Page 18 of Mated to the Monster God

ESME

W e take shelter under the broken grandeur of the satellite dish, its rusted arcs forming a cathedral of fallen dreams above us.

The curved ribs of metal overhead catch the rain in melodic drips, each drop a slow heartbeat against the cavern’s ceiling.

The air is thick with ozone, earthiness, and the volatile whisper of spent adrenaline.

Every sound—lick of water, scrabble of boots, distant thunder—feels amplified, as if recorded in a theater of bone and sky.

I settle into the nest of Sagax’s arms, anchored, alive.

Rainwater beads in rivulets across my jacket, soaking into skin, chilling me.

Yet I’m warm, centered, held together not by shelter or steel, but by this creature beside me.

His scent swells in the cold air—resin, rain, something unmistakably him.

My pulse slows; mine no longer races with fear, but hums with the steadfast rhythm of rescue and connection.

Sagax’s gaze remains fixed on me—molten gold shimmering with what I always feared I might not earn again: devotion, wonder, something brazen and unashamed. He watches with hunger tempered by tenderness, and my breath catches in my throat at the unspoken promise in those eyes.

I wander away from the edge of the dish’s curved wall, letting my fingers brush over its cold, dented surface—memory of human architects and broken signals. The metal hums, echoing with whispers of past transmissions, a reminder that hope is fragile but persistent.

He shifts, bringing me closer. My cheek rests against his scaled shoulder. Rain threads through moss and metal overhead. Earth breathes under me. Sagax’s heartbeat vibrates through the center of my back, steady and reverent.

I nudge free enough to turn and face him, chest heaving with very real emotion. The world around us has not calmed—but inside me, something is forging a new pulse.

“Sagax…” My voice breaks, trembles. It’s not a question—but an offering. A reckoning. Everything between us used to be danger or devotion born from chaos. Now it’s a deliberate choice.

His jaw relaxes. “Yes,” he echoes softly.

I press my hand to the curve of his neck, feeling the flow beneath his scales—strength and warmth and promise. “Take me again,” I murmur. Voice nearly swallowed by rain, by nerves, by everything.

He tilts his head, rain dripping into his ear. Eyes searching mine—no question there, only awareness.

When he leans in, the kiss is not quiet. It’s a scream of everything I’ve felt and everything I hoped could be real. Rain mingles with the taste of earth and my own need. His arms encircle me, fangs and bones trembling with careful fervor.

As tongues brush, thunder rattles the dish overhead. Our lips meld with something pure—not escape, not solace, but defiant, intimate choosing. I press closer, all questions drowning in the fire of contact, the joining of breath, skin, and soul.

His wings, ghost impressions beneath his scales, flutter gently—thrumming, uncontrolled sensation that wraps around my heart.

We break and I lean into the crook of his neck—the faintly mechanical hum of his spine grounding me. My voice is a shudder: “Not because I need comfort… but because I choose you.”

He presses his lips to the curve of my forehead—soft, belonging, a promise carved into bone. “And I choose you,” he replies, voice hot and earnest.

I slide forward, sliding into his arms again—not fragility, but ease, trust. Every tremor in my body is a testament. Our rhythms align. The world is distant—smoke and rain echoing on the metal cathedral above—but here, we exist in the present, melting the ruins of fear into foundation.

Rain drips off the dish's edge, and we feel it on our faces, tongues, eyelashes. It’s baptism and reclamation. I taste salt and rain and relief.

I part my lips, voice low: “Again?”

He pauses—those golden eyes darken and widen. Then he presses his mouth to mine, answering not with words, but with the press of lips, the rising arc of breath.

I melt into the moment, riding the pulse of desire and safety and the promise of what comes next.

Inside the stone womb of that broken dish, we reignite—fire tempered by rain, bound in blood and vows—and our souls rise.

I’m hyper-aware of every breath between us, he and I, as he lowers me onto the rough, rain-cold stones beneath the collapsed satellite dish’s metallic ribcage.

The fractured moonlight illuminates curves of moss and rust, casting us in a halo of shadow and silver.

Sagax’s body presses against mine, heat radiating through soaked clothes.

Between us is the ache of redemption, of fear turned torchlight.

I breathe in the tang of his sweat—earth and spine—and my heart reverberates against the cage of my chest, echoing over what we’ve survived. My pulse isn’t trembling; it’s roaring loud, incandescent with fierce, fragile trust.

We don’t rush. Not this time.

He kisses me—slow, deliberate as sculpting—like wishes carved from bone and blood. His lips taste of mineral and rain, tempered by months of hunger turned devotion. I wrap my arms around his neck, fingers threading through damp gold and shadow, and I can’t stop the spark that leaps between us.

His hands are careful at first— featherlight on sorrow-slick skin. He traces the ridges of my collarbone as though charting constellations in my flesh. Every contact illuminates firing galaxies beneath my ribs.

A thunderclap breaks the hush, but our storm centers in each other. My nails ache as he dips them into my thighs, claws pressing into muscle with pressure that’s agony and ecstasy in one electric curve. I gasp: pain, but happier than I’ve ever felt.

Stars blossom behind my eyelids—supernovae twisting behind the wet glaze of vision. Each brush of his hand is a planet born anew, orbiting my center.

