Mated to the Warrior Beast

*****

~ TARKYN ~

Tarkyn couldn’t stop. He knew he should take his time, but the drive to take her, to possess her, knowing their time might be short, was so undeniable… Thoughtless with need, he slid his hand up to grab her chin and turn her head, taking her mouth even as he curled over her, nudged her knees apart, then plunged into her with a roar that shook the air in the cave.

“Tarkyn!” she cried, shivering, her skin goosebumping all the way down her back.

“I—”

But then she pushed herself back hard against him so his thighs slapped against hers and Tarkyn was so turned on, he almost came.

“Holy shit, Harth,” he growled, letting her brace to take the weight of his chest on her shoulders as he reached for her breasts with both hands.

For a long, breathless moment they rocked, Harth arched and pressing into his hands, his breath hot on her shoulder.

.....

But it wasn’t enough. It was never enough.

Rearing back, he grasped her hip in one hand, pressed the other palm to her spine, then thrust into her so hard her knees lifted from the furs.

He gave a long, shuddering groan as she clenched around him, then thrust again. And again, pulling her back onto him, pressing her down against his thrust, moaning her name, his blood racing and heating with her cries that started small, bare gasps, but rose with every thigh slapping thrust, until her voice was breaking on his name.

Seeing her body ripple with the force of him entering her, he gave a strangled groan and had to bend over her, catching his own weight, stop moving for a moment, or he would have come already and it was too soon. Far too soon.

But even as he blinked and gasped, leaning over her, bracing both arms on either side of hers, she leaned back and whimpered his name again.

In an attempt to soothe her, he kissed the back of her neck—but she moaned, then reached back with one hand to pull his jaw as she turned her head and took his mouth, their tongues tangling—and when he groaned, she tightened around him.

“Harth… I need you… more…”

“Yes. Don’t stop. Don’t stop,” she breathed, dropping her head back against his shoulder again as he gathered himself, banking the terror that clawed at the back of his mind with the sheer fire of his need for her.

“My mate…” he groaned as he began to move again, first slowly, writhing against her. “My beautiful mate…” But it wasn’t enough—for either of them.

As Harth muttered a curse, he reared back again, let his hands drag up her thighs, then along her sides. And when she shivered, he grasped her waist and pumped into her, again, again, again, until his declarations of love and need became strangled cries.

With her thighs shaking, she panted and whimpered, pushing back against him, his name torn from her throat over and over.

They were both overcome, the world forgotten… both so desperate that Tarkyn feared he might actually shift. And it still wasn’t enough. He needed her closer.

“Hold on,” he gasped, then grasped both her hips as he leaned backwards, arching himself, and pulling her up onto him until her back came up hard against his chest and she straddled his thighs.

She was helpless there in his lap, able to do nothing but balance herself and reach back, one hand clapped to the back of his neck, the other gripping his forearm as he pounded into her.

The echoes of the claiming sent him over the edge. The mating call echoed through the cave as he

“Tarkyn! Tarkyn!” she sounded panicked, but she was arching, crying, searching for her peak, frantic for it.

“I have you. I’ll always have you,” he rasped, his lips against her ear.

The tiny hairs on her neck rose, her skin pebbling, then washing down her back as he stroked one hand from her hip, across her belly, then down, down to find where they joined, where she was spread, but so slick, he was forced to use multiple fingers to make sure he found her pleasure.

He knew he’d found the spot when she tensed, clenching around him, her fingers clawed into his other arm and her breath stopped.

“I love you, Harth,” he rasped as he stroked again.

“Love you so much.” Again.

“Don’t leave me… don’t ever leave me.” Again, and again, and again.

Harth was silent, her breath holding with each thrust, then rushing out when he eased back, sucking in to hold again when he thrust, until suddenly she shuddered.

“Tarkyn!” her voice was high and thin as her body gripped him and her entire body jolted. She cried out, her hips twitching as she rode that over the edge of ecstasy, tumbling into freefall on the other side.

She went loose in his arms, her body rippling and jerking, but Tarkyn buried his face into the hollow of her neck and clung, pressing her against him as he followed her, groaning her name against her salty skin as the world seemed to implode with pleasure.

*****

~ HARTH ~

Tarkyn slowly lowered her to the furs, then curled up behind her, sliding one arm under her head, the other over her waist, his knees bent behind hers, curling himself around her. There wasn’t a part of her that he didn’t touch, his breath heaving and still hot in her hair.

But neither of them spoke for several minutes as they lay there together, blinking and coming back to the world.

At one point she shifted her weight and his arm over her tightened as if he was afraid she would leave.

He was trembling.

Harth frowned and hugged his arm to her, his fingers splayed just under her breasts, on her ribs.

“Tarkyn, what is it… what’s wrong?”

“Nothing I just… I just need you close right now.”

Harth swallowed, staring at the wall of the cave and letting the events of the past few minutes play back in her head, desire fluttering in her again already as she thought about that moment when he’d entered her.

He groaned when her skin prickled under his touch, then kissed her neck again. “I’d take you again… right now.”

“What is this?” she whispered. “What’s happening?”

He sighed heavily, his breath rushing across the sensitive skin at the nape of her neck. He curled even tighter around her and pulled her against him. And when he spoke his lips brushed against her skin.

“I don’t know what to call it, but I’ve experienced it before… heard from others… it’s a kind of… panic, I guess,” he said, his voice a little self-deprecating, a little embarrassed. “There’s a feeling that always happens on the eve of battle… as if everything might be taken from you. As if there’s a need to ensure there’s no regrets. Nothing you’d look back on and wish for. I just… Harth I just can’t lose you yet. That’s all. Don’t worry. It will pass.”

“No, no, don’t… don’t be silly. I felt it too. I just wasn’t sure if what you were feeling was the same thing I was feeling. I felt it before as well, but it was different. When we were leaving Thana and we didn’t know if… if we were going to make it. There was this kind of… energy I had. I kept hugging people and…”

“Yes.” He sagged a little at her back as if he was relieved. “Yes, that’s it.”

“I’m here, Tarkyn,” she whispered, letting her fingers slide between his. He tightened his grip, keeping her there. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I pray to the Creator that’s true,” he said baldly. “But if I have learned anything in my life Harth it’s that we can take nothing for granted. So… just lay here with me before we need to go, okay?”

“Go? Where?”

“I need to speak with Sasha if possible. I need to… do what the Creator put me here to do.”

“What are you talking about?” Harth tensed, her eyes wide. What was he going to do? Was that why he was suddenly frightened?

“I submitted to her yesterday,” he said slowly. “And I’m praying that means she’ll receive me. I thought about it all night, Harth. And I realized… If I was in her shoes, I would want to know what I know. I have to try and tell her. And leave it up to the Creator whether she listens or not.”

“Tell her what?”

He sighed so deeply that she was pressed forward by his chest. “I have to tell her that her people are on the verge of revolt. If she doesn’t lead them to peace… Zev may not lead them at all after tomorrow.”

“Wait.. what?”

“That tension you can feel out there, Harth. I know it. I’ve felt it before, though for different reasons. Clearly the Chimera have been waiting for their Alpha to return, assuming that that is what would make them feel safe here. But they’ve come back… frightened and aggressive. No predators respond well to that. A fearful leader is an unstable one.

“If Sasha doesn’t stand up and take control of this, Zev will find himself overrun by his own people.”

“Overrun?” Harth asked, her voice thin.

‘They might go to the Anima without him… or her if she remains loyal.’

‘Loyal?! Tarkyn, they’re ardent. She’s not leaving him for anything?’

‘Even for the safety of her child?’ he asked carefully.

Harth froze.