Page 28

Lilith

I gasp and sit up when I hear rustling outside the tent. “What the fuck was that?”

“Relax,” Kael says softly. “I’ll go check.”

He gets up and leaves the tent while Daemon and Callum make me lie back down. “Sorry,” I sigh. “I’m just on edge.”

“It’s okay. We understand,” Daemon says with a smile. “What can we do?”

“If I told you to fuck me, would that be weird?” I ask. Daemon pulls me on top of him. I giggle as I sit up and straddle him.

“Why would that be weird?” he asks.

“Uhm… Because I was raped like… Eight hours ago,” I say.

“Do you trust us?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“Then it’s not weird. We are your mates, and you are not expected to be a sobbing ball of trauma. You get to handle that however you want,” Daemon says.

“Well, I’d like to handle it with you three aggressively fucking me,” I say with a smile, and he chuckles.

“We are good. I think it was just an animal,” Kael says as he comes back in. “I do like this setup.” Kael leans down and kisses my neck. Before he can move away, I turn and pull him back to me. He kisses me deeply, cupping my face.

“Our sweet little witch is feeling a little needy,” Callum says as he sits up and kisses my neck. Daemon presses his thumbs into the bends of my hips, and I whimper.

“Please,” I say, breathlessly. “Please fuck me.”

I must have said the magic words because they pull my clothes and theirs off in record time. Daemon pulls me back on top of him, and Callum moves behind me. Kael covers my mouth with his hand as both men thrust into me with enough force to make me scream out into Kael’s hand. They are instantly unrelenting with their speed. I am stuck between a moan and a scream while they fuck me. My constant flood of orgasms keeps my body on edge as they pump into me.

Kael stands only to uncover my mouth and starts to throat-fuck me. To be completely filled by my men produces a feeling that nothing else can compete with. I feel absolutely invincible when they take me like this.

Callum groans and pushes deep at the same time as Kael does as they both come. I drink down Kael as Callum fills me all while I am mid-orgasm. When they pull away, Daemon rolls me to my belly and is over the top of me.

“Do you trust me?” he whispers in my ear.

“Yes,” I breathe.

“You’ll tell us when you can’t take it anymore, right, sweet witch?”

“Uh-huh,” I nod and whimper when his cocks press against me.

“I’m not going to be easy on you,” he warns.

“Please don’t,” I beg.

“Don’t what?” he asks

“Please don’t go easy,” I say in a quiet voice.

“Tell me what you want, Lilith,” he says softly.

“I want you to use me,” I say quietly.

“Say it again. Say it like you mean it.”

“I want you to use me. I want it hard and rough. I trust you, and I need you to take me,” I say, nearly begging now.

With no warning, Daemon covers my mouth and slams into me. I scream out of instinct, but it feels so fucking amazing when he starts fucking me harder and harder, pounding me into the ground. I stiffen and tremble through every orgasm that he pulls out of me. He is barbaric in the way he pushes in as deep as he can.

“Does my little witch like being fucked like a whore?” he grunts in my ear.

“Mmmm,” is all I can manage.

“Fuck, you’re so tight,” he growls. I whimper as an orgasm builds in my belly again. As I start to tense up again, he pinches my nose closed, and my body immediately panics even though I know he won’t hurt me. He thrusts harder and forces an almost violent orgasm out of me as I fight against his hold. Stars flood my vision suddenly with the lack of oxygen. Daemon growls and bites down on my neck as he releases me. I suck in a breath, and the feeling of oxygen rushing through my brain thrusts me back into an orgasm, and my arousal floods out of me while I scream into my hand.

Daemon pushes deep when he comes and then doesn’t move even after he pulls out, he doesn’t get up. He kisses down my back while I catch my breath.

“Dear Gods, that was amazing,” I pant. He chuckles and moves away.

“I thought for sure you were a goner,” Kael laughs. I lay there and let them clean me up as well as everything else we made a mess of.

