But then that eye opened. And it burned a golden line, like a laser, between our hands, my breasts, and up to my face.

Holding fierce eye contact, he thrust his tongue deep inside once more, curling inward until I gasped and bucked my hips.

Then, still capturing me in that unblinking stare, he released my hands and stood.

I stared up at him, limbs weakened, skin flushed under his gaze as he positioned himself between my damp, splayed thighs. His cocks jutted out almost angrily from his body, and I found myself wondering how the hell he fit those things inside him, usually so well-hidden.

The smaller, upper cock oozed pearlescent fluid. It dripped onto the slickened tip of the cock below, mixing with the liquid there until it all stretched downwards in a continuous, glistening rope of seed.

“I want you.”

I sucked in a breath at the harsh vulnerability of his admission. He’d already told me that – much more than that. But something about the staggering simplicity of the sentence touched deeper inside me than any words that had before.

I want you.

There was no fluff in a phrase like that. No room for interpretation. Not much poetry, either, except for the naked art of urgency. Stark and honest as a blade.

For a whirling moment, I thought he might take me right here, right now. Shove one of those cocks inside me, or both, waiting for the starburn be damned. Need was as plain and as dark on his face as storm clouds on the horizon of a hot, clear sky.

But he didn’t bend down to fit the head of one of his thick cocks against my body. Instead, he raised both his hands, wrapping each straining cock in a massive, murderous fist. Then, he started fucking them.

His hips snapped back and then shunted forward. He didn’t stroke his cocks. He kept his fists perfectly tight and still, and from the thrusting motion of his pelvis and the way he stared so hard at my cunt I knew, I fucking knew, that he was pretending to drive into me instead.

He’s going to do that to you soon.

Fire licked at the base of my spine. I watched him through glazed, slitted eyes, panting on my back as he rutted into his makeshift proxy for my body. His breath sounded like stone grinding on metal, his muscles seemed to tear at his bones, threatening to erupt right out of his scales, as he urged himself closer to furious climax.

My hand lifted from the bed, and it was like watching someone else’s hand. My fingers hovered, hesitating, until on Skalla’s next rutting thrust I touched the slick head of his larger cock.

At the contact, he spasmed.

Then he detonated.

His cocks burst with sudden, shimmering jets, the shafts jerking in fractured, throbbing unison as he snarled. I didn’t know if it was because he had two, if it was due to his excitement, or maybe it was just normal for him, but the fluid seemed endless. Spurting onto my abdomen, my breasts, dotting my throat and cheeks until I closed my eyes against the onslaught. Without seeing, I could only lie there and feel it. Feel the heated evidence of Skallagrim’s desire exploding onto my skin until I was slick and coated.

Because my eyes were closed, I had no warning for the scaly hand that bumped the side of my cheek, smearing moisture across my skin. Large fingertips traced a path down to my jaw before caressing the softest places where my heart beat at my throat.

I didn’t open my eyes. I didn’t flinch away. Even with claws that could end me a hair’s breadth from my artery, I lay still and let him do it.

Because after everything, even knowing what I now knew – that Skallagrim was impatient and possessive and that he’d killed before me – I trusted him. At least, I trusted that he’d never hurt me. I had no idea whether I could control his violence when it came to other people, but I knew as deeply as I knew my sister’s name that such violence would never be aimed at me. For me, maybe. But not at me.

So I lay there and breathed and felt his lust cooling on my skin as his fingers and thumb stroked at my throat. When he finally spoke, it was with a disbelieving laugh shaking underneath the words, as if he was amazed that this wasn’t a dream.

“Little star, pretty mate, I have made a mess of you.”

My eyes fluttered open. He didn’t look like he much minded the mess. In fact, he was looking down at me like I was the most precious piece of art he’d ever seen. My skin glistened with his pale fluid, like smooth, moonlight-spangled snow on the hills and valley of my breasts, the curve of my stomach. I drew my hand between my heavy breasts, feeling the slide of him. Skallagrim clutched at his cocks and grunted at the sight.

“The bedding, too,” I realized, feeling dampness on either side of me. I was still floating on a cloud of fluffy hormones and bone-jelly relaxation and I wasn’t ready to let dismay or embarrassment touch me. Not yet.

There would be time enough for that eventually. When I regained my sanity.

With what looked like a monumental effort, Skallagrim pressed his cocks towards his groin, the muscles in his slit contracting to cover them. It was like a fucking magic trick. Making not just one, but two dicks disappear.

And then I remembered that he could do things that most people actually would consider magic. He could levitate water and wood, boil liquids in the very air, and I stared up at him in hushed wonder, trying to decipher just why the universe had decided to put the two of us together.

Had he ever wondered the same?

And had he ever been disappointed? Disappointed that he’d ended up with a weak, quiet, stubborn, squishy little human who almost died from something as simple as river water touching a wound on her feet? If he’d had a choice, would he instead have wanted a glittering Bohnebregg female, or maybe someone from another world entirely? A warrior to match his strength, or some powerful alien queen? Didn’t he say he’d been a prince before?

Ouch. That thought hurt more than I wanted to admit. Like a pin to the side of a balloon, it deflated the relaxation surrounding me.

“I should get cleaned up,” I said. “And wash the sheets.”

Skallagrim growled in complaint, but ultimately grasped my wrists and helped me up. Together we stripped the bed, and my face flamed at the spots of wetness I saw there. Not just his, but mine too. Bundling it all up with my also-soiled robe, I hurried into the bathroom and closed the door.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Skallagrim

While Suvi cleaned herself, scrubbing the stain of my seed from her skin, I placed extra, clean bedding on the mattress then sat upon it. I stared at some blank point on the floorboards, but I saw nothing. My mind was entirely caught up in replaying everything that had just happened between Suvi and me in rapturous, torturous detail.

Blast me into the stone sky, I’d never imagined her to be so beautifully responsive to me already. Her vulnerable skin so sensitive, so aroused by every touch. She had not taken the news of being my mate well, and I hadn’t wanted to pressure or rush her, but it now occurred to me that I did not have to wait for her to starburn. I could woo her, seduce her, wring cries of pleasure from her even now. Make her want me, make her need me, before she even went into heat at all.

And then, when she burned, I would be ready. I would know every intricacy of her form, every secret, shivering place. I’d already learned some of them today, like the delicious little pink pearl of flesh at the top of her cunt that made her whole body wind up then let go with delight.

My cocks throbbed, agonisingly tender from the stimulation but still needing more. I regretted letting her go so soon. I was wary that by the time she stepped back out of the bathing area, she would have shut back down again. That we would go back to the disconcerting distance that seemed only to grow between us lately.