Page 37 of Monster’s Obsessive Hunger

THORRIN

H er promise is new law that governs my cursed existence.

Then let me teach it what to crave. The words are an invitation, a challenge, and a trust so profound it makes the very bones of my frame ache with the weight of it.

The fire has burned down to a bed of glowing, orange embers, casting the cave in a soft, intimate light.

The tension in the air is no longer one of fear or uncertainty.

It is the thick, heavy silence of two souls standing on a precipice, a breath held before a willing fall.

She rises from the furs, her movements a fluid, deliberate grace.

She comes to me where I sit, a statue of stone and shadow, my entire being a coiled spring of restraint.

I do not move. I do not breathe. I wait.

My vow to never hurt her again is a brand on my soul, a sacred oath I will die before I break.

She stops before me, her small, human form silhouetted against the fire's glow.

She raises a hand, not to my chest this time, but to my face.

Her fingers, so impossibly soft, trace the hard, cold line of my jaw, the sharp edge of my cheekbone.

Her touch is not one of curiosity now. It is one of ownership. A gentle, loving claim.

She leans in, and I remain perfectly still, a mountain willing itself not to tremble.

She initiates the kiss. It is nothing like the brutal, desperate claiming in the forest. This is a slow, intentional press of her soft, warm lips against the cold, dead bone of my own.

It is a question, an offering. And with a control that costs me every shred of my will, I answer.

I do not crush, I do not take. I yield, allowing her to lead, to teach. This is not hunger. This is worship.

“I trust you,” she whispers against my mouth, and the words are both my salvation and my sentence. “I want this. I want you .” The simple, honest desire in her voice is a more powerful force than the curse has ever been. It is the anchor I have been missing for a thousand years.

With a slowness that is a physical agony, I rise, lifting her into my arms. She is a weightless thing, a creation of starlight and breath, and I hold her as if she might shatter at a single, careless movement.

I carry her to my sleeping furs, a makeshift bed of pelts that now feels like the most sacred altar in the world.

I lay her down gently, my reverence a stark, terrifying contrast to the violence I unleashed upon her in the snow.

Her trust is a physical weight, a constant, burning reminder of my vow.

I begin to undress her, but not with the frantic, tearing claws of before.

My movements are painstaking, my talons retracted as I work the simple fastenings of her tunic.

Each inch of her pale, luminous skin that is revealed is a new kind of miracle, a new verse in a prayer I am just learning how to speak.

I memorize her with my glowing gaze: the delicate curve of her collarbone, the gentle swell of her breasts, the soft, vulnerable line of her throat.

This is an act of worship. The beauty of her human form, the sheer, impossible life of it, is a sight so overwhelming it makes my sockets burn with a light that is not hunger, but awe.

The craving is there, of course. It is a deep, primal thrum in my blood, a low, steady burn.

But it is different now. It is not the mindless need to consume.

It is the desperate, soul-deep need to cherish, to protect, to prove myself worthy of the impossible gift she is offering me.

When she is finally bare before me, a masterpiece of soft curves and pale skin against the dark furs, I can only stare, my ancient, gravelly voice a broken whisper. “Lyssa…”

Our joining is a slow, deliberate miracle.

It is a dance of control and surrender, of a monster learning gentleness and a woman teaching him how.

I move with a restraint that is a constant, agonizing effort, every muscle in my body screaming for release.

But the look on her face—the soft, trusting haze in her eyes, the way her lips part on a breathless gasp of pure pleasure—is a reward greater than any satiation I have ever known.

When she cries out, the sound is not one of pain.

It is a sharp, clear note of ecstasy, a symphony that fills the hollow spaces inside me and turns my thoughts into a blazing star.

The beautiful, perfect sound of her pleasure is the final key, unlocking the last of my own restraint, but in a new and different way.

Her release triggers my own, but it is not the violent, all-consuming explosion from before.

It is a deep, resonant wave of completion, a sense of rightness, of two souls finally finding their anchor in a storm.

In the breathless quiet that follows, I hold her, my arms a protective cage around her, my face buried in the soft, fragrant silk of her hair.

I hold her as if she is my tether to the world, the only thing keeping me from drifting away into the cold, gray abyss of my own monstrous nature.

The hunger is still there, a distant, quiet hum beneath the overwhelming peace.

But it is quiet. It is listening. It is learning a new language.

The language of her pleasure, the grammar of her trust. And in this moment, held in the arms of the woman who chose to teach a monster how to love, I feel, no longer like a curse, but like a blessing.