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Chapter

Fifty-Seven

Liv

“ H ow did you find me in this city? What brought you here now?”

Brekt leaned a hip against the stone rail, his focus drawn to my mouth. “I think of you. Always. And sometimes, I can feel you out in the world. I sense where you are. And when the Aspis feels the pull of the magic, I can find you much easier.”

“You can feel me?”

“It must be some power from the Aspis. I felt the magic earlier. So I came.”

I used magic in front of the Elders.

There was something else I had wondered ever since becoming the Ikhor.

“I was dropped in that cave for you to find. Right at your feet,” I said. “You were always meant to find me. The dreams, the light sending me to you. The Aspis knowing where I am. Some of the legends are true. The beast was made to hunt down the Ikhor.”

Brekt had known me before we met—had seen me many times.

“So the magic possessed me and took me to my death. Why?” I asked, knowing he didn’t have an answer.

“Perhaps part of it wants to defeat the Aspis as well, and it took its host to the source.” He raked his gaze up my body as we spoke, and my face heated.

“How’re you feeling, really?” I checked him over for new scars.

His attention snagged on my nightgown, where it dipped low on my chest. He followed a path down to where the cold breeze hardened my nipples. Or was it his presence that made my body react?

I pulled on my nightgown, trying to cover more of my legs. The ache deep inside me took me back to when things were simpler between us. We had always been connected. I was afraid to touch him then. I was afraid to now.

“How am I feeling?” He repeated the question. “Despite the confusion of it all, right now, with you here, I feel like a king. On top of the world.” The sensuous curve of his mouth stole my breath.

My sanity ditched me on the balcony to figure it out on my own. “Why are you smiling? We’ve spent months trying to kill each other, you know.”

The mirth fell from his face. “It felt like years with how I’ve lived the same nightmare over and again. At the moment, however, life’s good.”

I grabbed onto the railing to keep my hands busy. Everything in me wanted to touch him because I still couldn’t believe he was real. And we were talking. Why were we talking?

I could think of a few other things I would rather be doing with him.

“How is it good? We have been at war with each other. I’ve been running from you, and nearly died several times.”

He was closer, unabashedly drinking in my bare legs. “Right now, my mind is my own, and I have the most … temping vision before me, bathed in moonlight. And I don’t know if you saw, but I can turn into the Aspis—a literal legend.”

“I’ve seen.” Heat rushed to my face with every inch he gained.

“What more could a man want?”

God, he was everything I missed. Yet he had never been this forward before, this at ease. He had always held back.

“Did I mention the part about being with the most beautiful woman I have ever seen?”

My face fell, and I stepped back. “In case the moonlight isn’t highlighting the changes, I don’t look beautiful. I don’t look anything like myself.”

Brekt didn’t let me step away. He followed me, coming forward and leaning in closer. The pine and leather scent of him surrounded me. “I don’t care about the colour of your hair, love. The way you look at me, speak to me … I see you in there, Liv.”

Time stopped when his hand palmed my cheek, and I could have wept for how much it felt like home. “And there’s the blush that always made me hard as a rock. As wild as I know your mind is, I love it when you get shy about it.”

The soft wind stole my breath, and I looked up into those warm obsidian eyes, impossibly darker in the night.

His strong jaw was shadowed, dusted with the hint of a beard.

I couldn’t remember where we were or why we were here.

He was touching me. There was a pathetic piece of fabric separating his warmth from my skin. I wanted it gone.

“Time has been taken from us. But no more. No more gods, no more fate, no more enemies. You want the Guards to help you find your friend. I want to help you find the gods and end this. I want us …” Brekt swallowed.

“Before, when we were in the Guardian Palace … I asked you to be my first. To be mine. I haven’t changed how I feel. ”

“Even seeing me now, standing amongst your enemies.”

Brekt’s thumb brushed my cheek. “I see only you—the brave woman from the cave who wanted to live until she didn’t.

The one who promised her friends to find the gods and save them all.

Who promised to save me. My little hero.

I dreamt of you like this. Bold. Brave. And so fierce that it makes others afraid. ”

“Brekt,” I whispered.

Had anyone ever seen me as he had?

“Do you feel differently about me now? After I’ve nearly torn your arm off and chased you across the world.”

“I flooded that world, mourning you. If anything, I feel stronger than before.”

He was closer still. “Tell me I can kiss you.”

My heart beat once, twice.

Hesitation and uncertainty etched his face.

“Do you need my permission?” I asked. “You’d still hold back? The big bad Aspis can’t take what he wants? You didn’t mind acting like a territorial beast before.”

His gaze darkened, his attention snagging on my lips. “I’ve been gone for weeks, as you say. I no longer know what you desire, love.”

Brekt traced a line along my jaw, down my neck and up again, sending waves of pleasure to my core. His palm cupped my cheek, and I leaned into it.

There were a million things we needed to talk about. To figure out. For the life of me, I couldn’t gather a single sentence to stop myself from what I wanted.

