Page 10 of Faeheart (Widdershins Supernatural Academy #2)

Elias

I stood in the shower, letting the hot water run down my body.

Thankfully, this new magical bond allowed me to leave the room once in a while without any extreme consequences.

Here in the shower, I could barely feel the other two, even though they were only fifty or so feet away.

It gave me some much needed peace, a break from the constant input of their emotions, magic, and thoughts.

I closed my eyes, feeling the water drum against my shoulders as I tried to sort through the chaotic tangle of emotions that weren’t entirely my own.

Four days of being magically bound to Wild and Caden had left me constantly on edge, unable to find even a moment’s peace except for these brief escapes to the bathroom.

Wild’s presence was particularly overwhelming, a constant surge of chaotic energy and unfiltered desire that crashed against my carefully constructed walls like waves against a cliff.

Every time I thought I’d built my defenses high enough, another wave of his emotions would sweep through me, leaving me disoriented and. .. aroused.

That was the part I couldn’t admit to anyone, not even myself. The way my body responded to him was unprecedented and terrifying. I’d never felt such intense attraction before, certainly not to another man, and definitely not to someone as reckless and inappropriate as Wild.

My hand drifted down my stomach of its own accord, fingers wrapping around my hardening cock.

I bit my lip to stifle a groan as I began to stroke myself, images of Wild’s smirking face flashing behind my closed eyelids.

The memory of his kiss in the quad, of his body below me when I’d saved him from magical burnout, sent heat spiraling through my core.

“Fuck,” I whispered, my strokes becoming more urgent. I could feel him even now, his presence in the back of my mind like background music that occasionally surged to the forefront. Was he aware of what I was doing? Could he feel my desire the way I sometimes felt his?

The thought should have horrified me, should have made me stop immediately. Instead, it only intensified my arousal. I leaned against the tile wall, water cascading down my chest as I worked myself faster, imagining Wild’s hands on me instead of my own.

Wild had a reputation on campus, of being an insatiable slut.

And thanks to his constant practice in the fae realm, I had a feeling he was exceptionally good at it.

I got lost thinking about all the ways he could pleasure me and all the ways he knew that I couldn’t even fathom.

The fantasy was vibrant, and I could almost feel his hands on me, his mouth around my cock, and the sweet tightness of his ass as he bounced on my cock in my mind’s eye.

When I came, it was with his name caught between my teeth, my body shuddering with an intensity that left me gasping. Shame followed almost immediately, crashing over me harder than any wave of Wild’s emotions ever had.

What was wrong with me? I’d never had time to think about attraction, much less sex.

Sure, I’d taken time to jerk off here and there when I was alone, imagining some unknown stranger who wanted to please me.

But this was different. I’d never been this out of control, this desperate.

It had to be the magic manipulating my desires, making me want things I shouldn’t want.

But even as I thought it, I knew it wasn’t entirely true.

The binding might have amplified everything, but it couldn’t create feelings from nothing.

Which meant these desires had been inside me all along, buried beneath layers of expectation and propriety.

I wanted chaos, sex, and freedom. I just couldn’t have it.

I quickly rinsed off, desperate to escape my own thoughts. As I stepped out of the shower and reached for a towel, I felt a sudden surge of amusement that wasn’t my own. Wild. He was laughing about something, the sensation bubbling through our connection like champagne.

“Get out of my head,” I muttered, wrapping the towel around my waist with more force than necessary.

But I knew he wasn’t doing it intentionally.

The connection worked both ways, after all.

Just as I felt his emotions bleeding into mine, he likely caught fragments of my thoughts and feelings.

The idea that he might have sensed what I’d just been doing in the shower made my stomach clench with mortification.

I dressed quickly, pulling on a clean shirt and pants with sharp, efficient movements.

When I opened the dorm room door, I found Wild lounging on his bed, flipping through a book and looking bored.

He looked up as I entered, and I caught a flash of something in his green eyes before he masked it with his usual smirk.

“Feel better?” he asked, his tone carefully neutral.

