Chained Soul by Eva Chase
5
Talia
As the sky darkens to shades of purple with the deepening evening, the pack steps back from where they’ve gathered around their two fallen kin. I slip through the gathering to where I can watch Sylas begin the funeral ceremony I first saw him carry out for his brother-in-law, Kellan.
For both of the murdered fae, a couple of family members or friends join the arch-lord in chanting the magic-laced words and moving through the gestures. The herbal scent that rises off the leafy fronds placed around the shrouded bodies takes me back to that past ceremony more vividly than I like.
Kellan was the first fae I ever saw die. There’ve been so many more since then. I’ve found a lot of happiness here in the Mists, but there’s no way to deny that it’s come with a lot of danger and violence as well.
I didn’t know either of my pack-kin being honored tonight well. As part of the pack’s contingent of warriors, they were often out on patrols, not hanging out around the pack village for the more domestic tasks I’ve helped with. But I can tell from the words Sylas and their loved ones say in their honor that they were well-respected and will be missed a great deal.
As Sylas raises the goblet with its shimmering liquid and asks that the summer sun embrace the dead woman at his feet “with all its warmth,” a shiver runs through me. How much more will the Murk steal from all of us before they’re finished?
Sylas pours the liquid over the body, and the shroud glimmers for a few moments before absorbing it. The other fae ease back as he falls into a more intent chant, the one that will transform the woman into her soulstone, a sparkling representation of the being she once was.
He finishes with a stretch of his hands over her body, and the flare of light washes over us all. I know to expect it this time, but it takes my breath away all the same.
When he’s completed her ritual, Sylas moves on to the shrouded man next to her. Whitt brings him a fresh goblet of the ceremonial liquid. Even the spymaster with his normally impervious good humor looks grim this evening.
He thought he’d given us a huge advantage with the new tracking strategy he came up with. Instead it led to several deaths across the arch-lords’ domains. I didn’t see the body, but August said Kesral was killed too.
My gaze flicks toward the glinting haze along the border between the realms. How is Laoni coping with his loss, when she fought so hard against admitting she cared about him while he was alive?
Kesral might have supported his lady over me, but I can’t blame him for that. He was kind to me and willing to open up the few times we traveled to the human world together. I might have liked to attend his funeral too, to honor him in my own small way, but I doubt Laoni would approve of my presence.
I didn’t even ask Corwin. He’s kept himself partly shielded from me as he carries out a funeral for one of his flock folk, the impressions that do seep through tinged with so much sorrow and fury that I can understand why he’s trying to shelter me from them even though he doesn’t need to.
August shifts his weight where he’s standing at the front of the gathering just a few steps from Sylas, his head bowed low. I haven’t managed to talk to him much either since he returned this afternoon, bearing the dead. The anguish I can read in his posture and his expression jerks at my heart. Knowing him, he’s taking the full weight of the blame for himself. As if the rat shifters haven’t taken so many of us by surprise so many times.
When Sylas has completed the second ritual, the families step forward to collect the soulstones. Then the pack drifts away, many of them gathering by the houses to grieve together.
Sylas nods to me and turns toward the castle of Hearth-by-the-Heart with Whitt flanking him. I’ll stay with them there until everything’s settled on both sides of the border. Both they and Corwin are worried about keeping our joint castle well-protected while everyone’s distracted by the funerals.
August turns on his heel, stretches out into wolf form, and lopes toward the woods, his ruddy fur sparking with the last bits of sunlight before the shadows between the trees swallow him up.
I know sometimes he goes for a run on his own when he’s grappling with his emotions. I hope he’ll come back soon.
In the castle, I find myself drifting down to the basement. The leather sofa in the entertainment room holds a hint of August’s musky scent from his many stints on the video game console. Maybe he’ll come down here or to the gym once he’s back to work off some tension in other ways.
I nestle against the arm of the sofa and wait, keeping my ears pricked. When footsteps rasp over the stairs, I raise my head in anticipation. But they stop just after they hit the smooth floor of the hall. I wait for several seconds and then limp over to the doorway.
It is August. He’s standing motionless in the middle of the hallway at the base of the steps, the brighter light that streams down the staircase deepening the contrast of shadows on his brawny body. He seems to be staring at the wall, or at nothing—or maybe at something he can only see in his mind, drawn from his memories.
