Page 35 of Fated in A Time of War

ALICE

T he morning light spies through the clinic window like a soft brushstroke.

I kneel beside a sprouting vine, its tendrils curious and alive in hand-built troughs outside the entrance.

The air tastes of earth and new growth—a contrast to war-torn memories that still linger deep in my bones.

Krall moves behind me, glancing over my shoulder.

When the comm panel pings—clear and sharp—it cuts me in two.

It’s cryptic, encrypted Alliance clearance. Routed through back channels. Something meant for his eyes. He pauses in the doorway, stilled by its glow flickering in his chest. I watch, heart tightening.

I don’t need to say anything.

He reads the message, jaw tightening. Then, without breaking our quiet, he folds it and tosses it into the planter. The paper curls into the soil, forgotten seed of a world neither of us wants to return to.

“Recruitment,” he mutters, voice low, cold. “Reactivation.”

My fingers still on the vine, I look at him head-on. “And?”

He shrugs, but it’s a half shrug—not complete. Wounds waver. “They don’t own me anymore.”

A bubble of tension holds between us. It tastes metallic, like smoke just before it vanishes. I sense the fear: that the war will never let him go. That the ghosts of commands and duty can still snap like canine teeth, drawing us both back under.

I slide off the planter, soil cracking beneath my knees. I draw in a breath rich with growing things.

“I’ll tend them,” I say—meaning the vines, meaning everything he’s trying to protect. It’s hope as small as a green shoot, and as big as freedom.

He watches me, and in his eyes I catch the reflection of renewal. Not just for the vines, but for both of us.

That night, I light candles. Not mourning. Not forgetting.

Protection.

The quiet reverence of the flame fades beneath the growing heat of his body near mine. His breath, thick and warm, brushes my cheek before I feel his lips again—gentle, not rushed, but carrying the full weight of his words.

“I love you, Alice,” he’d said.

Now his hands—calloused, massive, scaled in deep crimson—trace reverently down the side of my face, and every place he touches sparks a new ache inside me.

I press into him without hesitation. My mouth finds his again, our lips dragging together with hungry softness, that edge of restraint just barely holding back the storm.

He exhales hard through his nose, nostrils flaring, eyes flickering gold in the candlelight. “Are you sure?” he rasps, voice low, raw with the need he’s not yet unleashed.

“I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life,” I whisper, voice trembling.

The words loosen something in him. He rises to his feet and brings me up with him, lifting me easily with those powerful arms. I hook my legs around his waist and bury my hands in the thick, dark ridges of scales at his nape.

The way his claws cradle the backs of my thighs, holding me without harming, makes my stomach clench with want.

Krall carries me with careful urgency to the thick furs beside the hearth, laying me down like I’m more precious than anything he’s ever known. The fire casts gold over his red-scaled body, making him look molten—every black swirl along his skin moving with each breath he takes.

He kneels between my legs and runs a hand down my body, pausing to cup my breast gently, his thumb brushing my nipple until it pebbles tight under his attention. “So soft,” he murmurs, his golden eyes taking in every reaction. “You’re like nothing on my world.”

“And you’re exactly what I want,” I breathe.

He lowers his head, tongue flicking out to circle my nipple before sucking it into his mouth. I cry out, arching into him, my body already pulsing with anticipation. The heat of his tongue, the faint drag of teeth—everything about him is heat and contrast and worship.

His hands roam lower, taking his time. When his fingers dip into the waistband of my pants, I lift my hips in silent permission. He removes them slowly, reverently, baring me inch by inch until I lie naked beneath him, breathless.

“Goddess,” he murmurs. “You’re already wet for me.”

His clawed fingers slide through the slick heat of my pussy, circling my clit with shocking gentleness. My hips buck at the contact, and he growls low, deep in his throat—a sound of pleasure, not control.

“I need to taste you,” he says, and lowers his head between my thighs.

The first flick of his tongue makes me sob, and when he starts sucking on my clit with slow, devastating purpose, I nearly lose all sense of where I am.

His scales scrape against the inside of my thighs—just enough pressure to remind me of what he is—of the danger and power he carries with every touch.

But none of it feels threatening. Only reverent. Worshipful.

