There was something toxic, nearly drugging, about the way Wylfrael wanted me. It robbed me of common sense and spoke to something much deeper, without language and without thought, something carnal and instinctive that told me to go to him, to put my neck in the predator’s jaws and see if he’d bite down.

Eventually, I got to the point where my heart was banging so hard in my chest that I couldn’t swallow another bite. Brekken benefitted from my loss of appetite – I placed my half-empty bowl on the floor beside him

“Food! Food! Pretty pretty Torrance two-legs give! Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes!”

His many excited yelps were cut off as he began madly lapping at the bowl. Even though the dishes were fairly large compared to what I was used to on Earth, the bowl looked tiny under his head.

I bid the others goodnight and left the kitchen. I wondered if I should go back in there, grab my cloak, and walk outside for a bit. Try to use the cold to clear my head. But, as if pulled by some invisible and inevitable tether, my body began to move, my feet carrying me through the tunnel that led to the Eve Tower.

I mounted the stairs, passing floor after floor, room after room. My heart beat so quickly it felt like it was trying to run right out of my chest. To escape the body that was betraying it. It had climbed all the way up to my throat by the time I opened the bedroom door with a shaky hand.

My breath whooshed out of me. In a rather anti-climactic turn of events, Wylfrael wasn’t there.

Probably should have expected that, considering how he’s barely here at all these days.

The stab of disappointment infuriated me, and I decided to make myself busy until he eventually came back. A bath. I hadn’t had one yet today, and if something did happen when he came back...

Oh, my God. Why should I care if I’m clean or not for him?

I wasn’t sure if it was pride about not being seen as an unhygienic human, or if, pride be damned, I just wanted him to be pleased by the state of my body. I told myself fiercely it was the former while being afraid it was probably the latter.

I started up the bath, undressed, and slipped inside.

The holes in the tiles were about halfway up. When sitting on one of the built-in benches, the water created glorious pressure on the muscles on either side of my spine. I sighed, leaning back, as warm water massaged my back and began to fill the tub, covering my feet, my ankles, rising up my calves. I couldn’t rest my feet on the floor of the tub while sitting on the bench the way someone larger, like Wylfrael, could, so I swished my feet back and forth in the steaming water. Humidity made my skin dewy, dampened my hair until it stuck to me. I gathered it up, pulling it into a heavy twist on the top of my head, secured with nothing but its own weight. I closed my eyes as the water rose higher, nearly to my knees, almost submerging the bench I sat on.

“Bath time, little bride?”

I nearly jumped out of my skin. My eyes flew open, and I slammed my arms over my chest to cover myself.

Of fucking course this would happen. Of course, my timing would be this bad, or his just that good. I should have known he’d come back in here at precisely the worst time.

Or maybe, in some unmentionable part of myself, I’d known he would. I’d wanted this to happen and hadn’t been able to admit it.

No! I argued against that thought. I did not plan this!

At least... not consciously.

Wylfrael looked magnificent, as always. So beautiful it almost made me hate him all over again. He’d come in and closed the door behind him, something I hadn’t heard above the rush of water, and now leaned against it, wings relaxing downward and to the sides, arms crossed over his broad chest.

“Uncross your arms,” he said, a command that sounded soft, belying the knife’s edge of authority to it.

“You uncross your arms,” I snapped, rather idiotically, but I couldn’t quite string together coherent thoughts while hot and naked and wet under Wylfrael’s gaze.

Surprisingly, he obeyed. And perhaps unsurprisingly, he came closer, gliding into the room like fire licking further into the house it meant to destroy.

When he reached the edge of the bath across from me, he stopped. His face was taut, but ultimately impassive. It was only a tremor running through his wings and tail, and a thick bobbing of muscle at his throat, that gave him away. That, and the swelling at his groin. I lifted my chin in triumph, glad that I wasn’t the only one so affected by the situation. I could see his control, and see what surged beneath it. Magma under ice.

He kept his voice even, a slow drawl, as he undid the laces on his vest and slipped it off, baring hard muscle and stars. “I could use a bath as well.”

Oh, fucking hell.

“Don’t come in here,” I said, wrapping my arms tighter around myself and scowling. “Get your own bath.”

“This is my bath, little bride.”

I wanted to come up with some clever quip, but I couldn’t. My words were completely lost to me as he kicked off his boots and ridded himself of his trousers.

My breathing hitched as I took him in, standing completely nude before me, for the first time.

The first thing I noticed was that the stars were everywhere. Not just on his chest and wings but all the way down his thick, muscled legs to his feet and even...

Even on his cock.

I hadn’t seen it that night. Only felt the urgent press of it against my slick pussy. His fist had concealed the shaft.

Nothing concealed it now.

He had no pubic hair, just smooth skin, like bronze but cooler in tone, somewhere between copper and stone. He was fully erect, his cock both familiar and alien. It was vaguely human in shape, but huge, thick at the base and tapering smoothly to a wide, rounded point. There was no foreskin that I could see, and no distinct bulbous head, either, just that long, tapering rod, with two heavy, dark testicles beneath. Mouth dry, I traced the stars along his cock with my eyes, remembering the heated thrum of them under my fingertips and wondering if I’d feel those little vibrations inside myself.

No, I won’t. Because we’ve already established that he’s not going to fuck you like that.

But there my body went betraying me again. Because all I could think about was what he’d feel like inside me, stroking inside, throbbing, rutting...

“So. Um. How has all your business been going?” I said squeakily, trying to distract myself from sexual tension so thick it nearly strangled me.

“Slowly,” Wylfrael said, stepping into the bath and lowering himself onto a bench across from me. The bath had filled more, coming up to my hips, now. But he was so much bigger, his cock so long and hard, that it jutted out of the heated water.

“And yours?” he asked.

“Mine?” I asked, trying to retain at least some sense. But it was hard – hard to talk to him as if we weren’t both naked, as if his cock wasn’t calling to my body from across the water.

“Yes. The wedding planning,” he said. He stretched his arms back along the floor and gazed at me, the positioning of his body all arrogant power, thick thighs spread, cock ready.

He’s waiting for me to come to him.

I steeled my spine. I wouldn’t. At least, not yet. I could hold back. I could have some power here.

“It’s going well, thank you,” I said crisply. “Though I still don’t know when it’s actually happening.”

“It will be the day before the gathering of the gods. I want to marry you before I bring you before the other stone sky gods.”

“Oh. I see.” That was soon. The gathering of the gods was a week from now. Which meant we’d be getting married in only six days.

My throat bobbed. I’d known this was coming. But realizing just how quickly it was barrelling towards me was a shock.