Page 42 of Fated or Knot (UnseelieVerse: The Omega Masquerade #1)

42

LARK

W e were reentering polite society soon, so Marius donned a sleeveless shirt and his swimming trunks after giving himself a brisk dry-off with a towel. I took the second towel and wiped away as much water off me as I could, as the air was cooling significantly now that the sun had set.

We experimented with my wing-fins, having him squeeze the water out of each. It was like they’d gone numb when they’d gotten saturated, as he was able to wring them without causing me pain. They started plumping up and stiffening on my back after he further dried them with my towel.

Marius played with a wing when it was in an in-between phase, still flexible like a fin but firm enough to be posable.

“You’re evidence of something remarkable, p’nixie.” He twirled one of my top wings into a corkscrew shape, which tickled. I glanced over my shoulder to see what he was doing. It was a shock to see just how flexible my wing was right now.

“Careful. If it gets too damaged, it’ll fall off, and regrowing wings takes two seasons at least,” I said. I’d seen it happen in Osme Fen, after a pixie’s mate had accidentally crumpled one of her top wings.

“It’s fine. See?”

Already, my wing was unfolding from the corkscrew and resuming the shape I was used to seeing when I glanced back at it. That was rather remarkable, actually.

“I think it’s clear that omegas used to belong to a single race of fae. Some delved into the sea, mated with my kind, and became nixies, and others preferred forests, sunshine, and flight and became pixies. Generations later, here you are…both.” He stopped fiddling with my wings to press to my back, his body heat more than welcome against my cold skin. His hands roamed, spreading the warmth of his skin over my bare midriff and through the damp fabric of my top and shorts.

“Going to make you mine,” whispered his feral side, and I showed him my throat. I soaked in his rumble and the pressure of his fangs when they dimpled my neck.

“We can talk about it later,” I murmured. “I’m going to freeze.”

“So dramatic. It’s usually much colder at this time of night.” He slung our bag over his shoulder and took my hand, leading me up the rough-cut rock path leading away from the sea and the entrance to Telimarr. We’d both put on sandals for a bit of protection from sharp stones.

Marius made sure to walk at my right side, and his good eye sparkled from the light of our essence lamp before he reached up and dimmed it. We rounded the bend that’d seemed so dark earlier and entered a tunnel lined on either side with glowing, multicolored crystals. Unlike the ones we’d observed underwater, these had grown to hip height and absorbed the lamp’s light to gleam twice as bright.

My mouth fell open, and I gasped. No wonder he wanted to visit at low tide. There were puddles here and there that suggested the sea level rose to cover the first section of this tunnel, though it was set at a gradual upward slope. Prisms of multicolored light and spiky shadows danced around us as we walked.

Marius watched my reaction to the surreal loveliness around us. He felt so strongly in the moment that his emotions and mine mingled. This was it. Very soon, we would be tied together in a permanent bond.

It was as beautiful a concept as the tunnel itself. I saw why this long path had been created from the sea to our ultimate destination. We could rush through it, just like we could grab one another and complete the bond with damp stone as our bed. But the anticipation was heady as we walked hand in hand, soaking in the moment and each other.

This was another branch of Always. He and I were meant to be. No doubts, no worries, and no fears were left. We’d already exposed ourselves down to the last hidden thought while balanced over the depths of the open sea to arrive on this path of light and color.

“You’ve helped me understand.” He kept his voice at a hush, reverent for our surroundings. “Fate’s guiding hand is the force that brought you back to me. The odds of us meeting again were so incredibly low.”

“You don’t despise it anymore?” He’d been the only fae I’d met with an abject hatred for fate. It’d take time to seriously extract it from the core of who he was.

He snorted gently. “I will give thanks for it once now. But any time after, I’ll say that Fal tripped over you out of sheer luck. I would’ve still found you if he hadn’t, p’nixie. I was right on the edge of losing myself to my feral side, and Niall was of a mind to abandon Ilysnor to chase your shadow.”

“I was very close to getting on a train to a sanctuary city,” I admitted.

“And even closer to returning to Osme Fen against your will,” he growled. “I would’ve followed. Your destiny was never to remain there. This is your path, part of your journey. Here, by my side.”

