“I won't,” I promised.
He lifted a brow at me.
“Hawk Lord!” I added in a rush. “I won't come on you, Hawk Lord.”
“Good bird.” Dalsharan pumped faster. “Beg me to come inside you.”
“Oh, Gods. Please, come inside me, Hawk Lord,” I begged. “I want to feel your cum filling me. Please!”
Dalsharan gave one last shove, his whole body clenching gloriously, and emptied inside me with a deep grunt. The sensation of his hot release filling me sent me over, and I made sure to angle my cock so that it only hit my belly. The Hawk Lord groaned deeply—a primal, pleased sound—and drew his slippery flesh out of me, making me shiver. He stared at the cum on my belly with a satisfied smile and then laid down beside me. As I finally lowered my legs—which surprisingly didn't ache—he twirled a finger and the cum on my belly disappeared. I gave him a broad grin, but he pushed me onto my side and wrapped an arm around my waist, tucking my head in beneath his and nestling his spent cock into the curve of my ass.
“Okay, so you like spooning, huh?” I drawled.
“Bad bird,” he whispered in my ear just before he bit it. “I see you're going to need some serious training.”
“Are you one of those sadistic freaks who likes to tie people up and beat on them?” I murmured.
“No, I'm a warlord and you are mine,” he said simply. “Now, go to sleep, my naughty Ravyn. You will soon learn your place.”
“Yes, honey snookums,” I whispered.
The Hawk Lord's laughter followed me into my dreams.
Chapter Thirteen
“So, there have been others like me?” I asked Dalsharan as I got dressed the next morning.
The wind was howling at the cave entrance, but nothing else had disturbed our sleep. I had slept lightly, thinking that the Farungal would find us for sure. The second time a random sound woke me, Dal had murmured that he'd warded the cave entrance and we were perfectly safe. But now we had to cross miles of Farungal land before we made it to open ocean and then, hopefully, the shores of Stalana—the human portion of our continent.
“There has been one other like you,” he said softly.
I looked up from the pallet where I was tying my boots. “Only one?”
“At the beginning of the war with the Farungal, a human soldier saved an entire army, possibly even the continent.” Dal was leaning against the wall, naked. No sense in getting dressed when he was about to shift. “His warlord, the Tiger Lord, had learned of a Farungal weapon that had the power to destroy our continent. The Tiger Lord sent a small unit of soldiers to infiltrate the Farungal camp, but they were discovered. The battle was brutal. They were vastly outnumbered and were forced to retreat. But while the others ran away from the camp, one man—a human man—used them as a distraction to sneak further in. He crept past the guards, who were focused on giving chase, and he found the weapon.”
“Fuck.” I got to my feet and grinned. “That's my kind of guy.”
“Indeed.” Dal smiled back and looked at my new fae body. “Your kind of guy exactly.”
“So, he found the weapon and stole it?”
“He found the weapon and destroyed it,” Dal corrected. “It was black magic, a thing of evil that had cost the Farungal dearly. Cost them so much, in fact, that they've never attempted to recreate it.”
“But what was it exactly?”
“A curse,” Dal whispered. “A curse that would have required the slaughter of a battlefield to release it.”
“How did he destroy a curse?”
“There was no way that he could have known what it was. He shouldn't have even been able to recognize it as a weapon. All he found was a bottle. But he was drawn to it. He said that he heard a voice. It told him what the weapon was and how to defeat it.”
“I'm not a five-year-old listening to a bedtime story, Dal,” I huffed. “You don't have to draw it out for dramatic effect. Just tell me.”
Dalsharan snorted. “I'm trying to tell you that a human has heard the Beasts before.”
“How do you even know about that?” I asked suddenly. “I didn't tell you the stones talked to me.”
“All of them talked to you?” Dal lifted his brows.
I frowned and thought about it. “No, the Hawk Soul spoke to me directly, but the others were talking in the background.”
“What did they say?” he asked urgently.
I shook my head. “I don't remember. Something about... nope, I don't remember.”
“It's all right.” Dal took my shoulder in hand companionably. “It's miraculous enough that you heard them.”
“You still haven't told me how you know about that.”
He waved a hand at his chest where the Hawk Soul lay on its freshly fixed chain. “It speaks to me all the time.”
“All the time? That's gotta get annoying.”
“Not constantly.” Dal rolled his eyes. “Just often. It told me that it saw the greatness in you. That you were meant for a different life than the one you were born into.”
“I am?” I whispered, something shivering through me.
“You are.” The Hawk Lord smiled.
I just stared at him, amazed at how incredible he was, how casually gorgeous and powerful, and how I now seemed to have a place in his life.
“Mathias, that was the human soldier's name, sacrificed his life to destroy the curse,” Dal went on. “He drank it.”
“He drank it?” I made a face.
“It was a potion meant for the Farungal commander. He would have taken it right before battle and become like a god. A dark, evil god. He would have swept across Stalana and then into Varalorre, crushing all of us under his heel. But Mathias had a pure soul, and the magic had no evil to enhance. All it could do was release its power and fury upon him.”
“So, he died?”
“He almost died,” Dal said with a wry smile. “The men who escaped went straight to the Tiger Lord. Upon hearing of their failure, he decided to take a more direct approach and led his entire army to the camp. They found the Farungal General shrieking in fury as he beat on the dying human soldier. The Farungal had been so enraged by the loss of their curse that they hadn't even noticed the Tiger Army's approach. They were slaughtered, including the General. Mathias, however, clung to life, and the Tiger Lord was moved to save him. He used his soul stone to give Mathias a piece of his soul, granting him enough magic to heal the damage done to his body and extend his life. But the Beasts had called to Mathias for a reason. They wanted him. They admired his pure soul. So, when the Tiger Lord gave Mathias a seed of life, they decided to nourish that seed and give it the magic to turn a human into a fae.”