I already know monsters are not monsters here in the Yeavering. My friend Wynter is not only happy with her Barghest but she’s pregnant with his child.
While I can’t imagine ever wanting to be with a man ever again after Lord Guyzance, I know the Faerie are the worst of the worst and those others who inhabit this strange land are the ones who will give you their last morsel to eat or protect you with their own hide.
For whatever reason, I’m wanted by this Tam Lin, and Linton has decided to make me his and provide me with a protection I’m not sure he actually understands.
It says a significant amount about beauty and truth that I find what sustains the Bluecap not abhorrent but necessary.
“It won’t hurt will it?” I ask.
“No,” he says.
“Then take it.” I thrust my wrist under his nose. “Just don’t take too much.”
Linton doesn’t move, his gaze not leaving mine, as if not entirely sure I’m serious, like I might withdraw the offer.
“No one offers themselves to a Bluecap,” he says slowly.
“I am.”
His eyes trace their way over my face and slowly down to my arm, which I’m still holding and which shakes a little.
He reaches up and takes hold of it, one large clawed hand curled over my palm, enclosing it entirely, the other around myforearm, more than easily encompassing it. His eyes flick to my exposed wrist, my veins standing out blue against the skin.
I brace myself.
Linton brings me to his lips, their softness brushing over me like a kiss. He runs a dark tongue over my skin, and it tingles. He bares his teeth, and unable to help myself, I look away, screwing up my eyes, waiting for the searing bite of his sharp fangs. There’s some pressure and then…nothing.
A kind of bliss slides through my body, and I relax. With some trepidation, I open my eyes and turn my head back.
Linton has his lips fastened over my wrist, his eyes half closed, his antennae raised. He draws slowly, almost reverentially, not spilling a drop.
I find I don’t care in the slightest. My vision rainbows and my heart feels heavy in my chest. And there’s another part of me reacting too. A part which really shouldn’t be involved.
My core pulses in time with every gentle draw. My thighs get slippery. Unbelievably, a wave of extreme pleasure flows through me. It doesn’t matter Linton warned me about his venom, I’m suddenly closer to a climax than I have been in years.
I need to distract myself somehow, so I reach out to run my free hand over the closest antennae to me. The thing looks like a fluffy ostrich feather and at the moment I touch it, Linton groans over my wrist.
His hips jerk and his entire body goes rigid.
I try to pull my hand away in panic, wondering what I’ve done wrong as his eyes roll in his head, and he releases my wrist, two tiny puncture wounds being all which remains of his meal.
“Kaitlyn, you’ve made my spicket explode.”
LINTON
Her taste, her scent, her touch. I feel things, I feel everything, I feel alive, and at the moment my spicket produces, I’m sure I have died.
This has never happened to me before. I am awash with pleasure, with feeding, with venom, and with something else, something which encircles my chest and crushes at my heart.
I am awash with my spend too. My trousers are not going to be the same ever again. I don’t want them to. Her blood, sweet, and nutritious is the best I’ve ever tasted. I feel reborn.
Kaitlyn is staring at me, although it’s not with pity or horror. Her chest is moving rapidly, and I can’t help but be drawn to the orbs which sit tantalisingly under the fabric of her clothing.
There is a knock on the door, and I leap to my feet, ready with all my daggers to defend the creature who does things to my spicket and whose blood is the first I’ve been able to feed on in months.
“Hello!” a voice calls. “I have your dress, if you’re decent.”
Kaitlyn flashes a glance at me.