Once we are dressed and ready to take on the day, we leave the tent. The party is just finishing up packing, and they don’t seem to be bothered that we just had what could only have been loud sex. I wonder if Leli had an extra enchantment placed on our tent to make it soundproof. I giggle at the thought.

I feel better this morning, oddly. Maybe it’s a post-sex high, or maybe I just feel more confident now that I can tap into my magia. Everyone starts in high spirits as we begin our trek to Midavor. After a few hours, as we get hungry and realize we have nothing else to eat, people are getting irritated.

“Let’s just stop here for a while,” I say. “Maybe try and fish in this river.”

“That’s a great idea,” Striker says with a sigh. We all stop on the riverbank and get out fishing poles and bait.

I try for almost an hour, but every time I get a bite, nothing hooks. No one else is having any luck, and it’s starting to get aggravating. I cast out the line, and it immediately gets caught on some brush across the river because I cast out too far.

“ Godsdammit ,” I growl. “I’m going to go somewhere else before I lose my fucking mind.” I throw my fishing rod down and storm off to sit by myself downstream. I am close enough so that everyone can see me but far enough that it’s silent. I lie back in the grass and close my eyes to enjoy the warm sun on my skin.

I have an irrational fear of vines coming out of nowhere and wrapping around me. I know that won’t happen, but my brain is trying to convince me otherwise. When I hear rustling nearby, I gasp and sit up, expecting there to be someone standing there in front of me. Instead, it’s a pile of fish.

“What the fuck?” I murmur.

“How in the hell did you do that?” Daemon asks as he walks over. “Where did you get the fish?”

“I….” I stare at the fish, not knowing what to say, shrugging. “I don’t know. I didn’t do that. I heard a noise, and suddenly there was a pile of fish.”

“What happened?” Striker asks.

“Magic fish, I think,” Daemon says. Striker comes over and inspects the pile; he holds his hand out as if trying to get a read on the fish.

“I don’t detect any poison or anything,” he says.

“I wonder if it has to do with the noises we keep hearing,” I say.

“I don’t know. We are near Heartless Loch,” Daemon says, as if I should know what that even means.

Daemon and Striker call some of the others over to help move the fish to the camp while I start a fire so we can cook. Maybe we should be a little bit more cautious about eating random fish that show up, but I get a feeling that no harm will come from this. So far, my gut instinct has always been right. There are exactly thirty large fish for thirty hungry people. No one questions where it came from, luckily. I don’t have an answer for them on why I think it’s harmless.

As we are eating, I hear more scurrying noises and animal chittering in the brush behind where I am sitting with the guys. “Am I insane, or does it seem like we are being followed?” I ask.

“Yeah, I think we are being followed. Whoever it is seems shy. I don’t think they’re a threat, though,” Kael says as he eats.

“We should get back on the road,” I say as I stand up. “I’d like to get to the ranger station as soon as possible to stock up on supplies.”

Everyone seems to be in better spirits as we pack up and continue our hike on the trail. Vash begins humming low, as Daemon joins in. “ O’er verdant mountains we fly, their beauty fills my soul… ” His voice is low and gritty as he sings. “ How I long to meet my maiden with her onyx hair and a heart of gold. ” He glances down at me with a smile “An old draconic song,” He explains as we continue down our path. Birds are chirping in the trees. The land is lush and filled with greenery. I feel at peace as the sunbeams shoot through the trees, despite knowing what we are coming up against. Occasionally, I will hear rustling deep in the woods, but when I try to see further in, I don’t see anything.

We are only a few miles from the ranger station when a dense fog begins to creep along the forest floor. We continue to press on until the fog envelops our entire body, hanging heavy and thick in the air. “Let’s stop guys,” I say sluggishly. “We’ve been walking all day anyhow. Let’s get some rest, and we can worry about getting to the station in the morning.”

“I’m exhausted,” Leli yawns.

“Me too. Let’s just hurry up and get the tents set up,” I say as we move off into a small clearing. The fog is still heavy here, but at least we can see enough to get the tents up. I crawl in ours and collapse between Daemon and Kael.

