The tip of the hetier brushed the head of his cock, and he knew the moment that the mating barb struck and pumped the first load of mating venom into her because Robyn arched against him and keened loudly, her channel closing around him tighter than ever.
Unable to remain still, he pulled nearly all the way out, the grip of her channel squeezing in protest before he drove back in, wringing cries from both of them. Ashul shook his head, reining in his euphoria. Fucking Robyn had always been exquisite, but rutting his mate was a greater pleasure by far. Every sensation was heightened in recognition to the chemical running through him as his body prepared to make his claim. A chemical response that would continue long afterward once his venom was within his female. He could almost regret that she was incapable of experiencing the same level of pleasure, but by the way she thrashed, her fingernails scratching at his arms and back as her channel milked him with unending ripples, he knew that she was discovering her own incredible pleasure.
His lips curved with smug satisfaction. He was doing that. His mate was responding to his venoms, giving him every ounce of her pleasure even as she was drawing forth the heights of his own.
The second hetier wiggled its way in along the other side of his cock, immediately followed by the third just beneath the sensitive bottom of his shaft, making his mate scream her release as the last two barbs lodged in place. As she clenched down hard around him, his sex jerked and released a fresh load of precum, something he didn’t even think was possible. He certainly had not yet come. The ache to find his own release was growing worse, his need roaring through him relentlessly. Ashul trembled, his ears twitching with the sensory overload. Did he hear something moving outside?
Probably just Deroxas. The bone bag had better stay outside until he finished. He certainly did not want an audience right now.
He pumped his hips, his pace wild and uninhibited as his instincts took over, muting the world outside of them as everything narrowed to the sound of her gasps and sighs, and the wet slaps of their bodies coming together. He leaned down, running his tongue along the side of her neck. The bite had to go there so that his final dose of venom and a small portion of his own blood, triggered by the bite from the tiny veins around his fangs, could directly enter her bloodstream.
Gripping her hips, he dragged her bottom up further as he changed the angle, rutting deeper and quicker, his mate’s cries become a litany of pleasure in his ear. He was close—so close—he had to bite her. Now!
His teeth sank deep, the small veins around them breaking with a euphoric tingling sensation as he swallowed three small sips of her blood before pulling free. He eyed the holes until they partially sealed in reaction to his venom.
Satisfied that she wasn’t going to bleed out, he released the last of his control, riding them both fiercely to the pinnacle of all ecstasy. His balls tightened, drawing up, his nerves firing with electrical pulses that stacked upon each other until they rippled through him. Robyn screamed again, her sex milking him with its spasms as her nails dug into his skin with a sharp sting, drawing blood that trickled down his back.
He growled viciously as his pleasure crested and then spiked in a confusion of senses as something sliced deep into him. Pain and pleasure became one, and he came harder than ever, his cock releasing load after load into her. His mate continued to cry out in the thrall of her own bliss until she screamed, but this time not in pleasure as her entire body went rigid beneath.
“Get off of her,” a feminine voice snarled, and Ashul blinked as the fog from his own orgasm faded away only to be replaced with incredible pain.
He snarled, her face twisting with agony and focused in on his mate’s horrified face. Following the direction of her gaze, he glanced down at the source of his pain and hissed. The tip of a blade impaled him! Thankfully not through the heart, but that did not ease the terrible pain rapidly burning away the last traces of pleasure in him.
“I said, get off of her!”
He felt a dull kick to his side, and he turned, slashing out with his claws, narrowly missing his attacker. Stabbing him was bad enough, but he was absolutely livid that they had interrupted his mating night. It was not the sorceress—the scent and voice were different—but whoever it was, they were going to die as painfully as possible.
ChapterTwenty
Robyn gaped at the woman standing over Ashul—over her mate—her horror shifting to anger as she recalled that he wasn’t going to die on her. Some madwoman couldn’t kill him so easily. Still… the red-haired bitch stabbed her mate!
His lips curled back from his teeth in a terrible snarl as the blade was suddenly ripped free, spraying blood over the both of them. Her mate stared down at her for a moment, fury transforming his expression as he reached out and attempted to wipe some of his blood from her cheek with his fingers. Frustration and horror filled his eyes as the wetness smeared and spread. The low growl that had begun in the back of his throat grew louder as Ashul rose to his feet, his gloriously naked body dripping blood, and turned to face the stranger standing behind him.