He’d just posed a rather terrifying what-if , as Cymora would’ve pushed me straight back into Pack Ellisar’s arms had Pack Sorles not been such an incredible alternative for her schemes. Yet I felt comforted. There was never a chance that I would’ve been trapped in that fate. Niall would’ve come for me.

In my mind’s eyes, I saw him tearing through Ellisar and his brothers the next time they thought to corner me in the market. The trio of barkfolk were alphas, but they hadn’t trained for combat a moment in their lives.

“No contest,” Marius’s feral side whispered in my mind. He also weighed hunting them down anyway in a moment of outrage. “No male, past or future, will intimidate you in that way.”

“It’s in the past,” I assured him in a comforting whisper.

The kelpie shook his head to clear out the murderous thoughts. “I will always come for you,” he said.

I knew he would; he was swiftly becoming my safe haven. The close friend I wished I’d had with me all along but was more than grateful to have returned to me. “I give thanks to fate, too, for deciding that we fit together perfectly.” I squeezed his hand and admired the multicolored gleam off his fierce gaze. “I love you, and I am yours.”

My words set off a wave of possessive desire in him, a blend of alpha and feral intensity. “I have always been yours,” he replied. “And…I think you’re about to hear this far too much. I love you too.”

I practically glowed with happiness to hear him say it out loud and really hoped there was a bed waiting for us at the end of this tunnel.

He answered my thoughts again. “Better. The cutest fucking inn. Though you’ll have to wait until I let you off my knot to see it in the light of day.”

“I look forward to it,” I said dryly, assuming he was exaggerating his prowess for a male who hadn’t actually knotted me yet.

He raised an eyebrow back in challenge. Uh oh, I thought playfully.

“We’ll see,” he said, low and rasping. We’d reached the end of the tunnel, where it leveled off into a dirt path. The first stars dotted the night sky as it deepened to a velvety purple-black overhead. I huddled closer to Marius as a chill breeze whistled in from the sea.

He released my hand to draw me close for a short walk around the side of a two-story structure half hidden in the trees. If this was the inn, it was certainly secluded, as there didn’t seem to be any other buildings nearby. The windows on the second floor were dark, while a full-powered essence lamp gleamed atop a wooden porch made with fresh-smelling timbers.

Marius got the door, the hinges of which creaked mightily as he pulled it open, and I was blasted with a nice wave of hot air as I entered. Instead of having a front desk and an area for baggage right off the front foyer, it looked like we’d walked straight into someone’s living room.

It smelled like cooked seafood and aged fabrics. The floor was wooden and scuffed in places, covered by a faded area rug in the center, with a couch and loveseat set nearby, both of which had flattened cushions and knitted blankets draped across the back of them. Several wooden shelves lined the walls, especially over the hearth, all of them burdened with dusty items.

A wrinkled figure paused in a rocking chair situated close to the hearth, her knitting needles stilling as she took us in. “Henrik!” she bellowed at the top of her lungs. I startled, not expecting such a loud voice from a little old fae like her. “Henrik! Guests!”

“What?” called an equally elderly-sounding male voice from the next room over.

The female got up with the help of a walking stick and left her knitting behind. “Deaf as a post, he is,” she muttered to herself. She was also speaking louder than necessary. Fae aged, but very slowly, so she had to have seen many centuries to earn the stoop in her back and the gray that’d leeched most of her coloring.

“Hello, honored elder. May we rent a room for a few nights?” Marius asked.

“Of course. Look at you two dears, so young and in love,” she said, shuffling right by the Unseelie prince with his distinctive scar without more than a single glance. “You just missed dinner, but I’ll cook you up something special. New couples always deserve treats.”

“Oh, no, that’s quite all right,” I said quickly, even though my belly grumbled at the reminder of how long it’d been since we’d had a light lunch. We’d be too busy fucking to eat anytime soon, though, and I didn’t want to trouble an honored elder.

“I’ll prepare something that can sit and leave it in a basket right outside your room for when you’re ready for it,” she continued as if she hadn’t heard me. Which she might not have.

She’d walked to a set of stairs and retrieved a keyring off the banister, flipping through a few of them before offering us the ring by one key dangling between her fingers. “Right up these stairs. First room on your left. I’m Illia, by the way. If you need anything, ring the bell, though it would be nice if you’d come downstairs too. These steppers don’t work like they used to.”

