Page 55 of Voidwalker (Beasts of the Void #1)

One cure for a hangover

Fi slept like the dead and woke little better.

Her first awareness upon waking was her mouth, the inside of which seemed to have been replaced by some manner of juniper-laced sandpaper.

Fortunately, she didn’t have to dwell on that sensation long, distracted by the throb in her head.

She groaned a hoarse, crackling sound. At least she was somewhere soft.

Warm. Dark. Cracking open crusted eyes, she found herself safe in her bed.

Dim light slipped through curtained windows.

As was becoming a morning habit, she looked up.

Antal stretched along a rafter, tail dangling a lazy sway.

“Good morning, Fionamara,” he greeted drowsily. “How did you sleep?”

Fi groaned liked a depressed walrus.

He chuckled. “As expected, then.”

In a snarl of bedsheets and bad decisions, Fi scrunched her eyes shut and massaged her temples.

Her headache laughed at the feeble attempt with a throb like an ice pick through her brain.

The previous night, source of her agony, came back in fragmented pieces, a memory of too many shots and Antal carrying her home.

She wiggled bare toes, her boots stowed by the door, but otherwise she wore the same clothes. A relief.

Because Fi vaguely remembered trying to kiss him. He’d stopped her.

A tap landed on her floorboards. Next, a clink of glass in her kitchen. Through slitted eyes, she watched the shadow glide toward her, a smolder of crimson irises in the dim room.

Antal paused an arm’s length from her bed. Her rafters, her tub, her sofa, he’d made use of without qualm, but here was one place he’d avoided. A boundary never breached.

He offered a glass of water. Fi grabbed it and downed the liquid in too few gulps, leaving her mouth feeling more mud than sandpaper. She groaned again.

“How can I help?” Antal spoke low, gentle to her headache. Fi still winced.

“I don’t suppose you have some magical daeyari cure for hangovers?”

“A cure, no. But perhaps some relief?”

“ Please .” She’d take anything.

He came closer, another line bent, a shift in her mattress as he sat upon the edge. Fi tensed, wary but curious as he gestured for her to lay back down. Tenser still as he cupped a hand beneath her head, tender claws sliding through rainbow curls.

“Don’t mess up my hair,” Fi grumbled. “I’m sure it looks awful already.”

“It’s always gorgeous.” His voice roughened. “And I prefer it messy.”

What an unnecessary, uncalled for, delicious thing to say. Fi’s huff of protest cut short when he touched her temple. His cool fingers made her sigh.

Then, a bloom of energy. The current flowed into her like a cleansing flush, cold water trickling through snow, a similar prickle to the mind-altering magic he’d worked before.

Yet gentler. This version left her thoughts unmuddied, relaxing the swell of her throbbing head, a wave of relief that had Fi leaning into him.

This creature of shadow and death whose touch could soften like silk. Immediately, her headache receded.

“I’m sorry about last night.” She lay on her back as he leaned over her, lulled by his touch, chewing her lip. “I didn’t realize talking about your friend would be so hard. I shouldn’t have pushed.”

“You have an uncanny ability, making me speak of things I wouldn’t normally.” He spoke softly, not accusing, more mulling the words. “There’s no need to apologize. I haven’t spoken of him in a long time… Too long, perhaps.”

Antal moved his fingers through her hair, massaging the roots. The soft scrape of claws against her scalp produced a tingling, mesmerizing sensation that shuddered down her spine. Fi’s exhale verged perilously close to a moan.

Smoldering looks and lustful dalliances were one thing. No one had touched Fi like this in… too long. Not since Astrid. Her old defense mechanism bristled, the urge to raise her guard lest weakness damn her.

A glimpse of Antal’s contented grin kept her still.

A deeper warmth bloomed low in her belly, remembering the heat of his mouth on her temple the night before. To Fi’s equal dismay and outrage, a full night’s sleep hadn’t diminished her desire to taste him again.

Here they were now on her bed, close as lovers, his ice and ozone scent heady on the air.

Still too few buttons fastened at his collar. How easy it would be, to reach out and run her fingers across his collarbone, down the hard plane of his chest…

“He was much like you,” Antal said.

Fi’s guard slipped further, too curious not to ask. “How so?”

“Bold. Not afraid to speak his mind, to stand his ground. Even with me.”

Her lips twitched a smile. “So you’re telling me you have a type?”

“I suppose I do.” Antal returned her grin, though strained, his words stretched oddly thin. “It’s not easy, finding humans who see me as more than a monster.”

She frowned. “You’re not a monster.”

“You’ve seen what daeyari become.”

“Verne’s Beast is nothing like you.”