“I feel weird,” Daemon slurs.

“Mmm,” I manage. I realize my body isn’t responding. I try to roll to snuggle up to Daemon, but I realize I can’t move. “Something is wrong,” I choke out. My eyes are responsive, but the rest of my body feels cold and heavy. My hands are lazily lying in Daemon’s and Kael’s.

“ Something is wrong, ” I repeat through the mind link

“ Where did that fog come from? I can’t move,” Kael says. My heart starts to race, and my breathing shallows. I am quickly starting to panic, and the guys are in my head trying to calm me down. A sob is stuck in my throat when we start hearing cackling around the tent. I am desperately trying to keep myself calm, but I can’t stop picturing that man on top of me. I squeeze my eyes shut as I remember the pain as if he is still pounding into me with anger and malice in place of what should be compassion.

I hear the zipper to the tent slowly open before a man saunters in with a hunting knife. He grins at me when he sees that I can’t move and I am crying. Panic floods through my body. I can’t make it stop.

“ He’s going to hurt me ,” I say sadly through our mind link.

“ You’ve got this, baby. Just relax and don’t react, ” Callum says. I know he’s just trying to make me feel better, but we both know it’s not true. They’re going to kill me the moment they get a chance.

“Well, well, well,” the man says as he kneels at my feet. I notice he has gloves, a jacket, and black pants on. Most of his skin is covered, which means he knows what I did to the man yesterday.

“Seems like our little High Witch does have some power after all,” he says as he pulls my shorts and underwear off of me. “Lucky for me, I don’t have to stick my dick in you to enjoy this tight little pussy.” He pushes my feet back, and it forces my knees to come up and then fall open, spreading me open for him to see.

“Mmm. What a beautiful sight, Your Majesty ,” he mocks. “Shall I have a taste?”

“ What the fuck did he just say? ” I say to the guys.

“ He’s trying to humiliate you. Just relax. There are thirty people here. Someone will come help us, ” Callum says calmly.

The man drags his knife along the inside crease of my thigh, and I close my eyes. I slow my breathing and just listen to the guys talk to me. “ You’re doing amazing, Lilith. We will be okay, ” Daemon says.

“ Just breathe ,” Kael encourages me. I think they are trying to keep me from accidentally blowing myself up like yesterday.

The man bites the inside of my thigh, and I groan in pain when I feel his brown, jagged teeth sink into my flesh. I take long, deep breaths and brace for him to bite me again. When he takes one long lick across my clit, it takes me by surprise, and I groan again. The feeling makes me queasy as he keeps doing it, getting more and more precise with every drag across me that he makes.

“Sweet as honey, High Witch,” he says. “How would your mates like to see you come for a better man?”

Tears stream down my cheeks as I try in vain to move. No one is coming to save me. I’m too close to the guys to try to burn this guy. I don’t know how to be that specific with my spells, so I could just end up killing Daemon and Kael if I try. The man groans against me as he sucks hard, making my body shake. I can feel the pressure building in my belly, and I am desperately trying to push it down before it turns into something I don’t want. I try to hold my breath through the sickly surges of feigned pleasure, but that only makes my moans and whimpers louder when I take a breath.

“ I want it to stop. Please, make it stop,” I beg them, even though I know they can’t help me. The only thing I can focus on is the pressure combined with the sucking and slurping sounds that this freak is making. It’s ringing through my brain so loudly that it’s suffocating every logical thought. Behind all of these overwhelmingly disgusting feelings is a wave of paranoia that is trying to convince me that somehow, my mates will be angry with me. They will hate me because another man made me come.

“Lilith. Breathe, baby,” Kael says.

“I’m trying not to. I’m trying. Please don’t be mad. I don’t want this,” I plead.

“ No one is mad, Lilith. Okay? Just breathe,” Callum says. My thighs tremble and my stomach does a flip when he nips at my now extremely sensitive clit. He’s kept me right on the edge of a cliff, and it physically pains me to have my body reacting the way it is. It may appear as pleasure, but it’s the furthest and sickest possible feeling from it.

