“Is that so?” she hummed.
He growled faintly as her fingers lightly traced the ridges. Her mind conjured wicked possibilities sheshouldn’timagine, her body aching in places she wanted to deny.
“By the Abyss, you’re devastating,” she breathed and he grinned at her dark curse. “Are all the gods so… blessed?”
Rune chuckled, the low sound curling heat down her spine. “No,ra’ayati. The others are not so fortunate.”
Well, then.
She stroked both firm lengths slowly, her body aching with want. “I still don’t understand why you have two.”
He leaned close and his fangs grazed her ear.
“I am a dragon,” Rune said, his voice growing rougher as he thrust in her hands. “We are endowed withexcess. Our appetite is never sated.” His clawed hands cupped her breasts, and she moaned at the expert touch of those clawed fingers over hersensitive flesh. His eyes smoldered, dark and knowing. “And I can scent that you have not had your fill either.”
She squeezed her thighs tight, feeling her undergarments grow wet. He pulled her to him, mouth moving indulgently over hers.
The shadows gathered, a portal opening without command. Lifting her in his arms, Rune carried her through it into a cavern. Steam curled along the stone, the air warming with every step until the scent of minerals and mist wrapped around them like memory.
“Where are we going?” Alora asked.
“I am taking you to the first place I craved you.”
He passed by a row of stalagmites, revealing the hot spring nestled deep within Karag Dûr, its waters luminous and slow-moving, fed by the living heart of the mountain. Bioluminescent worms on the ceiling provided steady light.
Recognition flickered in Alora’s chest, sending a flush to her cheeks. This was where she had first stumbled upon him unguarded, steam-damp and dangerous, the sight of him burning into her long before she knew what they were becoming.
Rune’s mouth curved. Of course he remembered.
“I came here many nights, pleasing myself to the thought of you,” he confessed, tail flicking against her ankle. “Often slipping into your dreams where you were doing the same.”
Her blush deepened and she glowered. “So, you were lurking in my dreams.”
“Such delicious ones they were.”
Rune set her down and approached the water. Steam kissed his skin as he waded in, hot water curling around his calves, his thighs, then his hips.
“I quite liked having your scent on me.” His eyes darkened. “Let us bathe together before I coat myself in you again.”
Alora had a second to gasp before he snapped his fingers and her clothes dissolved away. Her squeals turned to laughter as he yanked her into the steaming pool.
They took their time washing each other.
Rune’s hands traced slow, deliberate paths along her skin, the oil warm and fragrant, his thumbs pressing enough to make her inhale sharply. What began as cleansing slipped easily into want, the line between the two dissolving under his touch.
The water sloshed gently as she climbed onto his lap.
His heavy-lidded eyes glowed in the steam as she slowly pumped her hands down both shafts in tandem. His voice was velvet over steel, soft and obscene at once. “Keep toying with me like that, and I will have you screaming as I claim your soul for all eternity.”
Goosebumps prickled across her skin. The implication had her insides twisting into something hotter, hungrier, dangerously heady. Because gods help her… he wasn’t jesting.
And yet, Alora was far past salvation.
She had chosen tofollowhim into the dark, fully knowing she might not return. He was the chaos she craved, the one who she would gladly sin for.
The shadows stirred, curling around her arms, her waist, tugging her closer as though they too sensed the shift.
Rune rose from the water, sitting on the edge of the pool as he reached for the towels folded on a nearby stone bench.
