Page 41

Wonder

At midnight, the sky darkens to indigo. Wonder wrestles with the linens, her calves tangling in the sheets. Truly, something this soft shouldn’t be so rough.

Her nightgown straps cut into her shoulders, her breasts mash against the satin, and it all feels wrong. No better than a restraint.

Rain droplets patter against the window, the rhythm tapping at Wonder’s consciousness. Usually, this weather lulls her into dreams. To the contrary, the room’s airflow thickens, which matches the assault taking place between her thighs, which hasn’t abated since the garden.

Once again, is this what heat feels like? The dynamics of temperature were a mystery until Anger revealed his former iron wings and Andrew joined their crew. From then on, Wonder had picked the males’ brain about the intensities of heat and cold.

Sometimes, she’s on the brink of understanding. From what she has been told, heat is the congestion of oxygen, a buildup of one’s blood and pulse. Such as that which currently rises at the nape of her neck, at the base of her spine, and deep inside the pleat of her pussy.

It emanates from between Malice’s legs as well. She knows this now.

In the botanical garden, that brazen airflow had intensified, radiating from his cock when he hauled Wonder atop his lap. To say nothing of what had occurred when his mouth feasted on her cunt.

His tongue flexing in and out of her slit. His lips drenching her. His mouth drawing on her clit, humming around the taut skin, flicking the crest.

Her body spilling across that lapping tongue. Her mind losing all semblance of right and wrong. Her cries so sharp they stung her throat.

The orgasm breaking her apart. The violence of coming around his mouth.

Wonder’s pussy contracts even now, as if he hasn’t stopped fucking her with those lips.

Damn that incident for depriving her of slumber, for wetting her through the sheets.

Curse her for letting it happen again and again.

Because yes, Malice hadn’t stopped, and neither had she.

Like starving deities, she’d given her pussy to him twice more in succession.

For hours, the relentless god had fed on her, making Wonder climax repeatedly until she had no voice left, coming so hard she nearly fainted.

Despite the inconceivable pleasure, Malice is a creative being. Experience in his company suggests they haven’t scratched the surface of what he’s capable of doing to her. Positions and props come to mind, as well as games ranging from bondage to sensual explorations.

Her flesh crackles with intrigue. Fates help her. Wishful thinking, but this might just be the product of Wonder’s natural inclination to curiosity.

Either way, she will eventually forgive herself for the lust. But not for the way she looked at him after the first orgasm, letting her facade slip, allowing reverence to peek through.

As for the rest of that interaction, it’s one thing to know the man he used to be, but it’s another to talk with the devil he’s become.

Most profound of all is this: She had enjoyed herself today.

Coming undone against his mouth had been one grave infraction, but Wonder also had too much bantering fun.

Whereas her crewmates know the grander parts of her life, she had told Malice about the smaller facets, which are somehow just as pivotal. Perhaps more so.

Her favorite things. Her resentment and gratitude toward magic. Even fragments of her childhood, along with memories of Harmony, her Guide.

Wonder could have kept going. And oddly, Malice had absorbed the particulars with an interest void of artifice or agenda.

Wonder shoots upright. Dammit, her archery!

She forgot the longbow and quiver in the garden. If Malice were a considerate god, he’d have brought the weapons to her upon his return indoors. But after the illicit hours they’d spent together… well, Wonder had been depleted and hasn’t seen him since.

The weapons could still be out there, getting soiled.

She flings back the covers, manifests outdoors, and steps into a maelstrom.

Clouds pack the sky, rivulets cutting through the awnings of trees and agitating the mesh of leaves.

The onslaught drenches her, reducing the nightgown to film, plastering the material against Wonder as she picks through the wildflowers on bare feet.

She casts about for company. Oh, honestly. Does she really expect someone to venture here during Stellar Worship? Particularly during a storm? Then again, Malice had reminded her anything is possible.

Nevertheless, who would expose themselves to the elements at this hour? Who would defy curfew, reason, and the law of nature on a night like this?

Who would be that reckless?

At the garden’s entrance, Wonder’s heels skid on the grass. She flounders, her soles slipping across the glade. Her hand shoots out, grasping a willow trunk to balance herself.

Malice stands in the clearing’s epicenter, making himself into a visible target. But that’s not the problem.

The problem is, he’s naked.

All thought, sense, logic, contemplation, worry, caution, and confusion drain from Wonder’s mind. Along with the deluge, paralysis seizes her limbs. This would be an optimal time to dash behind the tree. But Stars help her, she cannot move.

