Page 58 of Tangled Threads Of Fate

A look passed between the two Genii, but Erus nodded, pulling back a little from my body. I tried not to pout at the loss of his warmth.

Then, beside me, was a gloriously beautiful man with the head of a lion.

Holy shit. Holy fucking shit.

Although the size of his head didn’t change, just morphed into the face of a lion, his mane was huge and flowing. And so fucking glorious. And the eyes in that lion face were still Erus, watching me with cool intelligence as I lifted my hand to his face, brushing my fingertips through the soft fur on his face. He tilted his cheek hard into my hand, rubbing it firmly against my skin.

Scent marking me again.

Tryp huffed. “If I knew I could mark her in my lion form, I would’ve waited.”

I turned and looked at him, my eyes wide as I laughed. I was stroking a half-lion man now. What even was my life?

Tryp obviously took my expression to mean I wouldn’t mind him scent marking meagain,but as a lion this time. “Really?” Nodding, I laughed at his whoop of joy.

He was slightly darker than the light golden coloring of Erus. The light and the dark. That big lion head was stroking all over my body once more, starting at my hands and moving up my arms. At my shoulder, his huge tongue came out and licked my pale, freckle-spotted skin. I squealed. It was rough, like a cat tongue, but huge.

Erus huffed. “Keep your tongue to yourself, Tryp.”

Tryp made a low grumble. The kind of sound that would never come from a human mouth. But his next words would. “He didn’t say that when I was tonguing his balls the other night,” he whispered in my ear, and I made a choking noise. That sensation on any kind of private part sounded awful. Like sandpapering your testicles.

I was saved from replying by his furry cheek rubbing against mine, and I got a face full of mane. But with his smooth, muscular chest pressed against mine and Erus on my other side, it was like being in a sexy sandwich. A fully clothed sandwich; at least for now. My body didn’t really want to listen to my head when it said fucking a lion was weird.

I owed Eleanor Heber from the seventh grade an apology. Simba really did deserve his place in the top ten sexiest cartoon characters of all time.

Chapter 30

DEMKE

The girl was everywhere. In the halls, by the pool, on the laps of my best friends. In a few short weeks, she’d taken over the compound, and worse, over our lives. Like an icon of fertility, she was round and beautiful, and my dick betrayed me every time she walked past.

She was snuggled between Erus and Tryp outside, and I was watching them creepily through the window, like a ghoul in my own home.

“Doing some research, brother?”

I jolted, turning to see Teron, my oldest and best friend. Trying not to look guilty, I fixed my face into its usual mask of apathy. Teron had that small smirk on his face that told me he knew me better than I would’ve liked in that moment.

“Yes, I’m trying to work out how to break the soul bonds, if it comes to that. There must be something in these dusty old tomes.” The library was Teron’s pride and joy. He’d gathered each of these texts lovingly over the years.

He moved toward the large wooden table that sat in the middle of the room. “I’m afraid that even if you did find a way tobreak those bonds, none of them would choose to take the path. They are quite enamored with the little human.”

They weren’t enamored. They were obsessed. “If she falls, I won’t lose them.” It was a declaration. I vowed it to the universe, the words flying in the face of the Great Weaver themself, but I didn’t care. I couldn’t take any more losses.

Shaking his head, he gave me a sympathetic look that set my teeth on edge. “Demke, if she falls, it won’t matter if you break the bonds or not. We are all screwed. Us, them, the world. I believe we all hinge on her and those babies.”

He sat beside me and picked up one of the books I’d been reading. It was on the Fates and the turn of time by a hermit heretic several thousand years ago. The pages were fragile and beginning to crumble, but the information inside was still legible. The fact that some of these texts still existed at all was a testament to Teron’s care—and the fact he made us all use gloves to read anything older than 1956.

Pointing to the pages, he raised an eyebrow at me. “But you know that, don’t you? You know she’s important to us all—not just emotionally.” There was gentle chastisement in his tone, and I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.

We’d always been like this, Teron and I. While there’d been a certain amount of reverence from the others at one time or another, as their Goddess’s Consort, or as a God myself, Teron had never genuflected to a single person in his life. He had held himself apart, not quite my equal, but not my subordinate either.

He had loved our Goddess, but he hadn’t worshiped her. He loved and respected me, but as a man, not as a God.

“I understand she’s important, Teron.”

He was still shaking his head. “She’s more than important, brother. She’s our final chance at retribution. She’s the world’s chance for a fresh start.”

“She isn’t—the infants are,” I argued. Semantics, but if I put Wren on a pedestal now, I worried she’d never come down.

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