He speaks—voice low and made of gold-and-shadow thunder. “You are mine.”

The phrase shatters something buried inside me. I’m trembling, breath shallow with need and disbelief.

I reach up, fingertips tracing the line of his jaw. His scales glitter in the moonlight, cold and holy. “I always was,” I whisper, voice the ground breaking open.

He surges again, calm violence in purpose. His hands mold me, perfect contours, creatures settling into familiar shapes. Every part of me inflames—my skin, my nerve-endings, my bones—until I feel unmade and reshaped into something more honest, more vulnerable than I’ve ever dared.

The pressure of his body sliding into mine ignites that ancient recognition: home is not place—it’s him. I cradle him from inside, arms like stone, breath tethered to his. Moonlight flickers in the empty dish above, painting us in silver.

My heartbeat throttles. I taste fear—real, justified—but also overwhelming rapture. Trust, thought to be fragile, is now carved into me with every pound of breath, every slick brush of skin against skin.

I bite my lip at the fervor of possession—not rough, but sacred. He doesn’t seize me—he chooses me, ravages me with reverence.

The stars ricochet behind my eyelids again. I feel the wetness in my hair, in the ground beneath me, and the insistent friction of skin. It’s thunder and glass shards, cocoon and flame, all swirled into the same pain-pleasure paradox.

He groans my name like a vow. I feel him cradle me tighter. My reply is breathless: “Sagax…”

He holds fast, closing circles around me. “I’m not letting go.”

“I never left—even when I thought I had to.”

He nibbles along the nape of my neck, his claws firm on my thighs. It’s reverent violence. I’m alight with euphoria. Every cell is singing.

A hush blooms in my bones. Then I rise until we’re pressed face to face—rain-slick, heart naked. Our lips part breaths wide. “You’re everything,” I mumble, trembling on lips and walls.

He murmurs against mine, voice thick: “And you—are mine.”

It’s not sex. It’s a pact. A fusion of flesh and soul. A surrender even fiercer than combat.

Lightning flashes through the broken metal above. We shudder as one.

I gasp again, wet and wild. “Forever?”

He stands taller, body anchoring me. “Always.”

My legs vanish under his strength. I wrap around him, voice thin but certain: “I always was.”

Rain has softened into silver threads through the cracked canopy above the satellite dish’s wreckage.

The world beyond feels distant—cracked battlefield, jagged machines, terror and blood.

But here, in this broken metal cradle, everything that matters is slow, quiet: his breath, my heartbeat, the drumming of rain against rusty steel.

Sagax and I lie side by side on dried moss and rain-washed stones, cocooned in the hollowed arc of that fallen dish. My spine curves into him, his tail curls around my legs in a protective loop that vibrates with warmth and promise.

I trace lazy patterns on his chest, each fingertip feeling the ridges of his scales—the map of all the places he’s held himself together for me. He doesn’t pull away; he leans into the touch with a gentle hum.

We drift hours in and out of silence, broken only by raindrops and murmured words.

“What will we do?” I ask soft, each syllable a drift of breath. I mean the colony, the war, the relentless Baragon. But what I’m really asking is: what happens to us when it’s done?

He exhales, soft as thunder. “Not even the Combine would reach this place.”

I smile despite the tremor in my chest. “Thank you,” I whisper.

“It’s more than survival,” he says, voice low and resonant in the damp hush. “You deserve more than running.”

I taste the faint ache behind that vow.

“What if we left?” I ask, voice stronger now. “Not because we have to, but because we want to?”

Sagax’s tail tightens around me. I feel his smile against my temple. “Where would you go?”

I trace the line of his jaw. “Someplace green. Somewhere your scales would blend in—with tall forests, fresh air—not jungle cat territory.” I laugh, breath trembling. “Maybe a cabin on a lake where the water smells like lilies and cold stone.”

His hold loosens, but only enough for me to slip out a giggle. “No jungle predators?”

I shake my head. “No predators. Just—peace. Morning light. Books. A kayak.”

He chuckles low. “That’s strangely domestic.”

“I’m trying to imagine us not fighting,” I say. “And not running.”

He looks at me—distance and dawn mixing in his gaze. “Then let us stay. For now.”

I press a kiss against his scaled forearm. The rough texture—ancient wood, living bark. “Promise me we’ll stay in it long enough to build that.”

He wraps both arms around me, holding me with calm gravity. “Promise.”

The air shifts—the hush grows, the distance between us disappears, the dish becomes not a ruin, but a sanctuary. My heart unravels the last of its knots.

“I love you,” I say, voice soft, like offering a raw gem.

He doesn’t smile. He doesn’t pretend. He stays still with me, letting that vibration settle between us.

Rain hisses off rusted metal. The forest leans in.

I realize I’m not just burning with desire. This is love. Flesh-deep and soul-wide. It’s the surrender I choose daily.

I tilt my head up into his chest. The world doesn’t demand anything from us right now except breathing, loving, staying.

“I might never want to be without you,” I whisper, words tangled with rain.

He presses a kiss behind my ear. “Then you don’t have to be.”

I let that promise anchor me stronger than any war ever could.

We stay there, as the storm above becomes the cradle of our future.