don’t know. I didn’t do that. I heard a noise, and suddenly there was a pile of fish.”

“What happened?” Striker asks.

“Magic fish, I think,” Daemon says. Striker comes over and inspects the pile; he holds his hand out as if trying to get a read on the fish.

“I don’t detect any poison or anything,” he says.

“I wonder if it has to do with the noises we keep hearing,” I say.

“I don’t know. We are near Heartless Loch,” Daemon says, as if I should know what that even means.

Daemon and Striker call some of the others over to help move the fish to the camp while I start a fire so we can cook. Maybe we should be a little bit more cautious about eating random fish that show up, but I get a feeling that no harm will come from this. So far, my gut instinct has always been right. There are exactly thirty large fish for thirty hungry people. No one questions where it came from, luckily. I don’t have an answer for them on why I think it’s harmless.

As we are eating, I hear more scurrying noises and animal chittering in the brush behind where I am sitting with the guys. “Am I insane, or does it seem like we are being followed?” I ask.

“Yeah, I think we are being followed. Whoever it is seems shy. I don’t think they’re a threat, though,” Kael says as he eats.

“We should get back on the road,” I say as I stand up. “I’d like to get to the ranger station as soon as possible to stock up on supplies.”

Everyone seems to be in better spirits as we pack up and continue our hike on the trail. Vash begins humming low, as Daemon joins in. “O’er verdant mountains we fly, their beauty fills my soul…” His voice is low and gritty as he sings. “How I long to meet my maiden with her onyx hair and a heart of gold.” He glances down at me with a smile “An old draconic song,” He explains as we continue down our path. Birds are chirping in the trees. The land is lush and filled with greenery. I feel at peace as the sunbeams shoot through the trees, despite knowing what we are coming up against. Occasionally, I will hear rustling deep in the woods, but when I try to see further in, I don’t see anything.