CHAPTER 6: THE STIRRING WITHIN
535 Words
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Kael couldn’t sleep.
His body was too hot, too tight, too aware. Every brush of fur against his skin made him flinch. His n*****s ached. His thighs still trembled from Vaelen’s knot, and worse—something deeper had begun to pulse inside him.
He felt full. Heavy. Off balance.
And the scent of Vaelen—gods, it was everywhere. He couldn’t breathe without tasting it, couldn’t move without craving more of it. Spice, pine, smoke, and s*x. It clung to the den like a second skin, like a possessive hand wrapped around his throat.
He turned over with a soft whimper, curling tighter in the furs.
Vaelen stirred instantly.
“You’re in pain,” he said, voice still thick with sleep, already reaching for him.
Kael didn’t protest. He let himself be gathered up, cradled against the alpha’s chest.
“It’s not pain,” Kael whispered. “It’s… something else. I feel strange.”
Vaelen pressed a kiss to his temple, fangs grazing lightly over skin. “Tell me.”
Kael hesitated. “My stomach… it feels different. Like there’s pressure. And my skin—gods, everything feels too much. I can smell everything, even the moss outside the den. And you—” he inhaled sharply, “—you’re too strong. I want to crawl inside your skin.”
Vaelen went still.
Then: “It’s started.”
Kael’s breath caught. “What?”
“You’re pregnant,” Vaelen said, with that dangerous kind of reverence only an alpha could manage. “The bond knows. Your body knows. And now it’s beginning.”
Kael shuddered. “But it’s so soon.”
“You’re Aurelian,” Vaelen murmured. “It won’t be normal. Nothing about this is. The child will grow fast. The magic wants it born.”
Kael buried his face in Vaelen’s neck, breathing him in like air. “I feel like I’m losing myself.”
“No,” Vaelen growled. “You’re being rebuilt. Made to carry something stronger. My heir.”
His hand slipped between Kael’s thighs, fingers spreading slick. “Still wet,” he whispered, voice gone rough. “Even after everything. Your body’s desperate to keep me inside you.”
Kael whimpered. “I ache.”
“I’ll fix it.”
Vaelen lifted Kael, straddling him over his lap, guiding his c**k inside with brutal slowness. Kael cried out, stretching open, the fullness overwhelming.
Vaelen’s hand slid to Kael’s belly, resting over the soft curve that hadn’t been there days ago.
“I’ll worship this,” he whispered. “I’ll worship you. Every night. Every breath. Every stretch of your body around mine.”
Kael clung to him, hips rolling instinctively, the bond singing between them.
“I feel it,” Kael moaned. “Something inside me. It’s alive. Not just the child—something else.”
Vaelen kissed his chest, his throat, the mark. “That’s the bloodline. It’s feeding on the bond. On me. And I’ll keep giving until there’s nothing left.”
His knot swelled again, locking them together.
Kael arched, moaning, pleasure and magic and hunger colliding into something otherworldly.
They lay there after, joined, panting, trembling.
And deep in Kael’s womb, something stirred.
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- Writer