“Fine,” I replied stiffly, moving toward my bed in the corner. Caden was nowhere to be seen, probably off with that werewolf Atlas again on the roof. It was the closest place they could get privacy. Lucky bastard got to escape this suffocating tension.

Wild set his book aside and stretched, the movement causing his shirt to ride up and expose a strip of pale skin above his jeans. I forced myself to look away, but not before noticing the way his muscles moved beneath the fabric. I really wished he would stop being so hot. It was annoying.

“You know,” he said conversationally, “the bond goes both ways.”

My blood turned to ice. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

He sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed to face me. “It means I can feel what you’re feeling sometimes. Especially when the emotions are... intense .”

Heat flooded my face, and my cock twitched in my pants despite my recent orgasm. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Sure you don’t.” Wild stood, moving closer with that fluid grace that seemed effortless. “But just so you know, there’s nothing to be ashamed of. We’re all dealing with some pretty overwhelming urges thanks to this thing.” He gestured vaguely at the pendant beneath his shirt.

“It’s the magic,” I said quickly, desperate to maintain some semblance of dignity. “It’s affecting our judgment, making us feel things that aren’t real.”

Wild stopped directly in front of me, close enough that I could smell his skin, warm and slightly wild like summer rain. “Is that what you tell yourself?”

“It’s the truth.”

“Bullshit.” His voice was soft but certain. “Magic can amplify what’s already there, but it can’t create something from nothing. If you’re feeling it, some part of it was real to begin with.”

I wanted to argue, to deny what he was saying, but the words stuck in my throat.

Because deep down, I knew he was right. The attraction, the curiosity, the desperate longing for something beyond my carefully controlled existence.

It had all been there before the binding, buried so deep I’d almost convinced myself it didn’t exist.

“What do you want from me?” I whispered.

Wild’s expression softened slightly. “I want you to stop hating yourself for being human.”

“I’m not human,” I said automatically, the correction falling from my lips before I could stop it. “I’m a witch.”

Wild rolled his eyes. “You know what I mean. Stop hating yourself for having wants and needs that don’t fit into your parents’ perfect little box.”

I stepped back, putting distance between us, but he followed. “You don’t understand. My family?—”

“Your family isn’t here,” he interrupted, his voice taking on an edge. “It’s just us. Just you, me, and Caden trying to figure out how to live with this bond without killing each other.”

“And how’s that working out?” I asked bitterly. “We can barely be in the same room without fighting or...” I trailed off, not wanting to voice what the alternative was.

“Or what?” Wild pressed, moving closer again. “Or wanting to rip each other’s clothes off? Because that’s what this is really about, isn’t it? You’re terrified that you might actually want me.”

My back hit the wall, and I realized he’d been steadily backing me into the corner. “I don’t?—”

“Feel this,” he said, placing his hand flat against my chest. The contact sent electricity shooting through me, our magic responding immediately to the touch. “Feel how our power wants to merge. Feel how right this is, even when everything else is chaos. That has to mean something.”

I could feel it. The way his wild fae energy called to something deep inside me, something that had been locked away for so long I’d forgotten it existed. It was terrifying and exhilarating and completely beyond my control.

“This is insane,” I breathed, but I didn’t push him away.

“Good,” Wild murmured, his face inches from mine. “Insane is better than whatever repressed nightmare you’ve been living.”

Before I could respond, the door burst open and Caden stumbled in, his hair mussed and his lips swollen. He stopped short when he saw us, his eyes widening.

“Oh,” he said, his cheeks flushing red. “I can come back later?—”

“No,” I said quickly, pushing Wild away and straightening my shirt. “We were just... discussing the bond.”

Caden’s eyebrows rose. “Is that what we’re calling it now?”

Wild laughed, the sound rich and unrepentant. “Elias was just having some revelations about his sexuality. Very educational.”

“I hate you,” I muttered, but there was less venom in it than usual.

“No,” Wild said, his green eyes sparkling with mischief and something deeper. “You really don’t.” He tapped the crystal hanging around his neck. “I can feel it.”

