A tiny voice in his head muttered in glee,Fucked is exactly what we are going to be tonight.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Ward faced Viper again,and his breath caught when Viper met and held his gaze. He stared at him like he had every answer to any questions, as if he were worth any risk, and was the cause of every goddamn sinful temptation on earth. The space between them pulsed with invisible weight, a tether thick with need and desire as if their bond had taken shape and now refused to be ignored. Power coiled in the air—alive and insistent, refusing to be denied.
Heat crawled across Ward’s skin as his body reacted to the pressure, a low hum vibrating beneath the surface of his chest and his bones. Something ancient. Something terrifying. A soul-deep, pulse-wrecking, irrevocable connection.
Viper stepped into his space close enough that their marks pulsed in unison. “You feel that too?” His voice was pitched low and filled with gravel-wrapped hunger beneath a thread of disbelief.
Ward nodded, not trusting his voice.
“It’s not just magic, is it?” Viper asked. “Even without all this,” he gestured around them, “I’d want you. Fuck, Ward, I do want you, with or without glowing marks and holy tea.”
Thank God.
Ward swallowed hard. It would absolutely suck if the man he was so attracted to his cock was almost in a constant state of arousal was only attracted to him because of magic or a mate bond determined by the fates or the gods or whoever else fucked with unsuspecting people’s lives here. He clamped his lips closed to prevent the words that bubbled up inside him from escaping his mouth, but then he said them anyway despite his resolve not to. “I want you, too. I don’t know what comes next, or how we make any of this make sense, but I know this…” His hand found Viper’s. “…You’re the only thing I’ve been sure of since the moment we got here.”
He saw Viper’s breath hitch. Maybe he wasn’t the only one affected.
I’m going to be so mad if the Fianna’s horny tea just causes this…
Neither of them moved, and the world held still as the bond between them thrummed once more, then snapped tight like a bowstring drawn back and ready to let fly.
Ward’s blood burned and his mind blanked. He barely remembered bringing the cup to his lips. One moment, Fionn had offered it with solemn eyes and a phrase that sounded like a vow, and the next, heat had licked down his spine and unraveled him from the inside out. Whatever the Fianna king had said—whatever power lived in that drink—it had gone straight to his soul and stripped him bare.
Viper caught him before his knees gave out. “Ward.”
“I’m fine,” he breathed. He wasn’t. Not even close. The air around them shimmered, and for a second, he thought he might explode.
“You’re glowing,” Viper said, low and rough. “You’re fucking glowing, Ward.”
I am?
Huh?
Weird.
If he was, he didn’t care, not with the way Viper’s hand curled tight around his arm, or the way his voice had dropped to that possessive growl that made something in Ward’s chest ache and crave more in equal measure. The fire wasn’t hurting him—it was answering a call he hadn’t even known he’d made.
The Oathkeeper.
That word echoed in his head, not from Fionn or Oisín or any of the priestesses who were now chanting in low, guttural Gaelic tones—but almost as if it were from the magic itself, from the land, or maybe even from the bond thrumming between Viper and him. It repeated, soft and steady, each syllable a drumbeat in his chest.
Oath. Keeper.
Protector of vows.
Guardian of promises.
His vision blurred, but he saw the moment Viper’s pupils blew wide. The soldier swayed forward slightly, nostrils flaring, like the scent of Ward’s skin had just sucker punched him in the gut.
“I can feel you,” Viper rasped. His eyes were silver-bright, and his voice was unsteady. “Shit, I can feel you in my head.”
“Good.” His throat felt as if he’d been yelling for ten hours straight. “Because I feel like I’m about to crawl out of my skin if I don’t touch you.”
The space between them crackled with energy that wasn’t entirely theirs. Magic licked up his spine. It gave off sparks as it curled around his mating mark, tangled through his thoughts. The mating bond had already been a tether before, but now? Now it was a living, breathing, hungry thing between them. His skin itched, his bones buzzed, and every cell in his body screamed for more.
Fionn’s voice floated in from somewhere far away. “Go complete your bonding.”