“We will be no trouble,” he assured her.

She smacked her lips and waved him off. “Ah! Such a little charmer. You remind me of my Henrik. Came back from the war full of fire and verve.”

Marius drew up in surprise while I struggled not to laugh.

“Did you need me?” the male in question called.

“Nay, I got it!” she called back over her shoulder.

“What?”

Illia breathed a sigh. “Why don’t you two dears go get settled?” she suggested.

We started up the stairs a breath later. Marius let us into the cozy room we’d rented, turning on essence lamps and closing the curtains over the two windows inside. I skipped over, inspecting everything to head straight to the bed, lip caught between my teeth. “Go ahead and nest,” Marius said on his way past me to the attached bathroom and leaned into the closet. He tossed out a set of extra pillows, a heavy comforter, and what looked like a flat cushion.

I set up the bed enticingly, but this temporary nest wasn’t more than a strategic curve of fluffed-up pillows so we could lounge together. I folded up the comforter and the hand-knit blanket already on the bed to place them to the side. They’d be nice to sleep on later.

Marius handed me the cushion last. “I think this is a soak mat.”

The soft material had a nice give and, more importantly, a faint hum of magic. Soak mats were for heat sex, to keep the fluids contained, though I sensed Marius wanted to make use of it to be polite to our hosts. I shrugged and laid it on top of the sheets. “Worth a try.”

He nodded in approval. “Ready, mate?” he asked.

I smiled at him, still full of anticipation for what was next. His answering grin stretched his scar before he turned and headed for the door. I almost whined, but all he was doing was setting the keyring on the knob outside and locking us in the room together with a slow slide of the privacy bar.

When he faced me, his eyes immediately dilated. I’d dropped my damp top and shorts already, awaiting his return naked and eager. He prowled toward me, dimming essence lamps into a soft half-light as he went. “Lie on your front,” he instructed.

My wings quivered in excitement as I crawled onto the bed and rested on the cushioned mat. The prone position was a favorite of both of ours. I looked over my shoulder to see him rooting through our bag and taking out two familiar pots: the bruise salve and, as he unscrewed the lid to check, the lotion.

I twitched in confusion when he straddled my hips still clothed. “Someone’s been hunched over a kelpie’s back for several hours,” he said, rubbing some lotion between his palms.

“But—”

“Let me take care of you.” He started massaging my shoulders. Through our bond, I mostly picked up that he wanted the positive contact, to feel how warm and soft I was. His thoughts weren’t crisp enough for me to figure out what else he was planning.

“Mmm.” I didn’t need him to have reasons. He was really talented at rubbing away the lingering stiffness in my back.

“Do you want to know what else I’m thinking?” he teased.

“Hmm.” I was turning into a content puddle, especially once he threaded the base of my top wings between his fingers and put rolling pressure there. “Sure.”

“I’m not sure I can be gentle, mate,” he murmured. I had the sense he didn’t like that. He wanted to make love to me but knew the moment would get away from him. “I will pamper you before and after, all right?”

I glanced over my shoulder, a little concerned for him. “Okay.”

“Remember when your pre-heat punched you in the stomach?”

Niall supplied the context: I’d had a pre-heat cramp, and his scent had changed for the first time before he’d claimed me incessantly, like he was in rut.

“Of course. That was a memorable morning,” I said.

“I feel it coming on. In you. Which means I’ll be in rut again,” he warned.

I braced myself, wondering how he could possibly know. The cramp seized my core a moment later, and I gasped in pain and need. Marius released a strangled growl, his fingers tightening around my ribs. His scent, mingled with sea salt, grew rich with fertility and male musk.Subtle glimmers of yellow light sparkled from the ring of his irises. The infamous “rut glow” that was one of the only signs an alpha was in rut.

He shifted and pressed his hard length between the globes of my ass. I felt its throbbing heat like there wasn’t the thin barrier of his swimming trunks between us and rubbed back against him, leaving a damp spot from my slick.

When he drew back, taking away the tantalizing feel of him, I whimpered for more. He shook his head and breathed shallowly to finish what he’d started, making his way quickly down the rest of my back.

Once he was done, he moved his hands to my ass and squeezed. With a little shifting behind me, he had his clothes off. This time, there was no barrier when he rubbed his cock between my folds. I lifted my hips with a soft, needy whistle, trembling when he ground the base of him right where I needed him most.

