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“I thought I was your only mate?” she queried archly.
He chuckled. “I only know in theory.”
“Show me,” she demanded.
Let me in
Her body softened into his. She flinched instinctively against the stronger push into her mind, and then the abyss opened. Darkness seeped in and she whimpered. The hatred and rage, the cruelty, and the unadulterated blood-thirstiness shook her. Unwittingly she reached out to him through the connection.
Drac
“Never at you,” he whispered. “These are the emotions my essence thirsts and lives for. It is a part of me, never to be separated.”
Its malevolence is enough to destroy any soul.
After a tense pause he answered, we are one.
Saieke forced her limbs to relax as the oppressive feelings tried to dominate her mind. How did he bear it? She tried to shift through the mire of darkness to see truth.
Harm to you is not something we would ever condone.
Gentleness reached out to her seeking to soothe. The strangeness of it in the midst of such rage and cruelty confused her. It was more than gentleness…stamped with possessiveness and love?
“What are you showing me?” she whispered.
“I want you not to fear the beast inside of me.”
“Why do you not suppress this darkness as Lachlan does?”
When you do not have power those precious to you can be snatched from your arms.
A collage of thoughts, memories, their impressions clear and precise, tunneled through her mind like the rushing waters of a river. What accompanied the images were feelings. The depth of loyalty he felt to King Rajliegh—Gidon’s father—as Drac had bonded himself to his cadre. His ruthless resolve as he lowered his psychic shield to learn darkness and hone it as a weapon to become stronger—stronger to fight, to protect his king’s throne, his family and his kingdom, as they fought the subjugation of the dark era they lived in. The pain and terror at watching his brother succumb to evil. His feelings, as darkness and power beckoned and seduced, and his triumph at bonding with the beast inside. Images of her fighting the Mevians; of her fleeing to his world; of him drinking her blood; of being inside of her body, coalesced and sank into Saieke. The primal attraction, the lust, the desire, the need to protect and love her, bled from him into her.
Saieke wrenched her mind from the depths of his, breaking the connection. The intensity of the emotions shook and humbled her.
“You are still afraid.”
“No…yes…only because I feel so much for you. You have a beast claiming me. What do I have to explain my desire for you?” she asked rawly.
“My beast only detected what I would eventually come to know because of its heightened senses. Its powers allowed me to see faster, what I would have discovered even without its essence. Our animalistic essence allows us to find a mate that soothes the constant need to blood let with her smiles, her body, and her love. You are my mate, Saieke.”
Yet you do not want me.
“I want you with every breath in my body.”
She gasped. She had not expected him to hear her inner most thought.
“Will you allow me to court you?”
Her eyes widened. “Court me?”
His lips twitched. “Yes…I do not think I have the willpower to stay away for unending years, maybe only for a few hundred.”
Emotions clogged her throat. Uncertainty, even fear, but the sheer excitement that rushed through her at his words frightened her more than she thought possible. She felt lost in his need and desires. They scared her because they were also her desires. Yes
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