“ I can’t,” I whimper. “ I don’t want to lose you guys.”

“Lilith Deverell,” Daemon barks at me through our mindlink. “ We are your mates. We aren’t going anywhere. Now, you need to relax, or he’s not going to stop . Relax, baby. We are right here. You are doing good, but you need to relax before he hurts you out of frustration. ”

I force myself to take a deep breath as my mates provide me with a constant stream of praise and encouragement. I know he isn’t going to stop until he gets what he wants. As the minutes tick by, he is getting more and more aggressive. I focus on just their words and force myself into a place mentally where I can relax and let him take what he wants from me. An unwilling moan pours out of me, and my muscles act on their own accord. I tense when a climax punches through me. He doesn’t stop viciously sucking and nipping at me. I am overstimulated and hypersensitive, but he still won’t stop. Wave after wave crashes over me, and my stomach muscles ache from how tense my body is. Nothing about this feels good.

He finally unlatches himself from me, and my body relaxes. When he produces a knife and slowly cuts my shirt open while making eye contact with me. I whimper as fear floods me. I close my eyes, so I don’t see what he’s about to do to me, but he presses the point of the knife into my jugular.

“Look. At. Me,” he growls. I slowly open my eyes, and I can’t stop the tears from flowing. For all I know, everyone is dead already. “You are weak. Worthless. They call you the High Witch, but you are nothing more than a bottom feeder. Your place in this world is on your knees servicing your master, not on a throne meant for the worthy. Zypher is a fool to think he is worthy of that throne either. Only pure witches are worthy. Our coven has fought for centuries to take our rightful spot as leaders of this land, and now your time has come to be dethroned.” He leans over as he licks the trail the tears have left behind, tasting my tears.

The man pushes the knife onto my chest and slowly drags the blade down my abdomen. I scream through gritted teeth as the pain sears through me. My mates are no longer giving me words of encouragement. They are telling me to burn him, but it would hurt them too. I am not killing them just to survive alone. Living without them would be worse than death.

The man waves his hand over my face, and I scream out as I am suddenly able to move my face. He makes cuts across my breasts and stomach while I scream in agony. Each cut is deeper than the last, and I can feel the warmth of my blood on my skin as it trails down my sides. I can hear the cries of my mates as emotion overwhelms them.

“Please stop,” I plead.

“Then your mates will die,” he growls at me.

“ No !” I yell at him.

“Then beg for death, demon-spawn ,” he snarls.

“Please, don’t kill them. Please just kill me,” I beg. I won’t let them die for me. I know that will upset them, but I won’t do it. I won’t choose my survival over theirs.

“Then to hell you shall go, devil-touched harlot,” he says as he plunges the knife into my stomach. I grunt as the pain ripples through me. He twists the knife and digs in deeper before yanking it out. The immense pain forces a guttural groan from me. My vision is filled with dancing stars as I lie here bleeding out. Based on the cries and whimpers of my mates, they feel my pain.

This is it. My time has come. Somehow, I always knew that my death would be agonizing. I never deserved to be loved. Somewhere beneath all the pain is pure tranquility. It feels like a warm ray of sunshine beaming down on me while I’m lying in a field of wildflowers. My vision begins to blur at the edges as the voices of my mates begging me to fight fade away.

I can feel myself separating from my body until I am floating, looking down at the chaotic scene below. I am covered in blood as I lay lifeless between my mates. They are still but sobbing. Tears flow freely from them, and my heart breaks for them. I can’t imagine what it is like to feel your mate die. Despite seeing them fall apart, I feel, oddly, at peace. I have spent my entire life in pain; it doesn’t matter if I realized it or not. At least now I can move on and live my life free from my abusers. Zypher Fallins has no place in my peace. He can’t hurt me here. Not anymore. Really, this is a fitting end.

“Lilith,” I hear a voice say. I turn and see a familiar face smiling at me.