My core ached, filling with familiar need. “This will be inside you. My knot,” he said huskily, rumbling with arousal. His scent bloomed further, and my pussy clenched in reaction as I took a deep breath of him. It was intoxicating and made me more aware of how empty I was.

He helped me lie on my back and inhaled the pheromones at my neck before nuzzling and nipping the sensitive column. “Mate,” he said, muffled against my skin.

I could hardly breathe for anticipation. Our bond was kindling with fire, stoked as he lapped at my sweat and shook my body with his next growl.

“Mate,” I whimpered in agreement. He tilted his head so I could taste his pheromones next. The heady bloom of his waterlily and mint burst on my tongue and fogged my mind with need. I licked him again, savoring it. He was absolutely about to rut me into this bed, and I opened my legs to invite him in.

His first thrust was shallow. I was plenty slick for him but still tight. My pussy stretched to fit his alpha size as he rocked into me deeper with each roll of his hips. The bond between us was quiet of extra sensation until I felt the throb of his heartbeat when he was fully sheathed in my body.

He drew in a rasping breath, eyes shuttering. I cried out a moment later as I felt it too. The bond was tightening around us once more. Not only did I now know how heated my own body felt when we were so intimately intertwined, I felt the pressure squeezing its way through his spine and spurring him to claim with all his strength. That had to be what the rut felt like. Him starting slow was an act of absolute willpower.

I also knew why he hadn’t put the lady pleaser back in. He wanted to claim me as he was and enjoy our intimacy without pushing me to come prematurely. There’d be plenty of time for us to come together for blinding pleasure. However, my pre-heat made every touch more intense, especially with him seated knot-deep in me. The added sensations of how he felt through our bond was blinding. He tested this with a thrust that ended in another starburst of shared pleasure at its apex.

“It’s joining us,” he said through a haze of rut and instinct.

“Good. Now, claim me. I won’t break, no matter how you do it.” I dug my claws into his back to spur him on, and he sucked in from the bite of pain.

The last of his control snapped. He pinned me with more of his weight, grabbed my hip to pull me into his thrusts, and rut me into the bed, putting much of his strength into each core-shaking pound of his hips.

I dug my teeth into his shoulder and held on, knowing his claim would be unrelenting. “Harder,” he demanded, wanting to display the little bite wounds until they healed. And then he wanted them reapplied so everyone would know I was unashamed about marking him as mine. Maybe one day I’d bite him hard enough to give him a scar he would wear with pride.

We shared everything the closer we were to coming together, both literally and magically. Give and take, male and female, knot and not. I surrendered to sensation because to try to split the moment logically between him and me was impossible.

“Mine.” This whisper alone was all Marius, all alpha. “This is my claim, right here, right now. You are mine .”

“Yours,” I agreed. I quivered all over, on the precipice of coming, which meant he was the same way. His knot was starting to swell and rub against my pussy lips. Our bond was heartbeats from completion.

I opened my eyes, and he did the same, our gazes locking. He slowed the roll of his hips, tilting his head. His feral instincts clawed for control, and this time, I heard exactly what Niall wanted. “Breed her on her hands and knees. Fill her as deep as possible.”

“Do it,” I whispered. There was no harm in inviting him to breed me a bit while I had a fertility blocker inked on my wrist. In fact, he could give it several of his best attempts while his head was filled with the rut haze.

He pulled his cock free, his every muscle locking and the rest of his instincts screaming for him to complete the bond. Without him inside me, he—we—felt incomplete. I hurried to turn over on my hands and knees below the tight cage of his body. “There. Ready,” I invited.

I got about halfway through an enticing hip wiggle before he pinned me in this new position. He sank his fangs deep into my shoulder as he aligned with me from behind and slid back into my pussy with a sigh of relief. I arched into his solid chest and screamed.

His knot remained a steady bump in and out as he slowed his claim, just a little, enjoying the way I twitched and moaned underneath him. He savored the taste of my blood, too. “My female. My prey. Mine.”

“Yours,” I repeated. I was open to his bond, his seed, his love, a surrender that echoed between us. He was ready to finish giving me all three things and more. Everything I wanted. Every part of him was mine.