“You two didn’t kill each other, did you?” Atlas asked, his deep voice filling the room as he stepped in behind Caden.

“Not yet,” Wild grinned. “There’s still daylight left though, so don’t count your chickens yet.”

Atlas raised an eyebrow, his keen werewolf senses no doubt picking up on the charged atmosphere in the room. “Right. Well, I brought you all dinner.” He held up a bag from the campus dining hall. “Figured you three might be too busy... bonding... to remember to eat.”

“Thanks,” Caden said, shooting me an apologetic look. “We should probably all eat together, anyway. Professor Blackwood said maintaining the connection works better when we’re in close proximity.”

Wild flopped back onto his bed with theatrical flair. “Great. More forced family time with Mr. Sunshine over there.”

I bristled at the nickname but found myself oddly disappointed when he moved away. The absence of his presence felt like a sudden drop in temperature, and I had to resist the urge to move closer again.

Atlas unpacked the food with efficient movements, laying out containers on Caden’s desk. “So, how are you three handling this whole situation? Really?”

“Terribly,” I said at the same time Wild said, “Fantastic.”

Caden sighed, settling cross-legged on his bed. “It’s... complicated. The emotional bleed-through is intense. Sometimes I can’t tell which feelings are mine and which are theirs.”

“Tell me about it,” I muttered, accepting a container of what looked like shepherd’s pie from Atlas. “It’s like having two very loud roommates living in my head.”

“Only two?” Wild asked with mock hurt. “I feel like I’m hosting a whole fucking convention in here. Elias’s anxiety, Caden’s horniness for his werewolf boyfriend, my own natural state of chaos...”

“I’m not that horny,” Caden protested weakly.

Atlas snorted. “Yes, you are. Trust me. And considering some of your memories that have flashed through my head, you have good reason to be.”

The casual way they discussed their relationship made something twist in my chest. Envy, maybe. I’d never had that kind of easy intimacy with anyone, never been able to just be myself without carefully curating every word and action.

“Must be nice,” I said before I could stop myself.

“What?” Atlas asked, settling beside Caden with unconscious possessiveness.

“Nothing.” I focused on my food, suddenly uncomfortable with the direction of my thoughts.

But Wild was watching me with those too-perceptive eyes. “He means it must be nice to have someone who accepts all your messy parts.”

“Wild,” I warned, but he ignored me.

“Poor little prince has spent his whole life pretending to be perfect. No wonder he’s wound so tight he’s about to snap.”

“I’m not wound tight?—”

“You literally organize your socks by color,” Caden pointed out gently.

“And your books by publication date,” Wild added.

“Alright,” Atlas said, glaring at the other two. “Give the guys a chance to breathe. This is already difficult enough without you two picking on Elias.”

Both Wild and Caden looked up at Atlas, looks of surprise on their faces.

“Besides, there’s something else we need to talk about,” he added, suddenly turning red. “It seems the mate bond I share with Caden is bleeding through your bond. And that’s making me… feel things.”

“Feel things?” Wild chuckled. “Like what?”

Atlas looked up. “Like I want to fuck you. All of you.”

I felt my heart race. At the same time, I felt Wild’s shock filter through the bond. But Caden didn’t seem surprised, just nervous.

“You knew about this?” I asked, looking at Caden.

He nodded. “Atlas told me about it after that night you kissed Wild to stabilize his magic. Apparently, he felt it too.”

“Yeah, we noticed,” Wild laughed, winking at Atlas.

It was hard to forget honestly. Atlas’s jeans had bulged far more than I expected, and the image was burned into my mind. I’d heard the rumors about Alpha werewolves and their… packages .

“So…” I said, shaking my head in a vain attempt to clear my thoughts. “What do we do about it?”

“Atlas and I have discussed it, and we decided… that if you two are… you know…”

Atlas crossed his arms over his chest, staring at both Wild and I with hungry eyes. “A foursome. If you’re interested.”