Page 25

When I reached up to clasp Garroway’s waiting palm, all the dizzying weight of my thoughts, my wounds, caught up to me. I passed out.

I awoke in a lavish bedroom with a high ceiling, lying on the softest mattress of my life, practically sucking my body into clouds. A translucent veil hung from the elegant posts of the bed, hiding me from outsiders.

On the other side of the veil stood a shadow.

I sat up and abruptly coughed from shock, wincing in pain at the various wounds across my body—two in the arms, one in the meaty front of my thigh, and the deepest one just under my ribs. They rang out simultaneously, burning and making me inhale sharply.

The veil flipped aside and Master Lukain showed his face. “Sephania. You’re awake.”

His hand touched my arm, which I noticed was bare. My eyes trailed down my body and . . . shit, most of me was bare. My top had been peeled away to get to my side, where the wound was bandaged. My arms were wrapped up, and even my thigh . . . I had no pants on.

Only a thin shift covered my most vulnerable parts, hiding my hips, the lowest part of my belly, and the juncture between my thighs.

Lukain’s hand was surprisingly soft for how violent of a man I knew him to be, and how often he wielded a weapon. I expected callused ridges, yet my body melted when he skimmed his fingers over my wrist.

He shot me a small smile. “I’m glad you’re feeling better.” My grayskin master gently pushed on my arm to make me recline fully into the mountain of pillows. “Rest.”

“I . . . I don’t feel like resting.”

His eyes flared when I said the words—dark pools of crimson matched my own dark orbs. I choked past something in my throat and cleared it.

My breathing came shallow. From his touch, my nipples shamefully pebbled.

The ache between my thighs began. I was keenly aware how this man who had practically raised me through my adolescent years—molding me into a fighter, a survivor—was fully dressed in his black leathers, while I lay before him pale and practically naked.

The sight of his sinfully attractive face looming over me like a sharp blade stole my thoughts. For a moment, I was dumbstruck.

Then the recent memories flooded me and I blinked wildly to break eye contact with him. “J-Jinneth.”

He nodded deeply, perching on the edge of the bed in a way that sidled his ass against my leg and nearly made me shiver from our closeness. “She has been chosen, little grimmer.”

“Chosen?” I eked out, the hope draining from my voice and eyes.

“Demilord Tymon Aldion, the man whose lap she sat upon, has picked Jinneth to be his broodstock. His human mistress and concubine.” He frowned. “You will not see her again.”

My heart snapped in two. “Just like that?”

“I’m afraid so.” He put his hand on my shoulder, eliciting the same torrid response as before no matter how hard I tried to fight it down. His palm ghosted my skin in a gentle petting motion. “She always knew what she was getting into, Sephania.”

I snarled, “Not that you gave her any choice.”

“Jinneth will want for nothing,” he replied. “She is in a good place.”

“Yes, a good place pumping out half-vampire whelps for those monsters in the ballroom!”

Pain lanced through me at my outburst.

Lukain’s face softened. It was the softest I’d ever seen it. I hadn’t known he was capable of such a pitying expression, which only made me angrier.

It wasn’t Master Lukain I was angry at. Unfairly, it was Jinneth. For killing Aelin, for stopping the duel . . . For leaving me. Like everyone else. Why couldn’t you just let Aelin have him! We’d be on our way back to the Firehold by now!

The heavy guilt and truth flared alive a second later. No. We wouldn’t be headed home. I would be dead.

I gulped past a lump in my throat. My attention turned from my lost friend to the man sitting next to me. His body heat was a tidal wave I couldn’t resist.

“Garroway?” I asked. “The half-blood I fought.”

Lukain’s brow threaded. “What of him? He left.”

“Helget? And Lord Ashfen? I saw him—”

“Also left. The party is over, little grimmer. You needn’t worry.” He petted me more, trying to calm me. “Rirth is fine, Kemini is not, and soon we will head home. Only Jinneth was chosen out of the five girls. It’s a good thing she’s gone, too. I don’t take kindly to people murdering my property.”

“She did it for me.”

“I know.”

He smiled then, tilting his head. Our eyes locked and I felt the connection form between us—a connection that shifted my worldview.

I was a young woman who had seen nineteen summers. Nearly a third of them had been spent in this slaver’s underground home. He had fed me, whittled me into a weapon, and taught me to defend myself from the horrors of this world.

