Page 53 of Griffin Food

Atlas arches one brow.

Fenix’s wings spring and hard bone and feathers smack into my face.

“Why the fuck did you have to mention that?” Fenix snarls. “My dick has not gone down since I first sensed her a week ago. Now my fucking griffin is acting out! She is not even here to see my powerful wings. This makes zero sense!”

“They are not feeling reasonable,” Atlas says, referring to our griffins. “They will likely not be reasonable until we have all bedded her, and maybe not even then.”

Quietness thickens the air. We all share a look. This is the first time we have spoken officially about what is on all our minds, but it has always been understood that while Atlas would claim her, the rest of us would get to fuck her during her heat. Only his words conjure up images of something deeper, something that goes beyond mere tending through her heat.

“The Chosen one takes well to rutting,” Darkan says conversationally, thrusting images at me of her getting dicked-down through her heat. “She will accept us all.”

Fenix makes a pained groan. “Might need to let Vander at me again.”

“No,” Atlas snaps, his tone brokering no argument. “You will fucking hold it. She took well to me this morning. Knelt sweetly while I worked. She is not averse to my touch. I sense she has the capacity for love and lust to match our needs. But we shall take it slowly. We shall bear the burden of need until she is ready.”

“Did you pleasure her?” I all but snarl.

Atlas fixes me with a glare. “Do not fucking question me or my approach, Darrion. Mind that I am likewise feeling the strain of these circumstances. That Aldric has a grip on me every bit as potent as Darkan has on you. Further, I have had a hundred years without a mate over you. If I choose to share her, it will be because it feels right, and not through any sense of obligation. Besides all this, she must decide.”

I lower my eyes first, chest heaving.

“I did not pleasure her,” he continues.

My eyes snap up.

“But I believe I will not be able to hold back for long.”

Chapter Sixteen

Lark

The bastards are fucking with us.

It has been two weeks, during which we have chopped a forest’s worth of wood. Lugged sacks of grit, flour, and corn. Rolled boulders where they are tunneling out a new section of the eyrie, and generally grafted until we are shaking with fatigue.

They feed us mid-morning, and in the afternoon, take us to the vast, cavernous training area. Here, one or other of the griffin shifter bastards beats us within an inch of our lives under the guise of a training session.

My wolf is usually quiet. But even he is pissed with this. Mere entry to the training pit has him prowling, snapping, and snarling.

It is worse when the big bastard, Vander, decides to give us a going-over.

I’m usually an even-tempered, upbeat man, but I am permanently bruised, battered, and surly. The only saving grace is that the food is good, and we get to be with Violet of an evening.

By that point, we are so fucking exhausted, the best we can do is crawl into the nest with her and hold her between us.

This is coming to a head, I can feel it, an underlying tension that permeates every breath. Rafe and I have spoken about it, but neither of us sees a way out.

Tonight, like every other night, we fall deeply asleep almost instantly on hitting the nest with Violet between us. And also, like every other night, when it is dark and quiet, her small hands roam, slipping under the waist of my pants and delving beneath. Her fingers wrapping around my cock offer a prelude to her taking me in her sweet mouth—I guess it will be my turn to get sucked off tonight and Rafe’s turn to rouse himself to plow her.

She is such a sweet, eager little thing despite the turn of events. And how I love this version of her when she is not in heat. I wondered whether one day she would remember, and if she did, how she might be with us.

It is so much better than even my dreams.

My cock flexes. I groan low. Her sweet sigh is breathed against my chest, and then her fingers clench and squeeze over my hard flesh. My cock flexes again, pre-cum leaking from the tip.

She nips against my throat—I groan again. Her aroused scent fills my nose.

“Gods,” Rafe mutters thickly from her other side. “What is she doing to you?”