He devours me slowly, drawing out my pleasure until I’m writhing beneath him, fists knotted in the furs, back arching off the ground. When I finally come, it crashes over me like a tide, long and consuming. I cry out his name as the wave crests, my whole body trembling.

He rises over me then, licking my release from his lips like it’s nectar.

His cock—long, thick, ridged, sheened with his own precum—juts from between his thighs.

It’s alien, yes, but beautiful in its own dangerous way.

I reach for it, wrapping my hand around the thick shaft.

He groans, eyes narrowing with hunger, claws curling into the ground beside me.

“You feel… incredible,” I murmur. “Let me take you in.”

“You’ll have all of me,” he growls, voice deep with restraint. “But we go slow. I won’t hurt you.”

I nod, guiding him to me, legs parting in invitation. He lines himself up and pushes the head of his cock into my pussy—just the tip—and the stretch is already incredible. He’s thick, his length pressing into me with deliberate patience.

“Fuck,” I gasp, nails digging into his arms. “You’re so big.”

He leans down, kissing me deeply, distracting me as he slides in inch by inch. His breath comes in hot pants, his muscles taut with restraint. “Almost there,” he whispers. “Just a little more.”

When he’s fully seated inside me, our bodies pressed flush, we both pause. I’ve never felt so filled, so complete. His cock throbs inside me, stretching me to the limit but never past. I cling to him, pressing kisses to his jaw, whispering his name over and over.

“You’re perfect,” he groans. “You were made for me.”

He begins to move—slow, deep strokes that make my vision blur.

I wrap my legs around his waist, meeting each thrust, feeling his scales slide against my skin, his heat inside and out consuming me.

The rhythm builds, not rushed, but inevitable.

Every stroke grinds against my inner walls, pushing me closer and closer to that edge again.

Krall grips my hips, angling me just right. “Come for me, Alyssa,” he demands, voice broken with need. “I need to feel you shatter around me.”

I do.

My orgasm hits like lightning, sharp and blinding. My pussy clamps around his cock, drawing a growl from him that echoes like thunder. He pumps harder, faster, losing his rhythm as his own climax rises.

“Fuck—” he snarls. “I’m going to?—”

He buries himself to the hilt, roaring as he comes, spilling deep inside me. His cock pulses again and again, heat flooding me, his body trembling with the force of it.

When he collapses beside me, pulling me into the curve of his arm, there’s nothing but breath and firelight and the silence of peace.

“I’ve never belonged anywhere,” he says softly, brushing his knuckles along my jaw. “Until you.”

I press a kiss to his chest, over the heart that once only beat for war. “You’re mine now,” I whisper. “And I’m yours.”

And that is enough.

The room has never looked this small—or this beautiful.

Krall sleeps beside me, breath slow and deep. The soft rumble of it is the only lullaby this war-scarred heart needs. His chest rises and falls beneath bare skin that feels too warm to touch, yet my fingers drift there anyway. Instinct takes over, drawing my hand across the landscape of scars.

My fingers trace one scaleline that arcs from his clavicle down to the pectoral.

I didn’t give him that one—Horus IV, a plasma shard, and a choice that nearly cost me everything I held dear.

I know the edges of it by heart. Every imperfection, every stiff line of healed flesh.

And I don’t recoil. I hold it like sacred history.

War made him. War broke him. But war doesn't define him.

Our love does.

The silence in the room is thick—comfortable. Outside the small viewport, the solar panels’ soft hum blends with the faint hiss of night wind. In the gardens below, the spiral vines sway like quiet sentinels, their leaves murmuring against each other, holding vigil over our peace.

My eyelids grow heavy, but I stay awake, soaking in the fact that he’s here, breathing beside me, whole again.

“Home,” I murmur, pressing a kiss to the ridge of his shoulder. “You are home.”

He stirs, doesn’t wake. I smile into the softness of his skin and close my eyes.

The wind shifts outside, carrying a faint echo of distant battle—like a reminder that the war hasn’t ended. Somewhere in the cosmos someone else is fighting, someplace far away from us.

But here—in this forgotten settlement, on this quiet planet, in this fragile peace—we are more than survivors.

We are proof.

Proof that even in a time built for death, love can endure.

And not only endure—it wins.

I rest, anchored in the rhythm of his heartbeat, knowing that whatever comes next, we have each other.

That is everything.