“Sephania.” Lukain’s voice was soft, almost as soft as his touch. It had a needful note to it. “Before departing, Skartovius Ashfen showed interest in choosing you as broodstock.”

“Master Lukain . . .” I croaked.

He dipped his head closer. “I denied him. Said you weren’t an option.

He offered a great sum of money, power in his court.

But you’re a fighter, not a breeding mare.

And you’re mine.” Closer still he leaned, until our lips were mere inches apart.

His eyes skimmed over my face, taking in every inch. “You are beautiful, you know.”

“I never thought so.”

“I know so. I see it every day. I have for years.”

My lips opened but no words came out.

Master Lukain gently pressed his lips against mine. My eyes closed when he kissed me, a content hum escaping me and seeping into his waiting mouth. His tongue lightly batted against mine as our lips parted and the kiss became fervent and needy much quicker than I had anticipated.

Then again, I could have never anticipated falling for my half-vampire slavemaster. The kind of man Father Cullard had warned me about as a child, when it was actually the Father himself I should have feared.

My thoughts drifted away as I pressed the kiss deeper.

I wrapped my arms around his narrow middle, tightening against him until my peaked breasts pushed against his chest. The coldness of his leather garb brought much-needed friction that made me wet between the legs. A muffled moan rumbled out of me.

He sucked up my sounds, my touch, and dominated me with his graceful embrace, his darting tongue, and his firm hold on my body, lifting me into an upright position in the bed.

He kissed me harder until my lips felt bruised. Then he pulled back with a look of regret. “Your wounds.”

“Can’t feel them,” I answered, shooting him a half-lidded smile.

“Even so. I could get Old Endolf to concoct something to heal them once we’re home. But . . .”

“But what, Master?”

“. . . Nothing will heal your injuries faster than the blood of a vampire. Even a half-breed like me.”

My body tightened. His eyes moved from my face to his wrist, where his hand cupped the back of my head. “Not if you don’t wish—”

“Yes,” I answered before he could finish. “I do.”

His smile flickered. “That’s a good girl.”

The words, the idea, the notion of drinking from Master Lukain, it was everything I desired. Everything I needed. I didn’t even care if he was lying to me—if half-vampire blood did nothing to heal my wounds. That wasn’t the point. I wanted to be part of him.

He put his wrist to his mouth, hiding his lips and fangs behind his flesh. His eyes never left mine, the dark pools flaring brighter as the sound of splitting flesh filled the space between us.

“Drink, little grimmer,” he muttered, and then moved his wrist to my face. Beads of ruby-red dripped down his forearm.

I slanted my head and suctioned my lips to his cut, closing my eyes as the iron taste of his warm blood slipped past my tongue and down my throat like blessed nectar.

My world became dim then, hazy, lost in the throes of lust pulsing between my legs and in the slick warmth in my mouth. I felt nothing like healing at first—no thoughts of my injuries at all.

Only a ravenous hunger for more .

He pulled back before I could lose myself completely. I shamefully nipped at him, head darting forward.

Lukain chuckled, watching as blood trickled down my chin. He wiped the streak away with the pad of his thumb, licking himself clean. He resituated himself on the edge of the bed to have a more frontward position with me.

I noticed the throbbing between his legs. It looked painful behind his leathers, constrained like that, and my heart was greedy for this man. I was not in my right mind.

My hand found its way between his legs to press against the thickening bulge. “I want you, Master.”

“That’s good, little grimmer. Because I am going to take you.”

“I’m begging you to, sir.”

My hand dipped inside the waistband of his pants. I clutched his warm, thick cock in my hand. It was scalding and—

He clutched my wrist to stop me before I could begin stroking. When I made a confused face, he stood and threw his pants and shirt off, until he stood strong and naked and beautiful.

Lukain’s cock was a thick, powerful weapon that throbbed in front of me, dripping his arousal. I would never again believe vampires didn’t pump blood through their veins, because this was all the evidence I needed.

I gawked for a moment.

He crawled over me. “I will be gentle,” he promised.

“I don’t want you to be.”

“Your wounds.” His voice was a caress against my ear as he kissed me.

“I can handle it. You taught me to handle pain, Master. I’m more concerned about having something so big inside—”

“I will make sure you are only filled with pleasure, little grimmer.” His smile was wicked again, his voice raspy and low.