“Mom,” I say happily as she wraps her arms around me. “You’re here.”

“I am, sweetie, but you shouldn’t be,” she says softly, cupping my face.

“No one can save me,” I say. “My mates… they can’t save me.”

“You have to fight, Lilith. The world is counting on you,” she says. “Your mates are counting on you.”

“I don’t want to fight,” I admit. “Every time I fight, someone always hurts me. I’m just so tired of getting hurt.” Hot tears sting my eyes, but she wipes them away as they slide down my cheeks.

“I know, baby. I wish I were there with you to help you fight these battles,” she says. “You are stronger than you know. You will overcome this pain. You have your mother’s courage and your father’s determination coursing through you.”

“And out of me,” I say, motioning to my still-bleeding body. Everything is moving slowly as I talk to my mom. As if time is standing still for this moment.

“You will survive this, my dear,” she smiles. “You just have to fight.”

“I don’t want to leave you,” I whimper. “I just want my mom.”

“I’m always with you, Lilith. Every warm ray of sunshine that you feel is me. Every cool breeze of wind on a hot summer day is me. No matter where you go or what you do, I will always be with you. I will always be waiting for you to come back to me, but right now is not your time. You are not meant to be here, Lilith.”

“I love you so much,” I cry. She wraps me in a hug and holds me tightly.

“I love you too, Lilith. You have no idea how proud I am of you. Don’t ever forget that, okay?”

“Okay,” I sniffle as I pull back from her.

“You have to go back now. Okay?”

“Dad misses you,” I say, stalling. “They all do.”

“I know they do. Your father talks to me at night, as if praying to me,” she says with a smile. “Your brothers act tough, but I know they are just as depressed sometimes. Tell them that I love them. Leli too. We will all be together again one day, but not right now. You need to go now, Lilith.” Her smile is sad, as cups my cheek. “Remember, Lilith, you are the storm.”

“I am the storm,” I repeat softly as I nod.

I turn to look down at the chaos unfolding, and I’m pulled back into my body. My eyes flutter open to see a shadow rush into the tent with us. It quickly overtakes the witch by latching onto his head and shaking him until he goes limp.

Either I’ve lost too much blood or a giant otter with black and brown scales just broke a grown man’s neck. I gasp when it bounces over to me. It chitters and chirps as it happily licks me all over. I am in complete shock at whatever the hell this thing is doing, but when the pain starts to fade away, I realize that it’s healing me.

It moves away from me and curiously sniffs my mates before going over to the now-dead witch. I start to regain movement in my limbs. I slowly sit up to see this dork of an animal flop down and kick at the dead body with its hind legs a few times. When the guys sit up it simply glances at us before chewing on the body of the witch.

“What the fuck is that?” Kael asks quietly.

“It looks like an oversized otter pup,” I say, smiling at it as it eats its newfound meal.

It suddenly clicks with them that I was just stabbed. Daemon snaps his head to me and starts trying to inspect my body and where all of the blood on me should be coming from. “Where are you bleeding from?” he asks frantically.

“I’m fine,” I say. “I’m okay. I’m not bleeding.”

“Lilith! He stabbed you,” Callum says as he moves closer to me, not believing that I’m okay.

“I think he healed me,” I say. “He like… slobbered on me, and the pain went away. Now I’m just bloody and covered in puppy slobber.”

“That is not a puppy,” Daemon says. We all look over to see that he is purring and chewing on the now mangled corpse. “It has scales.”

“It’s a puppy,” I say as I move over to sit closer to it.

“Are you insane?” Kael asks as he grabs my arm.

“Oh, stop it,” I say as I pull away from him. “He just broke a guy’s neck, healed me, and is now eating said guy. Call me crazy, but I don’t think he wants to hurt me.”

“Is everything okay?” Dad asks as he runs into the tent. “We heard… Woah.” He stops as he sees the creature, then looks at me while I pet it.

“What is that?” Leli asks as she comes in. “Why are you covered in blood?”

