Page 49 of These Eternal Bones
“The scar on your finger…”
“A ring, a vow to a monster, atrueone. One that had no fangs, magic, or could not shapeshift into a fox. He was not bronze, nor was he special. He was just a man, filled with delusions of lust and greed. I was to be his–” I choke on my words. The weight of speaking this out loud, breathing its vile nature into this space that had been so warm…so loving, makes my stomach churn.
My tears spill over quicker than I can blink them away as Elric leaves my side. I realize I don’t truly want to hide them at all, that here it feels okay to cry. The feelings are not bursting from me because I give myself permission to feel them, however horrible. My eyes find his as he lowers himself into the bath, his pants getting soaked while his chest remains bare. His hands are icy, wonderfully so as he grips my face between them, bending in front of me, fitting his colossal frame inside with ease. A sob works free from my chest because, for a moment, there is no veil. For a moment, I see it, the grief, agony, and sorrow in his eyes. I hear the intense truth behind his words when he speaks. “You were never going to be his; your heart, your soul, as always, rested safe with me. Those parts of you remain untouched.”
My tears pour from my eyes, my chest hiccupping as he runs his thumb along my lips, making no move to wipe them away. He doesn’t try to hide my tears as they fall. He sees them, each one without annoyance or apprehension.
“There is not a plane of this realm in which I have not loved you, Molly.”
It’s just words strung together beautifully. A simple enough statement, but it has changed me.
“I think,” I sniffle. “That I felt no love for the others because it had always been reserved for you. I do not possess enough in me to have shared even a fraction of it.” I melt as he tugs me into his arms, humming that familiar song that makes my heart flutter. He doesn’t respond; he doesn’t have to. I have never known something so tangible, so confidently, as I know his adoration for me.
24
Negligent Lies & Deft Fingers
Molly
My eyes track Elric’s path as he stalks the landing of the solarium, the shrivels of plants brushing his coat. His anxiety and tension hold like ice in the air, but I learned quickly enough that asking will only get me a non-answer, soft, distracting touches, and his fangs to my neck. All lovely things that are effective in swaying my mind to other places. I’ve lost track of the days it seems, living here in his realm; it seems to operate on its own timeline. Day and night blend while we hide away under silk sheets.
Even now, as he frets, lost to his thoughts, his tendrils smooth assuredly up and down my legs, peaking and snaking ever higher to my core. My spoon clangs loudly against my bowl as one of themprods my ever-aching clit, a gasp nearly choking me on my soup. My attention snaps back to the man, only to find he’s no longer pacing, his attention held on me. It’s the odd animalistic tilt to his head and the predatory way his eyes track every puff of breath. “Elric–” My words cut off abruptly as the tendril finds my slickened core, slipping inside as a flush burns my cheeks.
My knees knock together with a thud, attempting to keep it out. Despite that being mostly for show, I want him there, badly. The need for this man is never-ending, like a fever you can’t sweat out. My embarrassment only adds to the throbbing at my center as two more tendrils join the fray, prying my legs apart under my heavy skirts.
His lips pull up into one of those damming smirks, showing just a hint of his sharpened canines. My body reacts in kind, the thrum of my pulse thudding lower and lower as I feel his tendril expand inside me. The pressure that builds there is immediate and overwhelming, pleasure and pain building into one entity as my core stretches to accommodate it. An entirely unladylike squeak leaves my throat as Tien blips into the room, my hands slap down to my skirts, attempting to wrench it from me, but it doesn’t budge. My lower half is well hidden, but that does nothing for my heavy-lidded eyes and growing flush. I am stuffed so full that my stomach is tight with it.
“Another townsperson brought you correspondence. It was the older shop owner, and she requested an audience–”
“No.”
Tien nods while my heart pounds in my chest, my mind only half able to focus on their conversation. “Yes, I thought as much and sent her back down the hill with Cartiel, much to his displeasure.”
“Set it on my desk, please.”
Please.
It seems Elric has found his manners inside my–
The damnable man twists his tendril inside me, making me slap my palm down on the table loudly, disrupting some of the fine crystal on the top. The different decanters of spice and sauce spill over, but I cannot seem to release the tablecloth to right them, my eyes instead on the man now lounging casually on a deep forest green settee.
“Miss Molly, are you quite alright?” Tien asks, taking a step forward, only to be stopped by a flat wall of tendril.
“The mistress of the house is fine. I must warn you against approaching her if you wish to keep your head atop your shoulders.”
I’m not sure what’s worse, that Elric has again suddenly lost his manners, or the sudden look of understanding in the old Chimeras’ eyes before he blips from the room.
“Elric…” I grit out. I don’t bother finishing whatever it was I planned to say because he’s twisting it again, swirling it inside me…achingly slow.
“Yes, my love?”
I open my mouth, but no words come, only a very lewd sound which earns me another tendril snaking around my mouth like a binding.
“It would be unfortunate for the soul who happened to overhear you make a sound like that.”
A muffled whimper leaves me, my hands fisting the lace tablecloth as I finally lean back, giving up my resistance on the tendrils keeping my thighs parted.
“I know you cannot help it, my sweet little human. My mate,” he speaks the words like a caress as I close my eyes, canting my head back sharply. There’s no surprise when it meets his stomach, his chilled hands smoothing their way across my heated flesh.
