Bloodbound devourer

Chapter three

Twenty-four nights remained.

The citadel thrummed with uneasy celebration. Bonfires roared in every courtyard, lycans and visiting vampire delegates drinking, dancing, f*****g in the shadows to seal the fragile new alliance. Inside the royal wing, the air was thicker heavy with incense, blood, and the scent of unrelenting desire.

Ravenna no longer hiding behind Vespera’s name, now openly the king’s bonded mate stood on the balcony of the king’s private chambers. The midnight silk robe clung to her like smoke, parted just enough to reveal the swell of her breasts and the faint curve of her stomach where new life already stirred. The child. Their weapon. Their chain.

Draven’s reflection appeared behind her in the glass doors, golden eyes feral in the torchlight. He had dismissed the guards hours ago. No one would disturb them tonight.

“You’re thinking too loudly,” he growled, voice rough from the day’s councils and the constant strain of holding his shift at bay. The full moon still lingered in the sky, three nights past its peak but strong enough to drive every lycan in the kingdom half-mad with need.

She turned slowly, letting the robe fall open completely. Moonlight painted silver across her pale skin, highlighting the fresh bite marks he’d left on her throat, her collarbone, the inside of her thigh. “I’m thinking about how easily you discarded her,” she said. “The wolf version of me. How quickly the bond rewrote itself to fit your ambition.”

His jaw tightened. He crossed the distance in two strides, crowding her against the stone balustrade. The night wind whipped her hair across his chest. “I discarded nothing. The bond chose you. It recognized you.”

“Liar,” she whispered again, but there was no heat in it only hunger. She rose on her toes and sank her fangs into the curve of his neck, not gently. Blood flooded her mouth, rich and blazing with alpha power. He groaned, hands slamming against the stone on either side of her head, caging her.

The taste of him sent fire straight to her core. She drank deeper, feeling his c**k harden instantly against her belly through the thin barrier of his trousers. When she pulled back, lips crimson, his eyes had shifted fully golden wolf irises glowing in the dark.

“You want truth?” he rasped. “Here’s truth.”

He spun her roughly, bending her over the balustrade. Cool stone bit into her hips as he yanked the robe down her arms, baring her completely to the night. Far below, lycans howled in the courtyards, sensing their king’s arousal through the pack bond. The sound rolled over her like a wave.

Draven’s hand fisted in her hair, arching her neck back. “I’ve wanted to f**k you like this since the first time I smelled you in the archives,” he confessed against her ear. “Vespera, Ravenna doesn’t matter what name you wore. You walked into a room and my wolf went insane.”

His other hand slid between her thighs from behind, finding her already soaked. Two thick fingers pushed inside without warning, curling hard. She cried out, the sound echoing across the citadel grounds.

“Tell me you don’t feel it,” he demanded, pumping his fingers in a ruthless rhythm. “Tell me this body doesn’t crave me the way I crave it.”

She pushed back against his hand, riding his fingers shamelessly. “I feel it,” she admitted on a moan. “I hate that I feel it.”

He withdrew abruptly, leaving her aching and empty. Then the blunt head of his c**k pressed against her entrance bare, burning hot. He didn’t ease in. He drove forward in one brutal thrust, burying himself to the hilt.

Ravenna screamed, pleasure and pain exploding through her. He was huge in this form, half-shifted, the knot at the base of his c**k already swelling. He gave her no time to adjust just pulled back and slammed in again, setting a punishing pace that rocked her against the stone.

“Mine,” he snarled with every thrust. “My mate. My queen. My f*****g apocalypse.”

The balcony shook with the force of it. Her breasts scraped against rough stone, n*****s hardening to painful points. His free hand snaked around to pinch one, rolling it harshly until she sobbed.

She reached back blindly, claws extending vampire talons raking down his thigh, drawing blood. He roared approval, hips snapping faster. The scent of blood and s*x filled the air, driving them both feral.

“Harder,” she gasped. “Make it hurt.”

He obliged, releasing her hair to grip her hips with bruising strength, pounding into her so deeply she felt him in her throat. His knot swelled further, catching on every withdrawal, stretching her impossibly. The pressure built, exquisite agony.

When he leaned over her, chest to her back, his teeth found the mating mark he’d already placed on her shoulder. He bit down again, reopening the wound, blood trickling hot down her breast. The bond flared white-hot, linking their pleasure until she couldn’t tell where she ended and he began.

She came first, shattering around him with a wail that carried across the kingdom. Her inner walls clamped down, milking his knot. He followed seconds later, roaring her name as he flooded her pulse after pulse of searing heat, the knot locking them together, ensuring every drop stayed deep inside.

