When Kavik set his blade against the side of the man’s neck, Barin looked into his eyes, grinning. He didn’t look down to see the ivory shard in Kavik’s left hand—until blood spilled from his mouth. Then he glanced down to see it embedded in his heart.
Cruel. But Mala thought Barin deserved it.
The warlord looked up, and she thought that now he saw what Kavik was. His end. His death. It was the last he saw. Kavik yanked the shard from his chest and shoved it through his eye.
Barin slid to the floor. Unmoving, Kavik stood over him with head bowed, and when Mala went to him he was staring at the man’s dead body, his chest heaving with harsh, ragged breaths. She touched his arm and he caught her against him, burying his face in her hair.
“It is done,” he said hoarsely. “It is finally done.”
Mala held him tight. Around them, chaos was exploding. Some of the guards shouted with fear, others with joy. Near the entrance to the great hall, the teary-eyed marshal was unfastening the collars of men and women tied by their leashes. Someone spoke a word, and soon it was repeated, louder and louder.
King.
So he was. She drew back and looked up at him. “Your work has only begun, warrior.”
CHAPTER 8
Later that night, her warrior followed her. When she’d left the chaos of the citadel below and climbed the stairs of the northern tower, Mala had known that he would.
She didn’t want to be inside, not this night. Instead she cleared the guards from the northern tower’s battlements and laid out a soft bed atop the stone. When Kavik found her, Mala stood at the parapet wall, looking over the city below. Barin’s fall was still being celebrated and fought over within the citadel and beyond its walls. Yet there was no one who argued with the name they were calling him now. Kavik, the king of Blackmoor.
He was still her beast.
His arms circled her waist from behind, and she leaned back against a chest as strong as these stone walls. “There is still much corruption to root out,” she said and shivered as his warm lips found her neck. “And Stranik’s passage is likely full of revenants.”
“We will root those out, too.” His gentle hand cupped her throat, holding her still as his fingers untied the side of her cuirass. “And I will return with you to your home, which will soon have far more than your strength available when they need it. Change will come to both our lands when others hear of this pass through the mountains. Everyone will be traveling this route—including more warriors. Perhaps even ten thousand of them.”
Bringing trade, riches, and trouble to both sides. Mala looked forward to it all.
But she only needed one warrior.
Unsheathing her knife, she turned in his arms and pressed the tip to the hollow of this throat. “The full moon still shines overhead. Do you intend to have me?”
His hunger lay stark upon his face. “I do.”
With a flick of her wrist, she carved a shallow crescent into his skin. Not a flinch passed through his body, but a question lay in the arch of his dark brow when blood began to slide down his chest.
“The scars upon the back of your neck are not moon blood scars, Kavik. Those cannot be offered by force. Your moon night is here with me.” As his gaze turned fiery, she flipped the knife in her hand, offering it. “Will you mark me?”
“I will.” His voice was guttural as he took the blade.
She tilted her chin back, exposing her throat to him. The sting at her neck was nothing, and yet it was everything. Hope for her future filled these drops of blood—a future with this man, blessed by the goddess who had brought them together.
Taking the knife, she let it clatter to the stone. “Vela has been given the blood that she wants. Now I will have what I want. Down, warrior.”
His grin was instant and fierce. Down he went, taking the long path. He stripped away her armor, and cold air caressed her skin. His lips followed the trickle of her moon blood, then journeyed over the swells of her breasts. Their stiffened peaks ached even before his mouth reached them, and when he had finished his heated assault upon their tips, her nipples throbbed from the suckling and her whole body was aflame. Only then did he continue down, pushing her back against the parapet wall and feasting upon her yielding flesh until she screamed.
Her hands fisted in his thick hair. “Now.”
With a growl, he lifted her against him and carried her to the soft bedding. Laying her upon it, he stepped back and removed his armor. Mala watched him undress with pleasure, stroking between her thighs as the torchlight flickered across his bared chest. His ravenous gaze fell upon her fingers. Grinning, she widened the spread of her legs.
“Do not be easy with me, warrior.”
He was not. With a rough grip, he caught her wrist and brought her fingers to his mouth to suck the wetness from her skin, then pinned her hands over her head. He pushed her legs wider before his weight settled between her thighs.
But he did not fill her. Instead he took his cock in hand and slicked the broad tip through her lush cleft, testing her entrance with gentle pressure. Again and again he did this, sliding up to tease her clitoris with his cockhead before returning to gently nudge her center again. Crying out in frustration, Mala arched beneath him, trying to force him in.
“Now, Kavik!”
“I have waited long, little dragon,” he replied through gritted teeth. “You will wait until I have seen you take all of me. I will not pound into you before I know how much you can bear.”
“I can bear everything you give to me, warrior.”
Abruptly he pressed harder. Mala gasped and stilled as her sensitive flesh stretched to accept his immense crown. Oh, but Temra had been generous to him. So generous.
Kavik paused, rigid above her. “Mala?”
“More.” With a rock of her hips, she urged him deeper. “If you will take me, take me hard.”
Bending his head, he claimed her mouth with his—but though his kiss was hard and deep, the invasion of her sheath was slow. So slow. Mala cried out as he retreated slightly before advancing again. He filled her, and filled her, and even as she wondered whether there would be an end, his loins finally settled heavily against hers.
“Do you see?” Mala panted, looking down between them. Her clitoris was nestled against the dark hair growing at the base of his cock. The delicate gates of her sheath embraced the root of his shaft. They were the only delicate part of her, and even they were strong enough to take him. “I can sheathe you, though your sword is so massive.”
“And you are tighter than a blademaster’s fist.”
Body shaking with strain, his eyes locked on her face, he rocked against her. She cried out, and her thighs came up to grip his hips.
Teeth clenched, he rocked again. “Is this pleasure, Mala?”
“It is.” Slicing through her, deeper and deeper. “The path is never easy.”
He stopped with his cock buried to the hilt. Mala bucked under him in desperate frustration. His gaze hot, Kavik licked his fingertips before sliding his hand between them. She shuddered as he brushed her clitoris—then screamed when he gently tugged with slick fingers. Heat rushed up under her skin. Kavik groaned and tugged again. Mala sobbed his name and her thighs fell away from his hips. Her sheath clenched around his shaft with each soft caress, as if trying to pull him deeper.