Possessed by a Dark Warrior (57 page)

Broke free of his hold, severing his connection and halting the process.

She huffed. “I did not give you my blood so you could take my wounds… they are mine to heal.”

Bleu opened his eyes and rolled his right shoulder in a shrug, refusing to apologise for what he had tried to do. She had eased his pain by giving her blood to him, and he had only wanted to ease hers. Besides, the medicine had healed him and he was strong enough to take on some of her wounds for her. It was either that or make her take the medicine herself, and he had caught the look in her eyes when he had been fighting the pain after taking it, the one that had said there was no way in Hell she was going to subject herself to it.

Maybe if he gave her blood, it would help her heal. He wasn’t sure how dragons worked in that respect.

His gaze drifted down to the puncture marks on her neck. Crimson welled in them, beads that trembled on the brink of falling, and he groaned as he realised that he had been so concerned with everyone watching them that he had forgotten to seal them.

He lifted his eyes to hers, held his hand out to her and waited.

Taryn touched her neck, her fingers came away bloodstained, and her eyes darkened as she stared at it.

Not with anger or pain.

With desire.

She placed her hand into his, allowed him to pull her flush against him and tipped her head back as he wrapped his lips around the wound on her throat. She moaned as he gave a shallow pull, her hands jumping up to clutch his shoulders and her fingers digging into his muscles.

Bleu groaned against her neck, the need he had been fighting for what felt like forever now spiralling back out of control as her sweet taste flooded his mouth and the connection between them grew even stronger.

“You need to rest and heal,” she said in a voice thick with desire that told him resting and healing wasn’t the only thing on her mind involving a bed.

“I’m healed, I swear… but I will rest later if it will alleviate your worry… right now I just need you,” he whispered against her flesh and licked the wounds, shuddered as heat shot through him. “You need me too.”

She didn’t deny that. Just moaned in his ear and melted against him, her pain fading into nothingness as desire roared to the foreground, need they had denied too long.

“I do… but…” She sounded breathless already, panting softly as he tongued her neck and lowered his hands to her backside. “You must rest.”

He knew that he should, that he was hardly in any position to be considering the things running through his mind, images of him and Taryn naked and tangled together. His body was healed but he was still weak. He tried to rein them in.

Taryn didn’t help matters.

“Perhaps we could rest together.”

Dear gods.

He wouldn’t be doing any resting if she shared a sickbed with him, that was for sure. He growled and kissed her throat, following the line of it up to her ear, and she moaned when he sucked the lobe between his lips.

“Or we could rest later,” she cried and clutched him, claws pressing into his shoulders. “Do not stop doing that.”

“I don’t intend to,” he husked into her ear and she shivered against him, a little moan escaping her. “I intend to keep doing this forever.”

She stilled in his arms, leaned back and searched his face in the low light.

“Forever?”

He nodded and righted her, and smoothed his hand across her cheek as he sensed the trickle of fear that went through her, the need for reassurance and to hear him say it all over again. Although desire reigned, pain still lingered in her heart, born of losing someone she loved, and that hurt clawed at her whether she felt it or not, placed doubt in her head that he would do all in his power to extinguish.

“I told you, Taryn. I love you and I’m yours, and I will always be yours. Nothing will ever change that.”

“Always,” she echoed, a distant edge to her soft voice. “I like the sound of that.”

Not as much as he did.

She leaned in close, tiptoed and brushed her lips across his. “I will love you forever… for always… for all eternity, Bleu… and I will always be yours… and nothing will ever change that.”

Nothing.

He liked that word almost as much as the words ‘always’ and ‘forever’.

Nothing would stand between them. Nothing would keep them apart. Nothing would change their feelings.

They would always be together. They would always love each other.

They would always look forwards.

He dropped his head and kissed his mate, losing himself in her as he always would, losing track of time as they stood together on the battlefield where they had slayed their pasts to set free their future.

A future that began as his lips danced with hers and she held him tight, and their love flowed through their bond, completing each other.

The clock in Valestrum struck the hour, bells ringing twelve times in the distance, and filled him with warmth as he held Taryn closer, his heart close to bursting as something dawned on him.

Yesterday had been the end of their past, a time that would fade into memory, put to rest for eternity.

Today was the start of their forever.

The End

He moved through the cobbled street between the squat stone houses that packed the fae town, towering over all of the people who passed him but blending in perfectly. He had mastered the art of it over the past century, learning to dress in the fashion of the era and to keep his head down to avoid drawing too much attention.

The last part was the hardest. As an angel, he had been raised to stand tall and command all those below him with a stern gaze and steady hand suited to his rank, but here in the mortal world he had to do quite the opposite. Even though every creature who occupied the small underground town situated beneath a mountain in the heart of the highlands of Scotland was definitely below him.

Still, he wasn’t here to interact with them. He was here on a mission, steadily closing in on his target, and once this task was concluded, he would be able to return to his duty and Heaven.

It had been a long time since he had set foot in his home, kept away from Echelon Headquarters by his hunt, only able to report his findings through messengers. His comrades believed it vital that he remain in the mortal realm, on hand to detain his target should their paths cross.

He had little love for the mortal world, but his duty had always been here. He had been born to hunt demons and eradicate them, ensuring that all but the stupid ones remained in Hell where they belonged, and were safe from his kin. The fallen angel, Satan, had ensured that by invoking barriers that stripped angels of their powers, rendering them weak in his realm.

This time, it was not a demon on his dance card.

He had been dispatched to locate a female and the fae towns spread across the globe were a perfect hiding place for her, and the perfect place for him to hunt for her, since she had been raised a witch.

