“I can change you back. Bring you back to life. It can be like before.”
“Before?” He shook his head. “Before when I was weak? Before when they took my power from me? No. I don’t want to go back to before.” He grinned, showing off the full length of his fangs. He’d been resting his weight mainly on his hands, keeping them on either of my head. But now his legs pushed mine apart, and he let his weight fall completely on top of mine.
I gasped. He was so heavy, it was hard to breathe.
“I have everything I want here. Power. Control. Strength unlike any I had before. I have an army beneath me, no laws. No Empire to bow down to. And now,” he licked his lips, and pushed his hips into mine, “I have you. I could barely believe it when my scouts told me there was a girl skulking around the mountain. A girl whose hair turned red in the sun. I knew I had to come see for myself. Knew that if it was you, it had to be me who found you. Who claimed you. Because you’re mine.”
I shook my head. “I am yours. But not like this. Okay. Everything can be different for us,” I said. “We can change things together. So much has happened since you went away. And I’ll be by your side to get through it all. It will be better for you. I’ll make it so. I promise, I swear.”
He laughed again. “A promise from you? Why would I trust you? You’ve broken promises before.”
I promise. I’ll make the pain go away. And I swear on all the Gods, no one else will hurt you. No one else will lay a fucking finger on you. I’m going to take care of you, Rhyan. I swear.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, Rhyan. I wanted to save you.”
“Shhhh.” He pressed a long-clawed nail to my lips. “Forget what happened. It doesn’t matter now. Because you’re here. And you’re with me. I’m glad. I should have known you’d find me,” he said. He’d spoken low, so low and so soft that it almost sounded like him. Those were his words, Rhyan’s words, and his voice … if my eyes were closed, I’d think everything was okay—that I’d imagined he’d become akadim. That his weight was welcome on mine. That I wanted him. That I wanted this. But then he snarled, “Now you’re here, now we’re together. You can give me everything I want.”
My body went cold. “And what’s that?”
His growled, low in his throat. “You. Always. I want you.” The red of his eyes lit up. “I’ve been deprived. Starving. You have no idea what it’s like. The hunger. The need to fuck. And I’ve held back. Every time. But you’re here with me. Now we can be together. Forever.” He leaned in, baring his fangs, his eyes on my neck.
“No!” I screamed, and then I bucked and kicked my legs with all I had.
By some miracle, or perhaps Asherah helping me, I pushed him off and he rolled beside me. I immediately turned, trying to get out of the bed with my hands behind my back. My feet touched the floor and I made it three steps before his fingers looped through my ropes and I was slammed back into him.
“Don’t run from an akadim,” he hissed in my ear. “It makes us give chase. And excites,” he pressed against me from behind, “other parts of ourselves.” I bit back a cry, my body shuddering.
“Then again, that is what you wanted, isn’t it? Why you came here? To get fucked by one.”
I felt myself recoil with disgust. “I don’t. I—no. No.”
“Not even if it’s me?Partner.” He pushed into my back and while I’d become aware of his new height and weight,it was suddenly very clear that every part of him had grown substantially.
“No,” I hissed. Godsdamn him. Every time he called me partner, it was like a punch to the gut. I took a breath. “Not even if it’s you.”
“Come on. You must have been missing me all this time the way I missed you.” His hands started to slide up, sharp claws at the end of his nails grazed the undersides of my breasts.
I wriggled just out of his touch. “Rhyan. This isn’t who you are. I know you and you wouldn’t—You wouldn’t do this.”
He whirled me around, hands beneath my underarms, then he lifted me up, my feet dangling helplessly in the air as he licked my face, from my jaw to my forehead.
“Wouldn’t I?” he asked, and slammed me to the floor. My knees collapsed. I was on my ass a second later, scrambling back away from him. “After all we had together, and all the ways I learned how to make your body scream, you think I wouldn’t do the same just because I’m akadim?”
He reared forward, and hauled me back to my feet, one clawed nail ripping down the front of my tunic. The thread popped and my clavicle was exposed.
Fuck. Fuck! I eyed the collar on his neck. The one that bound him, controlled him.
“What about your queen?” I blurted out. “Morgana. I mean …” I gasped, struggling to think, to breathe, as another thread tore. “Maraaka Ereshya.You serve her, don’t you. She made you Arkturion?”
“Yes,” he hissed. “Maraaka.”
“Take me to her then,” I demanded. “She’d want to see me. She’d want to know I’m here! Take me to her. Now! I’m her sister!”
He laughed, and his claws plucked at the threads on my sleeve, until they popped and the sleeve fell, revealing my bareshoulder. “I know who you are, Lyriana. My memories are not affected. I know who you are to my queen.”
“Okay,” I said, angling my shoulder away from him. My tunic was fast losing its ability to cover me. He went to work on the threads of my other shoulder. “Then can I see her?” I looked around, like she might pop up at any second. Maybe she would if she was nearby. She’d hear me, even if she wasn’t. She’d read my mind.
MORGANA!I screamed internally.