Her skin prickling with alarm, the hole in his body slowly knitting itself back together before her eyes, Robyn hurried to her feet and stepped out from behind Ashul to get a look at their attacker. Whoever it was, she had little doubt that there would be little left of them but a bloody mess once he got through with her, and she couldn’t find it in herself to object. Whatever she was prepared to see, however, it was not the sight of a fierce woman brandishing a massive sword as sigils ruthlessly carved into her skin glowed brighter with their protective magic.
Robyn stared at the marks, her shock briefly overriding her anger. Typically, sigils were magically branded, or the magic was inlaid in the blood through a tattoo when carried out by those who weren’t skilled enough to brand it by spell. But to cut them in? It was barbaric! Her lip curled. What was this—a mercenary sent after them? She certainly appeared to be someone from one of the mountain towns given the coarse leather of her attire, her armor bearing the distinctive designs and braids of the northern mountains.
The woman’s gaze dropped to Ashul’s still somehow slightly engorged cock coated with Robyn’s juices and his spend, and her eyes snapped up again, her mouth tightening with fury. Her gaze flicked to Robyn, as if suddenly recalling that she was there, and the woman gave her a tight smile. Robyn imagined that it was an attempt to be reassuring, but the open hostility in her eyes didn’t sell it.
Noting the direction of the warrioress’s gaze, Ashul’s scowl deepened, his lip curling back as a vicious snarl rumbled from his throat. With one quick, decisive movement, he put his body between them. The muscles along his back tensed, his entire body poised to strike. Though their weapons lay with their clothing some distance away, Ashul didn’t hesitate in his attack. With the incredible speed born of his race, he darted forward, his claws extended. The woman’s eye’s widened but she deftly slashed with her sword, blocking his blows with the flat of her blade.
Any concern that she was a mercenary assassin sent after them rapidly faded as Robyn watched them fight. She wasn’t necessarily bad but rather sloppy and raw, like someone trained in technique but with little practical skill and experience when it came to actual combat. Even as she swung her blade, the movements were more desperate hacks than controlled, fluid motions, not one of which came anywhere near making contact.
It reminded Robyn painfully of her first few years away from the monastery, trying to put everything she learned to work for her survival. Not that she was sympathetic toward the fighter’s current predicament as she faced a far more dangerous warrior. She hadn’t merely ambushed them or attacked in a way that they might be able to dissuade her without too much trouble. She’d gone immediately for a kill strike, and as far as Robyn was concerned that was enough to warrant making sure she didn’t catch up to them and attempt to do so again.
A terrible grin of bloodlust spread across Ashul’s face as he began to get strikes in around her defenses. Blood welled up and poured from the wounds lancing her sides arms and thighs, leaving crimson streaks that gradually coated more and more of her body where she was not protected entirely by her leather armor.
The woman screamed angrily as she lifted her sword and attempted to ram it through the drow’s eye only for him to evade with a rapid, flexible twist of his body and counter with a downward slash of his claws. Three deep gashes scored the side of her face where his first three claws caught her, goring deep down to the bone, and with another sharp twist of his body, he plunged his claws deep into her side between the seams of her armor. The woman cried out, and Ashul grinned.
Like a cat toying with a mouse, he grinned lethally and drew back, giving the fighter an opportunity to stumble back, her hand holding the gash at her side. She shook her head, possibly to discourage the blood from the gash on her cheek from getting into her eye, and her lip curled as she raised her sword again with a shaky arm. Ashul’s brow arched with amusement, and he began to circle forward. His tongue traced a path over his lips with excitement for the kill.
Her eyes cut to Robyn, something like sympathy flashing over the woman’s features. “Do not worry… ah, necromancer,” her nose wrinkled slightly with her grimace as she noted the sigil on Robyn’s brow. “I’ll dispatch the drow who has violated you.”
Violated… who? Me?Robyn gaped, bristling with annoyance. Was that what this was? Not a mercenary or an assassin sent after them, but some idiot with too much of a savior complex that she didn’t even make sure first that Robyn required saving.
“You will not! I definitely don’t need saving…and look what you did!” she bellowed. Turning impatiently to her mate, Robyn bit out, “Ashul, stop. Don’t kill this idiot. She wasn’t sent to kill us. She thought she was saving me from you,” she sneered bitterly.
Of all the times in her life when she could have used someone to step up to her defense when she was outnumbered, it had to be now when it interrupted the most important night of her life.