Page 1 of A Fate of Blood and Magic (Fated #2)

Chapter

One

ELIAS

As soon as my hands touched Teddy’s bare skin, the noise in my mind quieted. Every burden and demand slipped away beneath my fingertips. She let out a soft whimper as I kneaded the tension from her shoulders, and that sound unraveled the months of ache that have lived in my chest.

I kissed her, slow and reverent. One kiss for every lonely night I’d spent away from her. One for each breath I’d taken in a realm that didn’t have her in it. One for every smile I’d missed. I pressed my lips to her skin again and again, letting each kiss speak for me.

I was back though, and I was starved.

Her crimson hair fell over her neck and back in loose waves and I swept it aside to kiss the slope of her shoulder. I trailed lower. My hands followed her spine, memorizing her body all over again.

Every touch against her soft body melted my own anxieties away.

Her sigh was a beautiful sound caught between relief and desire. When she looked back at me from over her shoulder, the heat in her eyes made my heart pound.

She tried to roll beneath me, but I held her in place with a teasing grin. Her lips parted, her cheeks flushed. I leaned in to press a kiss over her lower back above a light speckling of freckles. She bowed into my touch and hissed out my name.

For months, our time together had been rushed with nothing more than stolen moments between my missions. A kiss here, a night there. Quick touches. Shared moments stolen away too soon. Then I’d be forced to leave again, pulled back to duty and responsibility and a vow I had to keep.

But earlier this afternoon, I’d completed my mission. Each fae was back home from the regions they’d been stationed. It’d taken three months, but there was no longer a command for me to answer.

So, tonight I could take my time loving my soul-bound mate. I could be greedy.

I licked along the curve of her spine and smiled at the way her muscles quivered in response.

“Elias.” The burning fire of her husky tone inflamed my lungs.

She shifted to the side, and I moved with her, trailing my palm on her stomach, high enough that my fingers skimmed the underside of her breast. She turned to lie on her back, and I followed her so that I hovered just above her. She arched, her hips rubbing against my length, and my breath hitched.

I pressed my cock between her thighs, teasing without entering and dragged my tongue over her nipple, swirling slowly. She inhaled a broken breath when I grazed her with my canine. A single bead of blood pebbled, and I licked it clean, tasting her on my tongue.

Guardians, I’d missed this. Missed her .

I took her breast in my mouth, my teeth tugging gently. Her fingers sank into my hair, and when she pulled, I peered up at her, and the raw hunger in her gaze nearly undid me.

Her thumb grazed my lips, her own lips parting when I took her thumb in my mouth.

“Elias,” she whispered, raising her hips up again.

Trailing my lips across her jaw, I kissed and nipped my way to her mouth.

“I want to take my time with you,” I told her, whispering my words across her lips. She moaned when I dragged my shaft against her clit, her eyes fluttering shut as I added, “I want to taste every inch of you.”

I ran a finger over her swollen slit and she gasped, her hands fisting around the bed sheets. When I brought my fingers up, wet from her arousal, her eyes narrowed.

“Suck your fingers clean,” she said. “Then touch me again.”

I did as she requested, my cock throbbing at her moan.

Her hips rolled against my touch and I slipped two fingers inside her. She threw her head back, her throat arched like an offering. I kissed a path up her body, taking in every sigh, every tremor.

“Bite me.” Her words came out in a breathless plea.

“So many orders from my queen.” My laugh was throaty, heavy with the same desperate need that thrummed inside me.

While I’d wanted to make her come on my tongue, I did as she asked and plunged my canines into the sweet spot where her neck and shoulder met.

Her hands clutched the back of my head as she cried out my name, her magic flaring as she came, trembling beneath me.

I licked her, healing the bite with a kiss, then pressed my nose to her skin, taking in her seductive scent.

Desperate for friction, I ran my cock against the mattress, tension coiling tight and hot as I trailed kisses lower. Her thighs parted and I licked away the evidence of her orgasm.

Her fingers twined through my hair when I thrust my tongue inside her.

I fought to ignore the urgent ache in my cock, the primal need to bury myself in my soul-bound mate as I worked to once again draw out Teddy’s pleasure.