His intel, and his orders, said that she wasn’t a witch though. She was a female torn between Heaven and Hell. A product of both realms. She was powerful, but he doubted she knew it, because she didn’t know that she was born of a union between an angel and demon.

A rare half-breed.

It had been two centuries since her mother had fled Heaven and used all of her tricks and powers to conceal herself from the angels hunting for her. When the angels eventually found her, she had already placed her infant daughter with a witch family and had lost track of her so the angels could interrogate her but would never discover her daughter’s location.

Now, that half-breed believed she was a witch, that her powers came from that blood in her veins, and he had been sent to bring her over to Heaven’s side.

He had been hunting her for close to a century, a mere blip in his lifetime, but one that was beginning to feel like an eternity as it kept him from his home in Heaven.

He felt eyes on him but ignored them as he marched forwards, weaving through the crowded shopping street. Canopies stretched out on both sides, bright jewel coloured canvases decorated with various crests and designs, each unique to the witch running the store. They peddled spells as ridiculous as love potions from the small cramped spaces, allowed their copper stills filled with foul smelling concoctions to stand on the streets and clutter the place, making it even more difficult to move around the town.

His intelligence said the female was here though, somewhere in this busy underground settlement, buried among the several thousand people who occupied it, a mixture of witches, shifters, immortals and fae.

And demons.

The skin on the inside of his right wrist burned and he rubbed it with his left hand, stroking the pad of his thumb across it and feeling the heat of the mark beneath it. He looked down at the stylised black cross on the inside of his wrist and wasn’t surprised to see a faint golden glow emanating from it.

It triggered often when he was in a fae town, warning him of nearby demons.

The burning grew more intense and he stopped and looked at the mark, and then at the creatures moving in colourful streams past him, all going about their business.

Being on the mortal plane had always disturbed him for some reason, but he had never quite figured out why. After speaking with the other Echelon, he had put it down to the mixture of fae, demons and other creatures who mingled with the mortals, and the fact that he rarely crossed paths with his own kind down here. He preferred the company of his own species over the disgusting ensemble of creatures who populated the fae town around him.

The buzzing in his mark faded to a more manageable level, telling him that the demon had moved on. He looked around the street, scanning the faces of everyone present for that of his target, and then moved on, venturing deeper into the town, towards the centre of it.

A clock tower rose ahead of him, high into the cavern, and the sound of music drifted from that direction. He looked around again, noticing for the first time that most of the people in the street were heading in that direction as evening fell in the outside world above them.

It might be a good place to scout for his target.

He followed the flow of foot traffic, mingling with them and pleased with his job of blending. With his wings concealed, and his mortal clothing of thick-soled black leather boots, black jeans and a black t-shirt, he didn’t stand out at all. Many of the Echelon chose to wear robes or their armour when visiting the mortal plane. Nothing drew the eye like a seven-foot-tall male in full regalia with huge white wings.

He had tried explaining the meaning of the word covert to his comrades, and it hadn’t gone down well. Being the youngest at only four hundred and sixty-seven years old, his opinion was often listened to and then immediately discounted.

The thought of having his wings out made the ridges of tissue lining his shoulder blades itch though. It had been too long since he had taken a moment to unleash them and take to the skies. He preened them every night before resting, but it wasn’t the same as flying.

The smell of magic swirled around him, stronger now, and the music grew louder ahead of him, but it didn’t stop a moment of silence from dropping like a shroud over him when the scent of a demon hit him and the mark on his inside right wrist flared hot.

Positively combusted.

Golden light glowed from it and he slapped his hand over it, hiding it as a few heads turned his way, curious gazes drawn by the sudden burst of light.

An urge went through him, dark and dangerous, screaming at him to call his blade.

A demon.

He could feel it somewhere close to him and it wasn’t the normal kind, the sort that crawled from Hell and declared themselves as demons from realms that were numbered.

No. This one was strong, born of the Devil’s blood, still under his command.

He scanned the crowd, hunting for the male responsible for the sudden burning in his wrist, and the rising desire to materialise his sword in his hand and do battle. It was hard to keep his focus when that hunger was clamouring in his blood, his instincts as an angel of the Echelon driving him to destroy the demon threat.

This sort of demon required a more cautious approach though, because some of them were old enough that they were a match for his strength and all had been trained in fighting.

Running headlong into a battle against a demon from the Devil’s ranks would be a mistake, and he wasn’t the sort of male who made mistakes.

He ran his eyes over the people surrounding him again, searching for the demon. Where was he? Satan’s demons rarely left Hell, so what had drawn this one to the surface?

He huffed when he couldn’t spot the male. Perhaps they were down a different street. If they had been on the same one as him, he would have easily spotted them. He was seven foot and most demons from the Devil’s ranks matched his height, a gift from their fallen angel DNA.

The music swept back in as the burning in his wrist began to fade and he forced himself to move forwards, towards the square. There seemed to be a festival happening. He could see colourful rectangular banners stretched taut across the front vertical beams of wooden stalls selling goods now that he was closer and people formed small groups, with some in the centre dancing to the band that had set up beneath the clock tower.

The festivities distracted him from thoughts of the demon and he managed to quell his mark, so the burning became little more than a dull ache.

Until his eyes settled on a female across the square from him, sitting on a stone ledge that was at least six feet high and formed a pathway that ended in steps that led down into the square.

Not his target.

Something else.

He curled his lip at the sight of her, dressed in a rather revealing fashion of a short black corset and even shorter skirt. She swayed as she laughed, swinging a mug in her left hand and spilling some of the contents onto a group of males below her. They all stared up at her, enraptured. Well, almost all of them did. Judging by the angle of some of their heads, they were busy looking up her ridiculously small skirt.