Page 76 of The Half King
The hair on his body tickled her exposed flesh, and for the first time, she let her hands explore him,fullyexplore him, starting with the contours of his chest and his shoulders, moving lower to trace his rounded backside, and finally trailing a fingertip along the ebony hair that encircled his navel. But she stopped there. She didn’t know what to do next, how to touch him. A sudden flush of shyness crept into her cheeks.
Kian seemed to understand. He guided her palm lower and then wrapped her fingers around his flesh. The feel of him was different than she had expected. He was rigid, and yet his skin was softer and more delicate than the rest of him. She loosened her grip, afraid she might hurt him, but he tightened his fingers around hers and then moved her hand slowly up and down. He removed his hand, and she stroked him on her own, letting the sound of his breathing guide her movements. She caressed him until she could hear nothing over the choppy pull of air into his lungs, and then he abruptly stilled her hand and looked to her with the same question in his eyes.
“Yes,” she told him. “More.”
Now it was his turn to explore her body. She held still, uncertain of what to do as he skimmed one hand down the length of her abdomen and to the juncture of her thighs. Before she could prepare herself for what might happen next, he cupped her in his palm and pulled ever so slightly upward with a firm but gentle motion, and there was no standing still after that. She arched against his palm as he went on massaging a delicious tension into her body. Just when she thought the act could feel no better, he replaced his palm with his fingers, and she tipped back her head, delirious with the sensations of his fingertips stroking and circling and dipping inside her.
She made embarrassing noises—whimpers and whines and guttural moans—but she couldn’t bring herself to care about anything except his touch. She didn’t know how he did it, how he had mastered her body as though it belonged to him. The longer it went on, the weaker her knees became.
“I can’t…” She panted, her legs wobbling.
Kian grasped her by the bottom. “Wrap your legs around me.”
She did as he asked and locked her ankles behind his back.
“Are you sure you want this?” He licked his lips and swallowed hard, looking to her with a hunger bordering on desperation. “If not, tell me now.”
“I’m more than sure,” she whispered. “I want you. All of you.”
He settled himself between her thighs, and she felt the smooth tip of him pressing against the slick flesh where his fingers had just been. He lingered there at her entrance, barely nudging inside her, teasing her until she felt swollen and throbbing with need.
“This might hurt,” he warned her.
“Oh, stars, I don’t care,” she breathed. Any discomfort she might feel couldn’t possibly be worse than the ache of longing between her thighs. She gripped Kian’s shoulders and begged him with her gaze, and then, with a gentle upward motion, he made them one.
She gasped, more at the sudden sensation of fullness than from the brief stab of pain. He stayed still for a long moment, motionless except for his breathing. He let her body adjust to him while he held her gaze, waiting as patiently as ever. When she gave him a nod, he tipped their foreheads together and began to rock gently in and out of her. His rhythm was slow and steady, and even though the motion hurt at times, the pain was mingled with an indescribable pleasure, a sensation that bloomed and strengthened each time he buried himself all the way inside her.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“Don’t stop,” she told him.
The wildness in his eyes told her he had no intention of stopping. There was something primal between them now. She felt it in the way she dug her heels into his backside, urging him ever closer. A heavy tension was building inside her, heightening to a near painful intensity. Kian drove her higher with each slow, deliberate stroke. Just when she thought she couldn’t bear it another second, he groaned and thrust into her one last time, deeper and harder than before. The pressure between her thighs broke into the sweetest release she had ever known—a set of involuntary tremors, like a convulsion from deep within her core.
She closed her eyes and tilted her face to the heavens, her lips parted in a strangled cry. Her body clenched like a fist. She couldn’t move or breathe or think beyond the continuous waves of pleasure washing over her, each one more exquisite than the last. The sensations were so intense that she was almost relieved when the quaking ceased and she drifted back down to herself.
She unlocked her ankles and placed her bare feet on the ground, her legs still weak and trembling. She opened her eyes and peered at Kian to find him watching her with a tired grin, a sheen of sweat glistening on his brow. There was an unmistakable look of satisfaction on his face, and she glowed with pride to know she had put it there. But before she could return his smile, several things happened at once.
A metallic tang of copper coated her tongue. An electric charge lifted the tiny hairs at the nape of her neck. A surge of energy flowed through her from the soles of her feet to the crown of her head, and then a loudcracksounded from the tremendous rock behind her.
Kian pulled her out of the way, and she whirled around just in time to watch the stone slab split apart and fall to the ground with athudthat shook the earth beneath her feet. She scurried backward and noticed a stream of water bubbling up from the ground where the boulder had just stood.
The water streamed over the cracked, arid dirt, and as Cerise crept closer to the spring, she saw that several green sprouts had already pushed their way up from the soil. She stared in awe as life bloomed in front of her. Two heartbeats later, the sprouts had grown tiny lavender blossoms—exactly like the flower she had offered to the Blighted Shrine.
She felt the sensation of being watched and turned to meet Kian’s wide-eyed gaze. The two of them said nothing at first. Then Kian began, “Was that…” He trailed off, shaking his head as though he didn’t believe what his eyes had shown him. “Was thatyou?”
“Me?” Cerise touched her chest and remembered she was naked. She darted to her pile of discarded clothes and gathered them up before the water reached them. “How could that have been me?”
While she dressed, Kian retrieved his blanket and wrapped it around his waist. “I don’t know, but right before the rock split, I swear I saw you light up.”
“Light up?” she asked. “What do you mean?”
“I mean it looked like there was a second sun rising under your skin. At first I thought I imagined it. But then…” He gestured at the split boulder. “But thenthat. It can’t be a coincidence.”
Cerise absently straightened her blouse while she tried to remember exactly what had happened. She recalled feeling a great surge of pleasure, and then afterward she had tasted copper. “Magic,” she realized. “There was magic here. I tasted it in the air. I felt it, too. It was electric. It came up out of the ground and moved through my body.”
Kian raised his eyebrows as if prompting her to make a connection.
“Maybe it was Nero,” Cerise guessed. “He opens up a spring at every camp.”