They stayed joined like that for long minutes, his weight pinning her to the balustrade, both of them trembling. His tongue lapped gently at the fresh bite, soothing now instead of savage.

Eventually the knot receded enough for him to pull out. He turned her carefully, lifting her into his arms as if she weighed nothing. c*m trickled down her thighs his claim, undeniable.

Inside the bedchamber, he laid her on the massive fur-covered bed and climbed over her, still hard. Lycan recovery was instantaneous under a strong moon.

“This time slow,” he murmured, voice rough with reverence now. He spread her legs wide, settling between them, and slid back inside with deliberate care. The contrast gentle after violence made her gasp.

He rocked into her steadily, eyes locked on hers. One hand splayed over her lower belly, feeling the faint spark of life there. “Our child will be unstoppable,” he said. “Stronger than any god-beast.”

She wrapped her legs around his waist, meeting each thrust. “And if it chooses her side?” she asked softly. “The wolf me?”

His rhythm faltered for the first time. “Then we burn together.”

The honesty in his voice undid her. She pulled him down into a kiss—slow, deep, almost tender. Tongues tangled, fangs nicking lips, blood shared like communion.

He made love to her then, truly long, languid strokes that built the pleasure higher and higher until she was begging. When she came again, it was with tears in her eyes, his name a prayer and a curse.

Afterward, he held her against his chest, one possessive hand stroking her stomach. “Sleep,” he commanded. “You need strength for what’s coming.”

But sleep didn’t come easily. As his breathing evened out, Ravenna stared at the ceiling, feeling the child quicken a flutter like dark wings.

She slipped from the bed near dawn, wrapping herself in his discarded shirt. It smelled of him pine, blood, s*x. Comfort and threat in one.

In the adjoining solar, she found the silver dagger wolf-Ravenna had given her. She pressed the blade to her palm, watching black blood well up. Then she wrote on the parchment she’d prepared:

North borders weaken. Vampire scouts sighted near Blackthorn Pass. Come swiftly. Bring fire.

She sealed it with wax and her blood, then summoned a shadow-raven one of the vampire clan’s messenger birds. It took the note into the night, heading north.

When she returned to bed, Draven’s arm snaked around her waist, pulling her back against him even in sleep. His hand settled protectively over her belly.

She closed her eyes and dreamed of two women with the same face one burning on an altar, the other rising from the ashes with an army at her back.

Twenty-four nights.

The child kicked again, stronger this time.

And somewhere in the northern wilds, green eyes read the message by firelight, lips curving into a savage smile.

War was coming.

But first, more blood. More s*x. More lies.

The prophecy demanded everything.

And Ravenna intended to give it just enough to choke on.

Later that day, the court gathered for the official presentation of the bonded queen.

Ravenna walked the great hall in a gown of blood-red velvet, throat bare to display Draven’s fresh mating mark. The child was still too new to show, but she carried herself with the subtle glow of creation and destruction.

Vampire envoys bowed low, satisfaction gleaming in their eyes. Their princess had succeeded beyond expectation.

Lycan elders grumbled, but none dared challenge the bond now sealed under the moon’s witness.

Draven sat on the throne, pulling her onto his lap publicly a brazen display of possession. His hand slid possessively up her thigh beneath the folds of her gown, fingers teasing her through the thin silk barrier. She bit her lip to stifle a moan as he circled her c**t lazily, right there in front of the court.

“Let them see,” he whispered against her ear. “Let them know you’re mine in every way.”

She ground down subtly, hiding the motion behind the throne’s high arms. The risk heightened everything the eyes on them, the whispers. When she came, it was silently, head thrown back against his shoulder, fangs buried in her own lip to keep from crying out.

He followed moments later, spilling inside her with a low growl only she could hear.

The court applauded the “blessing” of their union, unaware they’d just witnessed the conception reinforced again.

Afterward, in the privacy of the throne room’s alcove, he pressed her against the wall and took her once more quick, dirty, desperate. Her legs wrapped around his waist, gown rucked up, his c**k driving deep while courtiers milled just beyond the curtain.

“Again,” she demanded when he finished, still hungry. “I want to feel you in me all day.”

He laughed darkly, spinning her to face the wall and entering her from behind. “Greedy little vampire.”

“Your greedy vampire,” she corrected, pushing back to meet him. “Breed me again, my king. Make sure the world knows whose side the beast will rise on.”

He f****d her until her legs shook, until she was dripping with him, marked inside and out.

When they finally emerged, composed and regal, no one dared meet her crimson gaze.

Power thrummed through her veins s****l, maternal, lethal.

Twenty-four nights.

She caressed her stomach discreetly.

Come quickly, sister-self, she thought. The board is set.

And this time, when the knife falls, it won’t be my throat it finds.