It isn’t hard to guess what he might be remembering that has him looking so upset.
I walk over to him. He shakes himself out of his daze and turns toward me as I reach him, and I wrap my arms around his solid chest. He hugs me back, but something about his embrace feels more hesitant than I’m used to.
“It isn’t your fault,” I tell him, my words partly muffled against his shirt. “I know I’ve said we need to give some of the Murk the benefit of the doubt… but a lot of them do hate the other fae and are willing to be totally vicious to hurt you. And there’s still so much we don’t understand about their new kind of magic or how organized they are.”
August sighs, his chin coming to rest on the top of my head. “I let down my squad. I led them into a trap, even if it was accidentally. I didn’t respond quickly enough to prevent all those deaths. And I let you down by killing all the Murk too. I didn’t even think about trying to capture them in the thick of it—I just ripped into them.”
I hug him tighter. “You were defending yourself and your people. I’m not upset at you for that. If you’d tried to go easier on the ones attacking you, maybe more fae on our side would have died. It wasn’t like you had much choice.”
“I just…” He pauses, and his voice dips lower, as if he’s not totally sure he wants me to hear what he’s going to say. “I call you Sweetness because that’s what you are—you’re strong, but you’re always caring and compassionate; you’d never hurt anyone unless you absolutely had to. And I have this beast inside me. There’s a part of me that thinks of violence first when my temper sparks. How can you ever really be safe…”
He trails off again.
I ease back and touch his face with a noise of consternation. “Do you honestly think I have any worries at all about you hurting me? Because I don’t. Nothing about you scares me; it’s been a long time since it has.”
“You haven’t had to see me fight, not really, not all that much,” August says. “If I came toward you like Aerik and his cadre did that night, you’d still panic.”
“You wouldn’t come at me like they did,” I point out. “And if you just mean your wolf, I’m not scared of that either. I’ve been up close to it and others before. I know the difference.”
“I’m just saying it might not be so different if you saw me in certain states.”
The determination to show him just how much I trust him swells inside me. I step back, toward the longer end of the hall that leads to the gym. “Why don’t we find out? Let me see your wolf now.”
August gives me a questioning look, but because he’s August, he drops down at my request, shifting into wolfish form with the motion. There’s a grace to the transformation that I appreciate more every time I see it.
He stands before me on all fours, golden eyes glinting within his ruddy fur, his tail swishing from side to side. His head comes all the way to my shoulder. A prickle runs through the scars embedded in my skin there, but it doesn’t reach any deeper. I know the man in front of me, even when he’s in the shape of an animal. All I feel for him is love.
At the thought of what I’m going to do next, my heart does skip a beat. But I gaze at my mate a few moments longer, letting the emotion settle. Then I turn on my heel. “Come catch me!”
I say the words lightly and with a dare in my voice, and then I start jogging down the hall as quickly as my warped foot allows.
August’s wolf lets out a huff of confusion, and for a second I think he won’t play the game I’ve instigated. But then his paws thump against the floor behind me at a slow lope, not really chasing me yet but following.
The sound provokes a quiver of panic that just as quickly turns into an excited jolt. “Is that the best you can do?” I call over my shoulder with a breathless laugh. “You’re never going to claim your mate like that.”
With a sound almost like a chuckle, August picks up his pace. He charges after me. I glance behind me, seeing his furred form closing in, and everything about his muscular stride echoes the man I love. The man I know would never run after me like this in anything other than a game.
Another giggle slips from my mouth. I push myself a little faster and manage to dive through the gym doorway with August at my heels. As I spin around, he pounces on me, shifting back into a man in time to brace his arm beneath me before I hit the padded mats that cushion the ground.
His expression is still a bit tense, but his eyes dance with exhilaration. The same giddiness lights up in me all the way to my core. Before he can say anything, I run my fingers into his hair and yank his mouth to mine.
August kisses me deeply, his pulse thrumming in his chest even faster than mine. But it’s a good energy, a sense of scoffing in the face of danger together, which sets my nerves even more alight.
I trust this man, and I love him, and right now I want him more than I know how to express.
August tears his mouth away for just an instant, his voice rasping. “You’re sure you’re okay?”
