A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire (Blood and Ash 2)

Casteel was hungry.

Starving.

Was it for blood? He’d said that Atlantians needed the blood of their own. Had he been…feeding? Surely, he had. There were Atlantians here. He’d bitten me a few days ago. He’d drunk from me, but not a lot. I had no idea how potent my blood was, but if it could make vamprys, I imagined it held some allure to him. I also had no idea how often an Atlantian needed to feed, but that sumptuous, heavy feeling coursing through the connection sparked a primal sort of knowledge that this wasn’t just about satisfying a physical hunger.

But under the hunger, I didn’t feel any other emotions. The razor-sharp sadness that always cut through him was absent. I didn’t know if any part of Casteel or even Hawke was inside him now.

My heart pounded as I tugged on my left arm, the one still pinned to the bed beside my waist. His grip loosened, and he then let go, but he didn’t move. I was overly aware of how close his breath, his mouth was to the most sensitive part of me and where I knew a major artery waited. His head turned just the slightest bit, and his chin grazed the crease of my thigh. Several inches lower, closer to the knee, were the gouges in my skin that looked like claw marks but had been made by the teeth of a Craven. I felt none of the horror and fear as I had then, nor the revulsion and certainty of death. All I felt was a delicious ache.

The hand that held the knife to his throat trembled as a forbidden pulse of arousal thundered through me. It was wrong, and I shouldn’t feel the heat, the dampness gathering there. But it also felt right, and so natural, even while none of this seemed natural.

He made that sound again, the rolling rumble, and my entire body shuddered. I could barely breathe, let alone think. My senses were firing all at once, and when he dipped his head, my arm went lax, bending to accommodate. My fingers spasmed open, and the knife fell to the bed beside me.

What are you doing? What is wrong with you? What are you—?

He gripped my hips with both hands, lifting me, and then his mouth was on me, obliterating the panicky questions. The air left my lungs as his tongue sliced over the very center of me. This wasn’t like the last time, the only time. There was no teasing, slow exploration as he guided me into the wicked act. This time, he devoured me, capturing my flesh with his mouth, delving into the warmth and dampness with firm, determined strokes of his tongue. He fed from me as if I were the sweetest nectar, the source of the very life force he needed. I was consumed.

Crying out as my head kicked back, I was lost in the raw sensations. My body moved of its own accord—or tried to. He held me firmly in place, and there was no matching the sinful assault, no escaping it even if I wanted to. Fierce heat built inside me, twisting and tightening as everything in me seemed to concentrate on where he was. My back arched as I grasped the sheets fitted to the bed. His lips moved against me, his tongue inside me, and the sharp graze of his teeth scraped the bundle of nerves. The sensation echoed in the healed bite mark on my neck. It was too much. I screamed as I shattered, breaking apart into a thousand satin-garbed shards of pleasure as intense, stunning release rolled through me in undulating waves.

I was still trembling when I felt him lift his head. Blinking my eyes open in a daze, I lowered my chin and what little air had entered my lungs left me.

His eyes were pitch-black now, no amber to be seen, but they weren’t empty and cold like the Ascended’s. They were endless and heated, but equally disconcerting to look into. His glistening lips parted—

A terrace door swung open, and a gust of wind swept through the room and over the bed as Kieran stormed inside, his hand on the hilt of his sword.

He drew up short, brows inching up on his forehead. I had no idea what he could see or how much Casteel’s body shielded since the curtains had been pulled back. “I heard you scream,” Kieran said in way of explanation. “Obviously, I misread the situation.”

There was no time to feel the burn of mortification. Casteel’s head swung in Kieran’s direction. A violent snarl of warning doused the languid heat in my body. That was a far different sound than what I’d heard from him, even when he first woke. This promised blood-soaked death.

“Shit,” Kieran muttered, his pale blue gaze widening on the Atlantian. “Cas, my brother, I warned you this would happen.”

I had no idea what Kieran had warned Casteel about, but I could see his muscles tensing, preparing, and my gift…oh gods, my gift was still open, still connected to him. What I felt from him then truly scared me. The acidic sting of anger mingled with a charred taste I was unfamiliar with, but whatever it was, it was bad enough that I feared for Kieran’s life.

And I wasn’t exactly sure when I started to care if the wolven lived or died, but his death would be…it would be yet another unnecessary one. I didn’t want that.

“Casteel,” I tried, hoping that would garner his attention, and not of the murderous variety.