“You know what I desire. You knew before you met me.” I reached for his torn shirt, still a mess from the last battle he fought on that burning field. I pulled myself closer, and his eyes flared. The hand on my face moved to my neck while his other hand reached for the small of my back.

Like magnets, we were pulled together.

“Don’t ever hold yourself back from me again. If we only meet for moments at a time, I don’t want to waste them fighting.”

I didn’t even see him move.

His lips were on mine, violently claiming. We came together like a storm. Like we always did.

But this time, there was no hesitation.

Brekt pulled me against his body with an animalistic groan as his tongue found mine, and my arms banded around the back of his head, my fingers sliding into his hair and pulling.

He tasted like life. Like water would taste to someone dying of thirst. He tasted like sin. Like power. Like sex. Like mine .

He gripped my thighs hard and pulled up, wrapping them around his waist. The feel of his warm body rubbing against mine was ecstasy. I ran my fingers through his hair, ran my tongue over his, and squeezed my legs tighter to feel him.

He was moving us. My back hit a hard surface, and his whole body pushed against mine.

I arched, pressing my breasts tight against his chest, moaning into his mouth.

He fit like he was a part of me. Every hard angle of his chest. His abdomen.

The thick length that was confined and yet toyed at my entrance.

Had anyone ever succumbed to their desires so easily? Had anyone climaxed just from the feel of a body pressed tight to theirs? I was close.

Brekt’s lips explored my neck, teeth nipping at the soft skin below my jaw, and all I could do was squeeze him, pulling him closer.

I arched my neck, giving him access, rubbing my hand along the back of his head as his tongue ran a line up, up and up to my jaw.

I moved against him, forcing out a growl as his hands found my ass and squeezed, pushing his hips closer, digging in.

He rolled into me, and I could feel every inch of his hard cock through his pants.

Because I had nothing on under my nightgown.

A storm grew, tearing apart the city beyond with its ferocity as Brekt’s mouth returned to mine.

Our lips melded. Our tongues explored hot and wet.

I wanted every part of me wet with the evidence of what this man did to me.

We were messy, and I loved it. It wasn’t enough.

I wanted. I needed. I couldn’t live without this.

His hand left my ass and travelled up my side, exploring my curves until he found my breast and squeezed, moaning with me, playing, toying with me as I unravelled.

His thumb found my nipple, brushing it, and he pinched the rough peak as I caught his lower lip between my teeth. Not in punishment, in demand for more.

He knew.

I was on fire for this man. No. I was becoming a storm of my own for him. A current ran through me as I ground myself against him. Electric. Powerful.

I was vibrating with energy.

Literally.

Cracking energy filled the balcony, competing with the sounds of our kisses, our moans.

My eyes flew open. I was glowing, shocking veins of light emanating from me, spreading into the air. The balcony lit up as if lanterns had been placed all around.

Brekt’s face contorted in pain as he pulled back. He set me down, eyes squeezed shut, as streaks of light licked his hands, up his arms and travelled down to his feet.

“No, Brekt. Oh my god. I’m sorry. I lost control.”

He clenched his jaw where two elongated fangs grew, lowering his head to hide the sting of betrayal. But I saw it there. For a moment, his belief slipped. He thought I had used the magic on purpose.

He cracked open his eyes long enough to look at me, and then he screamed in pain.

Horns grew, and shadows crawled across his body. The Aspis was trying to break free.

He dropped to his knees, his back bending. “It’s true, then … you wield … more than fire magic.” He held his head.

He didn’t know all the truths I had learned since his death. Part of him would always be the Guard of the Aspis—seeing magic as strictly for the gods. His goal had always been to kill the evil that came back.

“No, please. Stay.”

Yellow fought with obsidian, and a new wave of pain must have come over him because he dropped to the ground, landing on his side while his back continued to arch at that unnatural angle. Scales formed along his arms and neck, and the shadows swirled around his legs.

“Everything has changed,” he could barely form the words. His eyes snapped open, searching the sky for something.

Answers? The gods? They wouldn’t help.

He winced, fighting a losing battle against the Aspis, and I wrapped my arms around myself, shaking. Was I going to lose him again? I couldn’t touch him, I couldn’t help.

“Some things haven’t.”

Could he hear the pleading in my voice? How could I make this stop?

Our gazes locked, and his lip drew back in a scowl. “Run,” he said around sharp teeth.

Brekt was holding a hand against his chest. I was hurting him with the magic.

“Don’t make me leave. Please.”

Brekt rolled onto his hands and knees. The shadows on his skin churned, going darker as he fought. “Run. Now. Shut. It. Off.”

I backed away toward the door.

“The parts of us … ugh … that belong to the gods,” he whispered around the pain, “are made to kill each other. I can hardly hold it off … we have to be careful … I won’t hurt you …”

“Careful?”

Of course. The gods had sent him to kill me.

It all came crashing down—if I used the magic, he became the Aspis.

If I didn’t use the magic, I would slowly kill myself by holding it in.

“Because until we are dead, we are the worst of enemies,” I whispered as he turned into smoke and scales.

Before I could run, the force of his transformation shoved me back into my room, and I landed in a heap, alone on the cold floor.