When I rocked against the bed again, a sharp groan tore from me, and I nipped at her bud in a way that had her moaning out my name.

“I need you inside me,” she begged.

When I continued feasting on her, she took my face in her hands. I looked up at her, taking in the beauty of her flushed body writhing at the way my tongue played inside her.

“Please,” she begged.

I pulled back, licking her taste from my lips. “I won’t last long,” I said, fisting my cock.

Her eyes darkened, hungry and possessive as she watched me stroke myself again.

“Lie back,” she said.

I did and when her mouth circled around me, all restraint fractured.

She sucked me down with a wicked grin, tongue swirling, and every pump of her hand brought me closer to the edge. I gripped her hips, moaning her name as she took me deeper.

I touched her breast, grazing my thumb over her nipple.

The way she hummed around me with her teeth grazing along the side, made my hips jerk, but I needed this to last. I wanted Teddy to surround me so completely, it made everything else in life an understatement.

Every lick up my shaft drew out my pleasure in the most torturous way.

I heaved out a ragged breath, moaning Teddy’s name.

She peered up at me through her lashes, her eyes burning with unfiltered desire.

I groaned at the painful way my balls tightened further.

She squeezed her grip as she pumped me faster and harder.

Her eyes locked with mine as I came and she swallowed hard, with a satisfied grin.

Before I could catch my breath, I hauled her up to me, kissing her hard as I rolled us over. With her tongue tangled with mine, I hardened further at the taste of my orgasm. Limbs intertwined, I pressed Teddy’s back onto our mattress and slid into her with one smooth thrust.

Her palm moved across my arms, my chest. Her body arched to take me deeper while my muscles quivered at her touch. I slammed into her and she groaned.

I steadied a breath, trying to calm my thrusts so I could love Teddy with the tenderness she deserved.

“Don’t stop,” she gasped against my neck, her words coming out as warm puffs of air. “Don’t stop, Elias. I want this. I want you unrestrained.”

I drew in another breath, fighting each movement of my hips to take her gently.

“Elias,” she warned.

I kissed her neck. “I don’t want to hurt you.” My words came out gritty and breathless.

With her palms on my cheeks, she turned my face to meet her gaze and the fire that continued to rage behind her eyes.

“You won’t hurt me,” she said, rocking against me and taking me deeper inside her. “I want this. I want to see you lose control.”

She licked my canine. I snapped .

I drove into her hard and fast, our bodies slamming together with every desperate breath. Her nails dug into my back and her legs wrapped around my hips. I kissed her through her cries.

With her beneath me, I came alive with each crazed thrust. She chanted my name over and over again, filling my ears with the melody I drew from her.

Somewhere, a knock echoed in the house. I bared my lengthened canines toward our closed bedroom door.

Another knock. This one louder. Teddy let out an incredulous laugh. Someone, a male, called my name.

“It sounds urgent,” Teddy breathed out. “Think you can make me come before they leave?”

“I think they should leave so I can make you come again and again.”

She clenched around me.

“Do that again,” I said with a snarl.

When she did, I slammed into her harder and faster while I rubbed a finger over her clit with quick, practiced strokes.

“Yes,” she hissed out.

My thrusts became more erratic, and when I felt my orgasm build, I teased Teddy with my finger. The scent of her mounting orgasm filled my nostrils, and I had to hold my breath so I wouldn’t explode before she had the chance to orgasm again.

“Come for me, mo elma .” My voice held a hint of desperation and pain.

Mo elma. That was what she was—my soul.

Her eyes met mine, and whatever she saw broke her wide open. She shattered around me, the hue of her peach magic calling to the silver threads of mine. They twined together. Only once her body stopped quivering did I let go, spilling into her with a guttural moan.

My arms trembled. I collapsed onto my side, bringing her with me. My heart hammered hard, and when I rested my palm over her chest, I took in the way her heart slammed just as fervently as mine.

Her fingertips caressed the length of my arm, and when I pulled her closer to me, she moved without hesitation. She smelled of her lavender soap but also of me. Of us.

She kissed my chin, her arm snaking around my back. “I take it you missed me?”

