Eight lovely points form on my wrist in gilded ink—a more elaborate twin to the sigil I carved into him.

“Now bite me,” Evander commands, baring his throat. “Don’t be gentle.”

My teeth sink into the corded muscle of his neck, and I bite down until he shudders against me. Until the copper tang of him spills hot and sweet across my tongue.

Nothing has ever tasted so holy. So profane.

He plunges his hands into my hair and tips my head, pressing his mouth to mine and kissing me deeply. Chasing the taste of himself. Of us.

I’m lost to it, to him. There’s no up or down, no air, no gravity. Nothing exists except sensation. The torrent of memory and feeling roars through the place where our souls collide.

The fundamental parts of me rearrange to accommodate the shape of him. It’s separate and symbiotic all at once. Two sets of heaving lungs, straining for oxygen. That’s his heartbeat pounding beside mine. His soul flooding me with mine and always and let me keep you.

His love is more natural disaster than emotion. It does not bend. It does not yield. There are no words in any language to capture the depthless intensity, how completely it consumes him. I’m on fire and I’m drowning, and I’m certain this will shatter me. Because it isn’t gentle, it isn’t sweet. It isn’t something I can cup in my palms like glass or hold tenderly to my chest.

It’s a storm. A war cry.

Evander’s hands are everywhere, now. Unlacing my boots. Stripping me with ruthless efficiency. Hot palms and clever fingers skate over every part of me.

“Fucking exquisite,” he rasps. His trousers and boots meet mine on the forest floor. “You’re so damn perfect.”

His mouth follows the path forged by his fingers. He pushes me against the tree, holding me up as his mouth nudges between my thighs. Each reverent swipe of his tongue against my pussy, each press of his lips, feels like an act of worship.

He whispers words in a language I don’t understand, but somehow, I know it means forever. Means always. The translation bleeds through our bond in fits and starts—in vows of vengeance and fidelity. In oaths to raze entire kingdoms to ash for me.

His hands tighten, digging into my hips hard enough to bruise. When he opens his eyes and looks up at me, the breath leaves me in a rush. It’s awe and adoration, worship and want.

My Chosen, I hear him think as he licks into me. Mine.

Then he rises and kisses me again, and I taste myself on him—my blood, my pleasure. I’m lost. I drown myself in the slide of his tongue against mine as he delves deeper, hotter, tasting and taking and devouring.

Evander’s hands slip beneath my ass, gripping me tight. I wrap my legs around his waist as he pins me up against the trunk. The rough bark scrapes my shoulders, but I barely register the sting. Not when he’s notching his hips between my thighs, his cock a blunt pressure against me.

“Look at me,” he says. “Don’t take your eyes off me.”

Our stares lock as he slowly pushes forward. Then he begins to move. Hips rolling in a slow, deliberate rhythm. Pulling out only to surge back in, again and again, settling into a pattern that has me digging my heels into his ass. Clutching him closer. Deeper.

This isn’t like Aethertide. This is slower, tender, and more raw than I knew sex could be. A declaration of intent. All the while, his eyes remain on my face, tracking the flutter of my lashes, my breaths, the helpless part of my lips as sensation winds tighter.

“I tried so hard not to love you,” Evander tells me with a thrust that has me seeing stars. “But then you left, and I didn’t know how to be in a world that didn’t have you in it.”

I dig my nails into his shoulders, urging him on. “Couldn’t even keep the roses alive for a day?”

A breathless huff of laughter stirs my hair. He slides his palm down to press against the small of my back, shifting his stance, hitting deeper. “That’s right. Never stood a chance.” He presses a kiss to my jaw. “I don’t know that I’ll ever deserve you. I’m not a good male. I’ll never be easy.”

“If I wanted easy, I wouldn’t have fallen in love with a god.”

He laughs. Then he readjusts his grip on my thighs until he can push them wider, sinking deeper. He fucks me a little harder. A little more focused. His cock drags over a spot inside me that sets my veins alight. He shifts his weight, wedging a hand between us to skim down, down, and then his fingers press to my clit.

My head thumps back against the trunk. “Right there.”

He rubs in tight circles, timing it with each thrust. My back bows, and my muscles clench down as pleasure builds and builds.

“That’s it,” he breathes. “Come apart for me. Let me feel you.”

He leans down to lick my pulse before setting his teeth to the delicate skin—a bright burst of pleasure-pain that sends me hurtling over the edge. I splinter with a fractured cry. There is only the clench of my body around his, him inside me as he buries his face in my hair and groans his completion against my neck. The ragged symphony of our breathing and the thundering of our hearts as they gradually slow.

Evander nuzzles me, his chest expanding with a deep inhale like he’s trying to memorize my scent. To carry it with him always.

Carefully, he peels us away from the tree and lowers us to the grass, cushioning me on a wing. He props himself up on his elbow and trails reverent fingers over my face. “Hey, Chosen.” There’s an entire liturgy of longing distilled down into those two words. “How are we feeling?”

I turn my attention inward to the glittering tapestry of him in my head. He’s everywhere—threaded through my every breath, bleeding into all the hollow spaces I didn’t even know were empty until he filled them up and made them his.

“Yours,” I tell him. And it encompasses everything. “I feel like I’m yours.”

Evander’s eyes flare. “Again.”

“Yours.”

Something eases in his expression. “I like the way that sounds.”

A comfortable silence settles between us. I lift a hand, idly brushing the symbol carved into his chest. The cuts have already healed over into thin, silvery scars.

“Will these stay?”

Evander covers my fingers with his own, pressing my palm flat over the steady thud of his heart. “Chosen marks always stay.”

“And you want that?”

“I want everything with you.” After a lingering press of his lips to mine, Evander sits up. “I hate to cut this short, but I need to take you back to the tower.”

With a groan, I tug on my discarded garments. By the time I finish lacing my boots, Evander is dressed.

I give his wings an indulgent stroke. “And after you take me back?”

Evander opens his mouth to answer, but then his head snaps up. He narrows his eyes at the treeline. “Go,” he snarls without taking his attention off the trees. His tone brooks no argument. “Run, Devaliant.”

So I do.

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43

EVANDER

BASTIEN,” I SAY, my voice steady despite the unease slithering down my spine.

Those obsidian eyes fix on me as he emerges from the trees. “You’ve been busy. I saw you made quite a mess in Hellevig.”

There’s a dangerous calm to the words, a dispassionate sort of observation, but I’m not fooled. His power is gathering, the pressure building in the air. Shadows writhe across the ground.

He tilts his head as he scents the air. “You’re struggling. Ruptured organs?”

“Kidneys, twenty minutes ago. But my power’s sorted it. Probably.”