Page 67 of Leviathan's Song
Levi’s pupils visibly contracted as a hint of fear flickered through his expression. Of all the reactions I could have anticipated, that wasn’t one of them. I couldn’t help a small, amused smile as he slid away and scrambled through the bag to dig a condom out.
“Was that a bad joke?” I asked when he returned, settling myself more firmly against his arousal with a slightly desperate wiggle.
His eyes shot to mine, and he blinked a few times before laying his head back on the pillows behind him. He swallowed twice and spoke to the ceiling when he finally answered me. “I know… it’s not rational. I know you wouldn’t leave me with a child.”
It took me a moment to place his meaning, and his eyes dropped to watch me in silence as I did. His mother had left his father after she weaned him, as did many or most other mermaids with their partners and offspring. That was Levi’s normal, the thing he’d permanently warded himself against with the runes hidden in his tattoos. The reason he lived in the Void even though it would shorten his lifespan in the long run. I pressed a kiss against his chin.
“I don’t have those instincts, Levi.” I kept my voice calm and rational… gentle. I wanted—needed—to reassure him that this thing he feared would never, ever happen. “I’m going to bind myself to you legally, but my love for you is what will keep me with you always.” I pressed more kisses to his jawline, unable to help myself, and felt his hands slide around to my back, pulling me tighter against his chest. “I would destroy anyone who tried to separate me from my child.Ourchild.”
Just the thought of someone trying to take away my hypothetical future child sparked a dark, primal rage deep in my soul. I would level nations using every golem on the planet. I knew he saw it in my eyes because he shivered.
“You could do it, too,” he murmured and kissed me again. He crushed me to his chest, pressing the air from my lungs with the strength of his embrace. He released me quickly at the sound and smirked. “Sorry.” Levi locked eyes with me and took my hand in his, comparing our hand sizes and studying the lines of my wrist. “So delicate, and yet, so powerful.” His words were layered with his siren’s call, so heavily saturated that my ward didn’t stand a chance.
So why bother?I wondered. I turned my wrist toward him to reveal the clasp on the cuff. “Take it off.”
His eyebrows drew together as he stared at my bracelet, and then his eyes flashed to mine with concern in them. I flipped open the latch on the clasp myself and explained, “Your magic is too strong right now for it to matter much anyway. I want all of you, and I trust you. Do you trust me?” I tugged the attached rings from my fingers and let the ward drop to the bed.
His answer was a nod, but that was still sparing me from his enchantment.
“Say something.”
“You’re my wife,” he whispered.
I was wholly unprepared. His voice… I immediately felt my pupils dilate, everything around Levi growing hazy and distant. The strength of his magic pulled the breath from my lungs. My heart twisted, both from the statement itself and the crushing desire rising inside me.
If before I had wanted desperately to be close to him, now it was a deep, painful ache. My insides clenched with a strange emptiness, and I heard myself panting for air, like there wasn’t quite enough.
My physical response was so strong, so frantic, that I felt a brief wave of panic before he placed his palm on my cheek and pulled me against him. “Shh, I’ve got you,” he said, comforting me. I felt like I was drowning in my need for him.
“I’ve got you,” he repeated as he lifted me slightly and lined our bodies up, pressing into me with deliberate slowness. The intrusion felt thick and hard, and we had to pause briefly to give me a moment to adjust before he was fully inside me. By the time I was seated on his pelvis again, his breathing was as ragged as mine.
Sharing my body with him like this took the edge off of some of my ache, but it wasn’t enough. I needed more. I had a strange desire to consume him, to bottle him up and lock him away in my heart so he would always be mine.
“I’m here,” he whispered, calming me. Gentling me. “I’m yours.” It was exactly what I needed to hear.
I rocked my hips experimentally and gasped at the pleasure that shot through me. “That’s right,” he encouraged, placing one hand on my hip to guide my movements, the other on the back of my neck, sliding up into my hair.
I was lost in him. Gone. The only thing I could focus on was the feeling of him between my legs, building and growing, warming and twisting. My cheeks felt hot. Suddenly, his fingers clenched in my hair at the back of my head, making a fist and anchoring me.
I opened my eyes and found him staring into mine, his own gaze intense as the hand on my hip slid around to my rear, continuing to encourage my movements. My eyes drifted shut a few more times, but every time I opened them, I was met with stormy ocean blue looking deep into my soul.
“I love you,” Levi murmured against my skin as I tipped over into the abyss, coming apart as his arms as he clenched me tighter.
* * *
I spenta long time on the edge of my bed holding the glass vials.
Bette had dropped by while Levi was still napping—worst timing ever—and knocked, much to my surprise. She said she’d seen me arrive with company and hadn’t wanted to interrupt—while conspicuously darting glances around to try to get a better look at my company—but she wanted to bring me my mail and was simply too excited to wait to tell me she’d finished my potions.
She’d received the Apothecary Oversight Committee’s approval for one-time distribution while they did more testing on it, but even that had been rushed through due to their excitement over a new potential ‘elite potion’ market. I’m sure it didn’t hurt that she was a member of the board. She brought stacks of paperwork with her. Legal documents, ingredients lists, possible spell interactions, usage directions… it would need to be dosed out under a medical mage’s supervision. I supplied the final payment and tried not to think about how much it cost me.
By the time she’d left, Levi was in the shower, and I’d been sitting there staring at them ever since.
When I’d made my negotiations before we’d left on our trip, I’d requested a second dose. Knowing Levi had the potential to bond with someone someday, even if that person was me—and that he might despise that bond—had driven me to make the extra purchase. But now that he had, even though he seemed content with it, would he take the potion and flee? My heart said no, but I couldn’t help the brief flicker of fear. The thought of it sucked the breath from my lungs and created a pit of dread in my stomach.
He deserved the option. Everything in me demanded he be given the choice.
Still, my mouth was dry as I heard the water turn off in the bathroom.