“Were you guys not able to move?” I ask as I grab a shirt from my bag before pulling it on.

“Yeah. It’s like we were paralyzed,” she says. “Can you please tell me what’s going on?”

“Some witch came in here when we couldn’t move,” I say, focusing all of my attention on the creature beside me.

“Are you okay?” Daemon asks, moving closer to me. I see Striker and Vash are now in the tent with us, but I go back to petting my new friend.

“No,” I admit. “Just tell them.”

Daemon goes through everything and explains what happened with the witch. He hides the details that I would never be able to say out loud but leaves out the part where I was terrified that they would suddenly hate me for what he forced me to do. I know that will be a conversation later, but I understand why. I doubted their loyalty to me.

“But you’re okay now?” Dad asks, kneeling down to pet the creature. He has completely devoured the witch and is lying on his back as I rub his belly.

“Yeah. Whatever he did to me healed me,” I say.

“He’s a Suthul,” Dad says. “They were thought to be extinct, but this little guy proves otherwise.”

“Little?” Callum chokes out. “It’s as big as Lilith.”

“Yeah, He’s not fully grown,” Dad says. “His saliva has a healing effect on demons, so since you’re half succubus, he was able to heal you.”

“I think I’m going to call him Thuly,” I say with a smile. He rolls slightly before reaching out to grab onto my hand, holding it in his paw.

“Looks like it imprinted on you,” Dad chuckles. “Congrats, Mom.”

“He’s such a cutie,” I say, still rubbing the soft fur on his belly.

“He just ate a person,” Striker says, shocked.

“I wonder….” Daemon starts.

“What?” I ask. Callum and Kael laugh and move over to sit with me.

“So… That guard that assaulted you,” Daemon says.

“Yeah?”

“We may have… fed him to what we thought was a lake monster,” he says. “We didn’t start hearing those noises until we got near the lake.”

“He could have sensed that you were close and came out to investigate,” Dad says.

“Then all of the random fish that showed up earlier,” I laugh.

“That thing got the fish?” Striker asks.

“His name is Thuly,” I frown at him.

“God… You are just like Mom. She would have put a sweater on the thing already,” Striker says as he kneels beside Dad to pet Thuly.

“About that,” I say slowly. “When he stabbed me, and I was dying… I saw Mom.”

“You did?” Dad asks.

“Yeah. She basically told me that she’s always here and she’s waiting for me, but I wasn’t meant to die. I needed to fight. When I agreed to fight, she disappeared, and I woke up,” I explain. “She told me that you talk to her at night.”

His eyes well up with tears, so I know that it was actually Mom and not blood loss. “Yeah,” he says softly.

“She told me to tell everyone that she loves you and specified Leli as well,” I say.

“I wish I could remember her,” Leli says as she and Vash finally come closer. Dad puts his arm around Leli and hugs her.

“She seems happy,” I say. “When I lost consciousness, it felt peaceful. I think Mom is at peace too.”

“I hope so,” Striker says, sighing.

“Enough sadness,” I say. “I don’t think camping here for the night is a good idea,” I say.

“I agree,” Dad says. “It’s dark, but we should at least move a mile or two and set up again.”

“We should try to find some food, and soon,” I say. “Also, we should figure out what Thuly eats.”

“People,” Striker says.

“Well, besides people,” I laugh. “Dad, can you update everyone? Just… Leave out what they don’t need to know.”

“Okay,” he says with a smile. “I’m glad you’re okay, Lilith.”

“I’m glad the murderous otter was nearby,” Striker says.

“Be nice to your nephew,” I say with a smile.

“You’re insane, little sister,” he jokes as he stands up.

We are determined to move camp and pack up before we start walking again. Thuly stays by my side for the entire two-mile walk. Sometimes he moves away when one of the guys is beside me, then he walks in front of me as if he is keeping watch as we walk.

Once we find a suitable place to set up, we unload and get the tents back out. When we go to lay back down, Thuly purrs and curls up at my feet and falls asleep.