“It is.” He kept speaking, despite Fi’s mouth open in protest. “That Beast is part of me, Fionamara. Part of all daeyari. With reason stripped away, that’s what remains. Only hunger and claws. What separates me, then?”

The question sounded rhetorical, but he paused anyway, shifting his soothing magic to her other temple. Fi waited, relishing each soft brush of his fingers.

“My actions,” he said. “My choice to be more than a predator. Razik helped me see that.”

She huffed. “Glad someone could kick your ass into shape before me.”

“He did.” Another small smile, frayed at the edges. “But beneath all that bristle, he was fiercely caring. The same as you. I think the two of you would have gotten along.”

“I’m honored.” Truthfully. Beyond Boden, she’d rarely grown close enough to anyone for them to see beyond her bluster and bravado, those defensive facades. “I guess I… hope your memories of mortals aren’t all bad. That you have some good ones, too.”

Antal’s eyes met hers, that piercing hold like he could see clear through her ribs.

“I’ve added quite a few recently,” he said, low enough to stop Fi’s heart. Then, with a smirk. “Though, I still question how overconfident drunk Fi was in your ability to triumph over an army of small Void horses.”

His touch on her temple lightened. Receded. When he released her, it seemed too soon.

Fi sat up, and though the remnants of a headache lingered behind her eyes, the sharper pain had vanished. Her thoughts felt clearer than ever.

One time.

That was what she’d told herself, unsure how deep she was willing to plunge with this creature of fangs and eternity. Unsure how much she’d risk being devoured.

Was she a fool, that such qualms frightened her less and less?

He’d let his guard down only briefly, yet now Fi could see nothing else.

She could see how meticulously the bluff was crafted, the cape of carnivores and myth, how necessary he had to flaunt teeth and claws to walk alongside his deadly kin.

But there’d always been more to him. Since the first time he’d pinned her to the snow, it had been a snarl sharp as knives and claws soft as feathers.

For every glare, there was a grin. For every taunt, there was a moment he’d spoken her name with the softness of a plea.

He swept a curl of hair off her cheek, tucking it tenderly behind her ear.

“Feeling better, Fionamara?”

Fi pushed forward and kissed him.

She met first with resistance. A stiffness of surprise.

As Antal softened to her, Fi scraped her fingers across the shaved sides of his hair, along the smooth lacquer of his antlers, devouring this taste that had haunted her lips.

First, came the spark of ozone on her tongue.

Then that cold, crisp, hard-to-place something that called to her like a siren’s song.

She pressed deeper, sampling every curve of his mouth, so close to putting her finger on it.

Foreign, yet familiar. An endless sky without stars.

The Void.

He tasted like the Void.

Antal pulled back as breathless as she was. He cupped her face, eyes molten, yet he studied her with a frown.

“What happened to one time ?” he said.

Hopeless from the start. Fi couldn’t pull away from him, couldn’t stop lidded eyes drifting back to his mouth.

“I guess I must be one dumb little rabbit,” she breathed.

Antal traced a thumb along her cheek, down the curve of her parted lips. Slow. Reverent. “You were never a rabbit.” His chuckle brushed like velvet. “You’ve always had sharp teeth.”

Fi was more interested in his sharp teeth. One time, be damned.

With a lunge, she was on top of him, straddling his lap as he sat on the edge of her bed. Her hands clawed his shoulders, pulling him into a deeper kiss. He cradled her cheeks, frustratingly light. Holding back.

“ Fionamara ,” he growled. A warning.

She stopped. Through speeding heart and shallow breaths, she registered him too tense beneath her, his tail flicking her bed, claws a whisper against her waist.

“What’s wrong?” she goaded. “I thought you wanted to have me again?”

“You made me promise. One time.” The words strained his teeth, a hiss of heat as he brushed his mouth to her jaw. “I need you to be more explicit.”

“Explicit?”

“About what you want.”

He spoke in anguish, dripping every ache she’d suffered this past week. Fi leaned back. Stunned. After all his taunts, all his lewd comments and rakish looks, here she sat in his lap.

And he wouldn’t touch her without permission.

The power was fire in her blood, more intoxicating than ten rounds of juniper liquor. All those years of Fi’s life she’d spent terrified of daeyari, and now she had one dangling at her fingertips, watching with the keen eyes of a starving panther.

At last, she knew exactly what game they were playing.

She brushed her mouth to his. Not a kiss, but a whisper.

“Is this not explicit enough for you, Antlers?”

A growl rumbled his chest. His claws flexed, pricks against her waist, rigid with restraint. All those snarls and teeth, hiding a teddy bear underneath.