Silver gasped when she saw him.
He had no name now, not since he’d taken his role as elder and advisor, wielder of the ink that marked us all. He had his supplies with him as I’d requested, everything Blade and I would need to banish all doubt from everyone present. If Silver wanted proof, the others would, too.
“Scribe. Thank you for coming.”
“Of course.” He bowed slightly at the waist, and the others, my enforcers included, rose to bow back to him. He was old, he’d been an old man when I was a boy and no one remembered his given name. He inked the names of new babes and members of my legion on my flesh, officiated at all matings. He was our record keeper, historian and my personal council. And he was here at my command.
He carried his small black bag under his arm. Within that bag? Ink. Silver bolts. Everything he’d need to send me down an unchangeable path.
I yanked my shirt over my head, and Harper turned at the motion, her eyes going wide with desire as she studied me, her attention lingering on the lines of names inked into my flesh with a fascination I was eager to test. She had never seen my bare chest before.
“What’s going on? What are you doing?” she asked.
Cormac grinned, the first time I’d seen the look on his face in recent memory.
When Blade pulled off his shirt as well, the shuffling and whispers in the room ceased and Scribe placed his bag on the table next to my mate. “You sure about this, Styx? What’s done cannot be undone.” His official words were for me this time, the only warning I’d receive from him. Blade, too. This was permanent. Forever.
I looked down at my beautiful mate, took her scent into my lungs and stopped trying to control the fangs that ached to sink into her flesh, marking her, claiming her, driving her into a mating frenzy. Blade had been gifted with a taste of her sweet pussy on Zenith. Soon I would taste her. Fuck her. Claim her. Forever. My mouth watered and my cock ached to do so.
“I’m sure. She is mine. I honor her claim and accept her mark.”
“What mark? What are you talking about?” Harper looked from me to Blade, confused. But Blade lifted his hand to her opposite shoulder and repeated my earlier words.
“She is my mate. I honor her claim and accept her mark.”
“Would someone tell me what the hell is going on?” Harper scowled at both of us, the irritated look of a woman thwarted by her men. I smiled back as Scribe took his ink from the bag.
“Where shall her mark be placed?” he asked.
I’d saved space, high on my chest, at the base of my neck where even a uniform wouldn’t hide her name from my legion, a spot for my future mate’s name to be prominently placed. I put my finger to the spot. “Here, Scribe. Her name is Harper.”
I placed my hands on the table, bent at the waist so he could reach.
He nodded in approval and got to work. First, I looked at each person around the table, silently telling them this was done. It was official. Then I looked at Harper. Didn’t look away.
The needle and ink went deep, the pain part of my test of loyalty. I wished in that moment her name was longer, the burn and everything it stood for making my balls ache, my entire body hum with barely suppressed need.
Those assembled watched in silence as he finished with me and went through the same process with Blade. Harper’s gaze drifting back and forth in fascination, and not a little desire. Her attention lingered, and as Scribe worked on Blade, she raised her fingers to my flesh, traced her name with trembling hands. “Why? Why did you do this?”
I took her hand and pressed it over her name, forever etched in my body. “Because you are mine and I am yours.”
Her stunned look made me want to kiss her, but she turned from me and looked at Blade. He spoke over Scribe’s bent head. “You are mine, Harper, and I am yours.”
“Holy shit.” She stared, shocked perhaps? Trembling. A little pale. I looked to Blade.
“Did you feed her?” I snarled.
“Of course,” Blade barked right back and Silver laughed.
“By the gods, this is going to be fun to watch.” She leaned back in her chair, arms crossed and put her feet up on the stone slab with a grin on her face.
“I’m right here, you know,” Harper countered. “And I’m not a pet. I’m an intelligent adult. I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself.”
“No.”
“No.”
Blade and I denied her claim at the exact same time and Ivar grinned, glancing at Silver. “Fun? Nothing like seeing our two best fighters get their balls chopped off.”