I huffed out a laugh. “So much,” I admitted. “Every day apart from you was torture. And the days I spent with you, knowing I’d have to leave again . . . they were worse.”

She nestled closer to me, her head dipping below my chin. “Having you here and knowing you don’t have to leave again makes this cabin finally feel like home.”

My heart both ached and swelled. I knew she’d felt lonely in my realm and missed me as much as I missed her. I felt it in the way our magic yearned for the other’s. Despite that, she’d already made this place our home. It was my refuge, and I hoped it’d be the same for her and the younglings.

“I love you.” I kissed the top of her head. “You are threaded through every piece of my soul. I am yours, mo elma.”

She sighed, a contented sound as she whispered, “I love you too. I just don’t have the pretty words to say it the way you do.”

I chuckled.

The annoying bastard on the other side of our front door knocked again.

I grumbled, hugging Teddy tighter.

Teddy sat upright, tension stiffening her frame. “What if it’s about the kids?” she asked. “What if something happened to them?”

The warmth I’d found in that moment gave way to cold dread.

When the endless winter first started in her realm, Teddy had taken in and cared for four younglings. Now, they were unofficially ours, making our cottage and family feel complete.

I bolted out of bed, pulling on my clothes while I rushed out of our room and to the front door with Teddy close behind. I waited for her to finish dressing before I opened the door.

“Your Majesty,” Hayden, one of the royal warriors said, “I apologize for the intrusion.”

A hint of red spread over his neck to his face, and I caught the edge of discomfort in his scent. I wasn’t sure if he was unsettled by what he’d interrupted or the weight of the news he carried.

“What is it?” I asked, my words streamed together. “Are the younglings okay? My mother?”

Hayden shook his head. “They’re fine. I believe the younglings are at the bakery with Brenton, and I haven’t heard word of anything happening to them.”

Beside me, Teddy loosened a breath.

“It’s the fae,” he said. “Several of them showed up at the castle.” He roughed a hand through his hair, clearly shaken. “They claim their loved ones, the warriors Hudson had sent to the human realm, still haven’t returned. They’re demanding answers.”

“What are you talking about?” My question came out sharper than I intended. “I went to each region. I brought them back myself. You were on some of those missions.”

“I know.” He bowed. “But we still have hundreds of warriors unaccounted for.”

“I’ll start the shower for us,” Teddy whispered, a blush blooming across her cheeks.

It was so perfectly, achingly Teddy that it took everything in me not to order Hayden away and reclaim the moment we’d just lost.

“Gather the others,” I said, steadying my voice. “We’ll meet you at the castle as soon as possible.”

Once he disappeared to retrieve my fae friends and Ximena, the other warrior I’d come to rely on since the mage war, I stood and stared at the closed door, willing the bile in my throat to settle.

I’d been certain I’d brought them all home, but even as I visited each region, I’d had this feeling .

. . a sense I couldn’t name, only chase.

It’d driven me to reach deeper into my primal instincts, to listen harder to the world around me.

I’d searched without knowing exactly what for.

I’d counted the people who’d come back without knowing if the numbers were correct.

We’d lost so many in the mage battle, and without a record of who my uncle had sent into the human realm, certainty was impossible.

Now, though . . . now, I questioned everything.

I clenched my fists, forcing each breath to come slower.

Had the human soldiers I’d spoken to lied?

Although my people had worked hard to rebuild our kingdom after the mage battle had left her in ruin, our realm was still reeling.

How could we know for certain who was missing and if any had been taken?

How many warriors were unaccounted for? My fists loosened when Teddy grazed her finger over my knuckles. I watched the motion, mesmerized by her affection. Then she laced her fingers with mine, and I clung to that small tether, trying to calm the chaos writhing inside me.

I’d just gotten back. I was finally home, ready to build a life with my mate.

And somehow the human soldiers had betrayed me. They hadn’t returned all my people.

Months ago, I’d warned them—if they put my fae in cages, they wouldn’t survive my wrath.

But this? This was worse. A calculated lie. A quiet theft. A treason that would not go unpunished.

They would return my people. Or I’d show them exactly what it meant to cross a fae king.