He didn’t seem to hear me, his chin dropping even lower as his fingers slid from my hips. Snarling, he bared his fangs.

“I hope you’re listening, Poppy,” Kieran said, voice low and unbelievably calm as he let go of the hilt of his sword. “When he lunges for me, I need you to run. Go to the area near the stables. It will have double doors. Find Naill or Delano. Get ready.”

Get ready? He expected me to run? Besides the fact that I rarely ran for help, I doubted that I would even make it to the door.

“Casteel,” I tried again, and when I felt the power coiling in him, I did the only thing I could think of. Using my gift, I reached out and placed my hand on his arm. I thought of every wonderful feeling I’d ever felt. Walking on the beach with my mother holding one hand and my father holding the other with Ian dancing in front of us, kicking up sand. I sent that through the connection, through the contact of my flesh to his, using the same technique I did to temporarily give a reprieve from pain. I didn’t know why I said what I did next, other than I needed to. “It’s okay, Hawke.”

His entire body jerked as if an invisible hand had grabbed him by his shoulder and pulled. Chest rising and falling in rapid, short pants, his back bowed as his hands landed on either side of my hips. He didn’t move. Not for several long moments, but slowly, through my abilities, I no longer had the charred taste in my mouth, and I felt something under the hunger—a cyclone of shame and sadness.

Slowly, he lifted his head and opened his eyes. I let out a ragged breath. They were amber, the only black his pupils. His gaze met mine, and a long moment stretched out between us. Swallowing thickly, I dropped my hand as he looked down.

“Honeydew,” Casteel whispered. He grabbed the halves of my robe, tugging it over my hips and my thighs. His hands lingered there, a faint tremor coursing through them as he lifted his gaze to mine once more. “I’m sorry.”

And then he rose from the bed and walked out of the terrace doors, past Kieran, without saying another word.

Chapter 23

Sunlight streamed in through the terrace doors, and for several moments, all I could do was sit there and stare at the open door. I couldn’t believe what’d happened, from the moment I woke up, all tangled up with him, until he left the bedchamber. What had happened to him left me confused. And my actions, what I’d done and allowed, left me stunned and in a daze.

Casteel had lost his mind.

I’d lost my mind.

Kieran closed the door, cutting off the rush of sweet-scented air and snapping me from my thoughts. My gaze cut to where he stood in front of the fireplace. The flames had calmed, no longer stirred by the wind. “Did he hurt you?”

“What?” My voice was hoarse as I blinked.

“Did he hurt you, Penellaphe?” Kieran repeated, his voice softening.

“No. He…” I looked at my bare legs. He hadn’t hurt me. He could’ve, and I wasn’t even sure if he hadn’t wanted to, but he’d done the furthest thing from hurting me. Reaching for the blanket, I tugged it to my waist.

A muscle flexed in Kieran’s jaw. “He didn’t force himself on you?”

“Gods, no.” I shoved the hair back from my face and caught sight of the knife. It remained where I’d dropped it on the bed. Casteel hadn’t forced anything, and the truth was, I could’ve stopped what’d happened at any point if I wanted to. I could’ve wounded him enough to attempt an escape. But I hadn’t because I…I’d wanted what’d happened. I’d woken up wanting that. And I didn’t know if Casteel had sensed my desire through whatever had its claws in him, but regardless, I had wanted that.

Him.

I searched for remorse or shame, anything that would show that I regretted what’d taken place, but there was nothing. Like before, there was just vast confusion and irritation with myself because I knew better—knew that things like this just aided in me falling more and more for him. Not too long ago, I had told him that nothing like that would ever happen again, and I’d proven that I couldn’t trust myself to make good life choices—not once or twice but three times. The pantry. The nightmare. And now, this. How could I want him so badly that I didn’t care about what he did or who he was? Or what he might do to me?

“What happened?” Kieran asked.

It took a couple of moments for me to gather my thoughts. “He woke up, and it was like he didn’t recognize me. He was snarling, and his eyes were pitch-black.” I left out quite a bit there as I looked at Kieran, but I was sure he already knew a great deal of what’d happened. “His eyes reminded me of an Ascended. Is he…will he be okay?”

Kieran’s face was impressively blank, considering what had just happened. “He should be once he cools down.”

“Cools down? I think he needs more than that.” I glanced at the door. “He was about to attack you.”

“In that moment, he saw me as a challenge.” He paused. “A threat.”

“To who? Him?”

“You.”

My heart turned over heavily. “That doesn’t make sense.”