To any common deity, nudity is hardly scandalous or private. However, it’s impossible to apply this rule.

Not to him. Not to this.

With his back to her, Wonder gawks at the expanse of skin, the muscle and sinew rippling across a toned, athletic form.

A doused figure, beads cascading down the pillar of his neck, the ridges of his shoulder blades, and the taper of his waist. They roll over the swells of his ass, tight and smooth.

A pair of indentations sculpt into his rear, hinting how they might contort while thrusting between a pair of spread thighs.

Malice reaches behind and carves through his wet hair, rainwater darkening the layers. The motion readjusts the contours of his body, every ridge shifting.

Wonder’s lungs cease to function. That same compression of air from earlier, and from her bed, and from countless other moments, incapacitates her. An influx of blood—a suffusion that might be akin to heat—charges between her thighs. Wonder’s pussy clenches, fluid dripping like a flash flood.

The demon is bathing. That’s what he’s doing.

Although Malice has exhibited the front of his torso on numerous prior occasions, he’s never turned his unclad back to her. Yet now, his upper body twists sideways as he rubs water from his forearm. In her stupor, Wonder gets a view of slender, black threads feathering across his flesh.

Ink. The image of a fletching appears on one end, which extends into a quill pen at the other. The intricate design could be a natural facet, such as Anger’s flame tattoo, or it was crafted by an outcast artisan in The Celestial City.

Regardless of the origin, it’s a haunting sight. Although a tattoo hadn’t adorned his mortal self, the symbol isn’t lost on her for other reasons, significant in relation to his former identity. Of all objects, it just had to be a quill.

Yet. Despite its meaning, the inked design is a physical novelty. And it’s all Malice.

In hindsight, Malice had been shirtless while licking her hours ago. From her vantage point, Wonder could have easily noticed this detail. Except she’d been too consumed by rapture to recognize anything but his tongue, his face bowing into her cunt, and the unfathomable pleasure.

Wonder envisions how that tattoo would rise and collapse, constricting while he fucks another deity up against a tree, the ink rippling as his waist thrashes, ass swinging with a vengeance, the quill scribbling nonsense while he snaps his thick cock.

Wonder digs her fingernails into the bark. Despite her arousal, she pries herself from the fantasy. He shouldn’t be out here, though this demon would never heed such a flimsy lecture.

Her archery slants against another tree. If Wonder moves to snatch the weapons and withdraw, he’ll catch her.

Malice chooses that moment to twist. The hint of a round, flared head swerves into view.

The tip of his cock.

Wonder’s mouth plunges. She spins before the rest infiltrates her vision. Something else had glinted as he turned, but she’s not about to take liberties and peek. However much her skin aches, however much her cunt slickens, and however much her temple pounds.

It’s not lost on Wonder that the only way she could have glimpsed the wide crown of his cock is if he’d been erect. A moan slides across her tongue, but she clamps her mouth shut. Backing away, Wonder races from the scene. When Malice finishes washing, she’ll return for the bow and quiver.

Her respirations unsteady, Wonder retreats to the only place that gives her strength.

If she’d been concentrating, evanescing would have been more practical than making an inconvenient trek.

Instead, she splashes her way through The Archives and into The Hollow Chamber, rushing down the subterranean stairs and across the walkways, fleeing to the lowermost level, then isolating herself in the restricted section.

Rounding a bookcase, she slumps against the shelves to catch her breath.

Her sodden body dampens the carpet, while other parts of her react in a more succinct way, her cleft pooling, her nipples pebbling.

Wonder’s head cranks backward. She swallows and stares up at the nebulous prisms of lantern light. “Cursed Stars.”

“You forgot something.”

Wonder whips toward the aisle’s entrance, a yelp lodging in her throat.

His tall, dark shadow looms like a thirst trap, his arms spread and both palms bracing on the bookcases flanking him.

Even if his whipcord physique weren’t large, Malice’s personality alone is massive enough to consume the empty space.

The demon watches her through eyes that flash like steel. Though, it’s hard to say whether he’s using the shelves to anchor himself or barricade Wonder from escaping.

A set of poplar weapons rests on the floor, tipping precariously against the shelves. As for Wonder’s archery, he’s got the items harnessed to his back, the buckle tensing across his chest.

His bare chest.

Because he’s still naked.