Page 29 of These Eternal Bones
“You are so blessed!” my sisters had cried.
But I knew.
I’d always known.
Now, standing here in a library full of books, I was told I would never have cause to read, a new exciting world full of magic that I was made to think only lived withinhim….I have never known with more clarity what I knew then… Joseph was just a man. A sick, perverse man who wanted to have his cake and eat it too.
Joseph was Captain Faine, but handsome and far more charismatic. With a pretty smile that made you feel warm,seen,when you were neither. I’d watched it happen over and over. He took wife after wife, child after child, lined up for his pleasure like the sheep we kept in the herd. He’d done everything right with me. I don’t know why it didn’t work. Why his attentions had never had the proper effect on me, why I was cursed with the desire to question when everyone else was content to simply obey.
Perhaps the universe, the gods, whatever powers that be, knew I had somewhere to go.
Someone to meet.
Someone to help pass the long years, if only it would be a moment for him.
I gasp as Elric all but appears in front of me, his dark eyes swirling. “I have left you alone for too long. You’ve fallen into your thoughts. A dangerous game indeed, syringa. Perhaps we’re in need of a distraction.”
That heavy weight that had settled on my shoulders eases, my heart beating through what feels like sludge. As the hours pass, it's getting harder to remember why I was so angry at him. Why it was important to stay that way. That this life here, with the Vampire of Port Clyde, isn’t mine, the cottage… Péal and all the others I’ve yet to properly meet. They don’t matter to someone just passing through. My lips part as he doesn’t take my hand…but takesme.
“Elric!” I gasp as he lifts me into his arms, heading from the room the way he always does, with grace and purpose. Those tendrils that had formerly been content wrapped around his broad middle worm against me as if they were suddenly desperate to be free. My eyes widen again as the pressure of them releases, leaving us in a cloud of black mist. My side suddenly snug against him. I need it innately, everywhere. My bottom is seated on his arm like a bench, my hands gently lay on his shoulders, the other dangerously close to his neck. “Surely you don’t need to carry me around like a pet.”
“You are under my employ, yes?” He quips, that damming smirk on his lips. The one that gives me a dangerous peek of sharpened canines.
“Y-yes.”
“Then, as your boss, it pleases me to carry you.”
“I–”
“Also, you walk quite slow, things are much more efficient this way.”
My mouth opens and closes like a fish out of water several times before I let loose a drawn-out sigh, making my displeasure clear. It is hard…to unlearn that closeness is wrong. It is hard to ignore the way my deepest part tightens at the prospect of doing something I’m not meant to do. Something perverse, with a very inhuman thing. I quite think one cannot get further from God than this.
“Where do they go, your tendrils?” I ask, needing a distraction from our proximity.
“They simply bleed into the surrounding air, dematerialize into something undetachable.”
“So-so I have…beenbreathingin your…what?”
He laughs at the sudden horror on my face, his black hair tickling my wrist as I try to hide my smile. “Is the thought of having me inside you truly so terrible, little human?”
It takes me precious few seconds to get his meaning, my mind not catching up until his eyes slide to mine, darkened…daring me to respond.
Oh.
OH.
A flush overwhelms my face, making my cheeks feverish as I slam my eyes away, suddenly interested in the art lining the grand stairwell. My body heightens as he takes in a deep inhale, a small growl escaping before it’s cut short. He gives me a moment for my mind to cease its spinning, each step drawing attention to the slickening between my thighs. Such an odd, gross thing, I’m not sure if it is normal. It seems…like quite a bit more than what I would typically find in my underthings after a day of wear.
Péal’s words from last night tunnel through me, only adding to the maddening need to clench my thighs. That tiny bundle pulsing and throbbing again. He was waiting to feed from me…
Could he truly want me? Like that?
When I sneak a look over at him, he’s already staring, his veins darkened and bleeding from his eyes betraying some deep sense of emotion. I slam my eyes away again as we finally come to a stop. Another long descent dragged down his front at a mind-numbing pace nearly makes a whimper escape my throat. My core feels so…hot, so needy for touch. I barely notice that we’re standing in a bedroom. A large, opulent one that smells so richly of spice and cedar, every breath I drag through my lungs is heavy with it, making my mouth water. He’s gone and back in a blink, wrapping my shoulders in a heavy coat,hiscoat, before he throws open the ornate embossed glass doors in front of us. The sight before me is…stunning as he guides me gently onto a large balcony overlooking the ocean, the lighthouse…everything. I take a seat by the railing, keeping my eyes away from the man at my back as my heart races. Embarrassment heavy on my chest as I press my thighs together, lowering my hands to press into the space where I need the pressure. I don’t dare move them; I don’t dare move at all. But my voice betrays me, it’s breathy, barely a whisper. “It’s beautiful, Elric.”
“Breathtaking, syringa. Like every time I see it, it is for the very first time.” His deep growl heats my flesh, so much so that I barely feel the nip of cold. “I will send for some tea for you.”
And then he’s gone and not a moment too soon.