I tug at him insistently. “I’ll be more okay if you keep kissing me.”
The remaining tension finally melts from his stance. He meets my lips with a laugh that spills his breath hot across my mouth.
I haven’t come together this urgently with any of my men in days. They’ve all been treating me so delicately since they found out I’m pregnant. But I don’t feel at all tired or sick while the adrenaline hums through my body. With every kiss and caress, August wakes me up into sharper alertness—and desire.
I want to be loved in every possible way, not just the gentler ones.
My fingers fumble with the hem of his shirt. With a groan, August helps me pull it off him. He looms over me, his eyes darkening as I trail my hands over the muscular planes from his shoulders down across his torso. His abs flex as I graze the top of his slacks.
He kisses me again and finds the zipper on the side of my dress. With a few hasty jerks and a little squirming, I’m tossing it aside. My mate gazes down at me, nothing but hungry adoration in his eyes.
He claims my mouth once more, and then the corner of my jaw, and then my neck, sucking hard enough that I gasp. As he charts that path downward, he cups my breast, swiveling his thumb closer and closer to the peak until I’m pressing into his touch. With an approving growl, he sucks the other nipple into his mouth at the same time as he pinches the first.
I arch into him, reveling in the pleasure that’s quivering through my chest and throbbing between my legs for more. Thankfully, August picks up on my impatience, and he’s never been one to deny me for long. With a pleased grin, he dips lower, hooking his fingers around the sides of my panties at the same time.
He pauses over my belly, still flat at this early stage, and kisses around my belly button so tenderly my throat constricts with emotion. I tease my fingers into the short strands of his auburn hair, and he dips even lower with a yank of my panties.
The second he’s bared my sex, he’s pressing his mouth to it. His tongue flicks over my opening, his lip sliding over the sensitive nub above, and a rush of bliss floods me.
I grip his hair harder, and he laps at me even more eagerly. It’s all I can do to ride the storm of passion he’s summoning inside me with each swipe of his tongue. I whimper and buck toward him, and he groans.
“So sweet inside and out,” he murmurs, and dives back in.
My body starts to tremble with the sensations racing through it. My hips sway up, August grazes his teeth over my nub, and I come with a violent quaking, possibly wrenching his scalp with my grip on his hair.
August doesn’t show any sign of minding. As my limbs sag in the aftermath of my orgasm, he looms back over me with a beaming smile and captures my lips, passing my tart taste on to me.
My hips bow up to meet his again, seeking that even deeper pleasure. I pull at his trousers.
August’s breath stutters out of him. He kicks his pants off, and I’m already wrapping my fingers around his thick erection. It twitches in my grasp, so hard I have to swallow a moan at the feel of it.
“I want you inside me,” I say, meeting his eyes. “I love you tame and I also love you wild. I’m not going to break.”
August growls eagerly and pushes into me, stealing another kiss as he does. I raise my knees to let him plunge in deeper, unable to stop the moan that reverberates up from my chest now. We rock to meet each other, urgent but still tender, his lips dappling kisses across my face and neck. He keeps one hand braced against me while the other strokes more pleasure across my curves.
As the feeling of fullness inside me drives me toward my second peak, I push myself toward him more forcefully. August slides his hand beneath my bottom and lifts me up. At the new angle, his thrusts spark a hotter blaze of bliss that sweeps through my whole body. I whimper, pressing into him once, twice, and then cry out as I tip over that ecstatic edge again.
August’s pace turns more erratic. As I clench around him, his chest hitches. He burrows his face against my shoulder and grunts as his heat fills me.
He sinks down beside me, wrapping his arm around me to tuck me close. I nestle myself in his embrace. For a few minutes, we just lie there, coming down, enjoying the lingering heat we generated between us.
“No more worries,” I say, turning my head so I can look at him straight on. “Not about how I feel about you. We’ve got plenty of other things to worry about without adding that to the list. You’re my mate, and nothing can change that.”
August sighs, but it’s more a sound of release than of resignation. He kisses my hair just above my ear. “You do know how to make a point, Sweetness,” he says with a fond glint in his eyes. “I’ll try to remember this one.”
“You’d better,” I mutter teasingly, and snuggle against him again, wishing there weren’t quite so many other worries to take up the space in both our heads.