His knot filled my channel, popping into place and stretching the rim of my pussy. Pleasure burst between us at the same time. He came with a roar, drowning out the rest of my senses in a shattering moment. I trembled with each liquid rush as he pulsed within me. And it wasn’t my imagination. He spilled a lot, and his rut-enhanced pheromones still leaked from him as he rolled his hips without going anywhere.

“The bond isn’t set.” His feral side had this distinct thought just as our pleasure started to ebb, enough for a shred of reason to peek in. Did we do something wrong after all? We’d followed all the steps, shared our minds, and joined…

As soon as we stopped coming, it snapped into place. I felt the thread between us anchor in my essence and resonate with a twang that felt like pure bliss.

“There it is!” I exclaimed. I immediately came again, just as hard as before. Sparks danced in my eyes, and Marius groaned. My squeezing pussy grabbed his knot and milked out more of his seed while he panted and shook. He tried to roll his hips and only succeeded in rocking us together, we were so tightly joined.

Thank the stars there was a soak mat, because this would be a mess the moment he pulled out. By the time we were coming down from this pleasure high, I was sweaty and limp, only held up by his arm around me. Our bond settled into place, letting us have our separate headspaces again. If I focused, I could sense his emotions and thoughts. I bet we could continue enjoying mind-to-mind communication pretty openly.

He proved me right after repositioning us so he was seated and I rested in his lap. “You really think you’re getting away in twenty minutes?” he asked in his smoky feral voice.

“We can’t fuck again if I’m stuck on your knot,” I pointed out.

He gently licked the twin wounds he’d left on my shoulder. They were starting to hurt in earnest. Maybe I wouldn’t scar him with my little fangs, but the stinging punctures he’d left behind were sure to remain. “That’s not how this works, sweet prey. I caught and marked you. Now, I’m going to breed you properly.”

“Okay, Niall. Breed me, then.” I wasn’t all that concerned about what he’d do while we were tied.

His rumble turned into a purr at the invitation. He licked the pad of his thumb and used it to circle my clit. Oh, stars , I had underestimated him. The touch was electric, at first too overstimulating, causing my leg to jolt. He slowed until he was rubbing the side of the little bundle of nerves, coaxing out a reaction.

Just a flutter of my pussy would squeeze him enough to keep his knot sealed in place. We could be here for a long, long time if he drew out my pleasure just right. And there were few forces more determined to make that happen than the male kissing his way up my neck. I tilted my head back to meet his lips with mine, moaning when I tasted the full blast of his blooming mint and waterlily and…

My channel rippled. His fangs dimpled my lower lip as we both came a bit, and his knot pulsed with his heartbeat, firmer than ever. “This is a heat strategy,” I said, a thought I meant mostly for myself.

“Mmhmm. This is how I make sure the child is mine.”

I also meant how he’d keep me from combusting from my heat. My understanding was that an omega’s heat pain only abated while she was knotted.

“That too. When you’re in estrus…” He drew off, confused, but only for a moment. His mental voice shifted seamlessly to his princely side. “What the fuck, p’nixie. Don’t challenge Niall to breed you.”

“Why not? He’s good at it,” I teased. Even though he’d returned to his senses, he’d resumed rubbing my clit after realizing where his hand was. We moaned together through another shared mini orgasm.

“You’re going to end up pregnant.”

“That does eventually have to happen.”

He pulled away from our kiss, opening his eyes to search my gaze. He worked his jaw before responding aloud. “Eventually. I want a life for us before we go creating new lives.”

“I agree,” I murmured. “We’ve only just started.”

He cradled the side of my face with his free hand and brushed my kiss-swollen lip with his thumb. “That’s right. From tonight until our end as stardust, we are bound. There’s plenty of time to make more p’nixies later. Much later.”

“And colts too. As handsome, strong, and blue as their father,” I added.

His ear flicked. “Stop saying such sweet things while you’re squeezing my knot, mate.”

I batted my lashes back at him. “Maybe you should let me off of you so we can eat something,” I suggested breathlessly. He hadn’t stopped playing with my clit ever so slowly, and my skin tightened with awareness.

“Hmm.” He flashed his fangs in a wicked smile. “Maybe later. For now, sit tight.” As he teased, he pressed my sensitive nub just right, and we came together again.