His precious, living flame.
Vorynthar reeked of her delectable perfume, even now, when she was sealed safely away. Locked safe in the clenched fist of his parasitic reef, the Raskoril that served his every whim. She was protected from any but him, until he was ready to put her on display before his court.
Nyx grinned.
She was perfect.
His.
Cock aching and heavy behind his slit, swollen with the need to knot her placid and drift with her for hours, he snarled.
Frustrated.
Denied.
She was close.
Floating on the edge of her first heat, ready to be bred and fucked pregnant with the first of his many offspring.
A low rumble shook his throat.
But the Abyssari had arrived.
He could sense them lurking, just there. Beyond the edge of his kingdom.
Summoned by his call, drawn in by her scent.
He couldn’t go to her. Not yet. Not until it was safe.
The Deep was restless.
Stirring for the first time in aeons.
The old blood circled in the shadows, drifting through the dark.
Gills flaring, Nyx pulled the black waters through his lips and sent it gushing over his gills. Tasting the current.
One of the ancient ones was pressing at his borders. Testing the edge of his patience. A relic. A living reminder of the wars, this was a male who’d lived long enough to know the scent in the current. To be drawn to the memory of it. A Siren flirting with estrus.
Old enough that he would try to take her, Nyx knew. That he would attempt to slaughter his bride in some misguided attempt to appease the Shallow King and avoid another war.
Nyxarion’s lips peeled back in a snarl.
Let them try.
He would tear them apart. Feed their bones to the Raskoril, and make an example of any blood traitor foolish enough to choose the Shallow King over Abyssari survival.
Fins flaring, fingers tight on the trident’s shaft, Nyxarion stretched and caught the current. Drifting in a slow, deliberate arc as he surveyed his fledgling rebel kingdom from above.
Flexing his claws, Nyx rolled his neck and let a pulse of light shiver down his spine—his biolume. It throbbed in perfect harmony with his fledgling reef. Synced to his unique patterns, his signature in an unspoken language used by the creatures of the deepest dark.
It was time.
Thrumming, the hum began as a single breath. A guttural sound beyond hearing. Pressure that drummed in his chest, rattled his ribs, and was answered in the pulse of his reef. Glowing blue as the polyps flexed and shivered, reacting to his call.
The Resonance blended with the water—a sub-audible purr that rolled off him in waves. Lifting his scales, venting the heat of his colossal body.
His biolume pulsed. Violently blue. A beacon in the dark that traced his every ridge and serpentine curve.