I nodded diligently and reclined in the bed until the pillows surrounded me in a heap of softness.

Lukain’s hard body scooped over mine, arms framing my head.

His girth rubbed over the swell of my belly, lost for a moment in my curves before pressing dangerously against my heated flesh between my legs.

I wrapped my arms around his neck. “I don’t care if it hurts, sir,” I whispered. “I want you to fuck my little pussy until I can’t see straight. It’s what I’ve always—”

He surged inside me with a low growl.

“—wanted!”

My body tensed, muscles clamping around the thick shaft plunging inside my depths. Lukain grunted as precious inches sank deeper inside me, pushing past my resistance.

I moaned loudly, wrapping my legs around his narrow waist, heels falling on his taut ass. My heels bounced on his rear as he thrust deeper, pushing against my curves and sinking down to kiss me at the same time.

My eyes rolled behind my lids. The gashes of my cuts reopened and seeped through my bandages. He sucked in a harsh breath, growing more animalistic as the scent of me drove him wild and drove him harder inside me.

Master Lukain took me like he had been waiting years for it. Now I knew he had. All those shirtless training sessions, those quick looks, those smoldering words that could be misconstrued . . .

This had always been his desire. He had hidden it when I was younger, patiently waiting. And now I was his. No, he was—

“ Mine ,” I whispered in his ear, spurring him on to fuck me harder, deeper, until his cock hilted inside me.

“Give me your blood, Sephania,” he rasped, bucking his hips.

My large breasts swung, and he put a hand to my chest to hold them steady—to keep my curves from running wild beyond his control.

“My . . . blood?” I eked out. Our sweat mingled. Confusion found a home on my brow.

He smiled wickedly down at me. “It will enhance the pleasure.”

Oh. Fuck. I nodded dumbly. “Then take it. Fuck me True, take anything !”

This was nothing like Dimmon Plank. The fact that despicable cretin of a man even vaguely passed through my mind was an affront to the sheer blissfulness Lukain Pierken was giving me with every hard thrust of his hips.

The clapping of our flesh echoed through the room. I let out another moan as the tension at the base of my belly tightened and roared and prepared to explode.

He bent lower to glide his fangs over my supple neck. “There will be no pain,” he promised.

I nodded eagerly, hugging my arms around his neck even tighter. One hand grabbed his hair, forcing his face down against my neck—trying to take some measure of control. A quick pinprick skimmed across the vein in my throat—

And then pure euphoria ignited. My blood prickled with something new, something deep and ancient. He drank loudly, his mouth a vacuum on my neck. My blood was singing for release.

My body tensed, trembled, and dizziness washed over me as I came with a cry, curling my toes against his ass while I embraced him deeper inside me.

The sensation of Lukain drinking my blood and fucking the thoughts from my head was too much to handle. I rose up and met his thrusts, shaking and slamming my wide wobbling ass against his hips until I forced him into a kneeling position and pushed harder against him.

His face pulled back from my needy lunge, my whimpering voice. He grunted, gripping under me to grab handfuls of my ass and slam me on his lap.

I didn’t know what I was doing, I was inexperienced, but the throbbing of his big cock inside me, filling me, showed me I was doing something right.

I wailed, ready for another orgasm, encircling my thick legs around his torso and squeezing—

And Lukain froze.

My eyes shot open. A strange expression passed over his beautiful features. It was close to confusion, or distaste, as my blood trickled past his wet lips, down his chin.

“M-Master?” I stammered.

“ Nngh ,” he let out, but it was not a sound of his own orgasm. It was a grunt of . . . something else. He shook his head, blinking his eyes rapidly, and then smiled at me, regaining his wits. “Apologies, little grimmer.”

“Are you all right?”

“Just high from your essence. Where were we?”

I smiled at him.

He slammed into me again, humming at the way my curves jiggled on his lap. His hands curled around my back and he brought me up so I could properly ride him.

“Fuck, you feel so perfect, Sephania. I wish we could do this forever.” His voice was heated, rasping for release.

I nodded, unable to use my words as the pure pleasure of his cock drilling inside me made everything else go blank. I dug my forehead into the crook of his shoulder.

We lost ourselves together the next time I planted my ass on his lap, in a surge of curses and moans that changed my life forever.

Because I knew what I needed now . . . even more than freedom.