Drinks with Bloudwedd, Marcus, and Ethan sped by with shared tales of patron antics, gossip about who'd gotten together with whom, and bitching about Claw. It was only the second time I'd been able to get together with them since Pazuzu had removed me from the temple. Not that Pazuzu wasn't good about giving me the freedom to explore as he'd promised, but more that coordinating when the four of us could get the hours off at the same time was more challenging. Claw didn't like groups of acolytes to have leave from the temple at the same time. Apparently, he worried about our safety.
"So we've been sharing all our stories, Mist. When are you going to tell us something about our dark lord?" Ethan asked.
I shook my head and took a drink. Yeah, no fucking way was I going to share any of Pazuzu's secrets. That way led to my death by dragon teeth, and I had no desire to die one bite at a time. He'd probably start at my feet first, like he had that foolish griffin who'd tried to lie to him about a missing shipment of some kind.
"Shells, Mist. You never tell us anything. At least tell us what the palace is like? Is it fancy? Do you get your own room?" Marcus asked.
Ethan smiled and clinked his mug with Marcus'. "Surely you can tell us that much?"
My eyebrows rose as I narrowed my gaze at them. "Are you trying to get me killed? Do you hate me that much? All I'll tell you is that it is built from obsidian and a bloody fortress. Anyone choosing to go against the Prince is a complete moron."
Bloudwedd put her pale hand on my arm. "It's okay, Mist. I was beside you when he took you. He's scary dangerous. I don't blame you for not wanting to chance incurring his wrath."
Ethan put his hand up. "We were just teasing, Mist. Really, don't endanger yourself."
I glared at him, then Marcus, who also looked contrite.
Bloudwedd started telling us a tale of various elven festivals that made the fertility temple antics look tame and my wrist brand chimed.
"It was wonderful to catch up with you crazy lot, but I'd better go. There is no way I want to be late," I said, pushing back from the table and standing.
The three of them stood as well, each hugging me, with Bloudwedd the last. "Please be careful, Mist," she whispered into my ear.
"I will," I murmured, then released her.
Without another look back, I left the busy establishment and wove through the throngs of demons in the market until I reached the courtyard. Lord Pazuzu hadn't yet arrived, thank the Norns. A glance at my wrist told me I was twenty minutes early. Still, better to be early than to make him angry.
Sure enough, he arrived five minutes before our meeting time in a swirl of black smoke as he shifted from massive dragon to humanoid. The lethal aura undiminished by his change, Pazuzu landed and stalked towards me. I froze, muscles tightening even as my abdomen coiled and heated. Deadly beautiful, l couldn't take my eyes from the predatory masculine grace. Everything about him made me want to touch—the flexing muscles, the shadow on his jawline, the soft midnight locks, and those spectacular smoking wings—even if I might not survive the contact.
His dark eyes roved over my body, leaving gooseflesh in his wake. A partial smile curled up one side of his mouth and I found myself biting my lower lip as he reached for me. With an relentless grip on my ass and fist in the braids at my nape, he gathered me against his firm body, the scent of cedar wood smoke and a hint of sharp pungent rosemary surrounding him. Uniquely him. He dragged me up until my face was level with his, then kissed me breathless in a possessive conquering that left no doubt I was at his mercy.
We rose into the air as he flew back towards his palace.
"I'm pleased with you, kitten," he rumbled when he released my mouth.
With my hands threaded in his hair and legs wrapped around his waist, I could tilt my head back enough to focus on his face. "Why, my lord?"
Again, that partial smile appeared. "Your discretion. Twice your friends have pressed you for details, and twice you've denied them. And, you befriended Anna today."
Ice froze my lungs as my heart pumped frantically. He'd been listening, as I suspected he could, and somehow, even though I hadn't said his name, he still knew. I'd be wise to never, ever underestimate him.
"You know Anna?" Had she said his name three times? Did he listen to her frequently? Was he able to read her mind? What had I said in her presence? Damn it. I couldn't remember exactly, but I didn't think I'd said anything negative.
His smile widened, fangs gleaming. "Indeed. Anna is mine, as you are, but her human frailty is something I'm working on rectifying so that I can claim her. Waiting is... tedious."
"You aren't... you aren't going to hurt her, right?" It was hard to get the words out, fear coating my tongue.
"Do I hurt you, little kitten?" Pazuzu laughed, his eyes glinting. "My plans for Anna involve many pleasurable years of fucking. Something about her calls to me."
I nodded before I could think better of it, then held back my wince. Stupid! Stupid, Mist!
Pazuzu's black eyebrow rose as he landed on the slate tile of the palace courtyard in his private wing. "So, you were also attracted to Anna?"
Fuck. I had no idea how to answer. Did I tell the truth or would that make him angry? I bit my lip, my stomach churning as I tried not to fidget. A cold sweat broke out on my back.
Breaking eye contact, Pazuzu licked a line over my neck then nibbled his way towards my ear. His hand on my ass moved to tear open the tunic over my breast so he could palm my nipple, creating a contrast of hot and cold, fear and arousal mixing within me and confusing my senses. "Do you like women as well as men, my sensual Valkyrie?" His voice deepened to a sinful purr in my ear. "Because while any male who has been with Anna is a dead demon walking, I'd be very interested in seeing her with you, in taking you both together. Would you like that?"
His hand plucked at my nipple as his teeth nipped my neck where my pulse beat a frantic tempo. Heat spread within me, flipping the adrenaline to a rapidly growing arousal that slickened my sex. A little whimper of sound escaped me.
"I think you would. If I slide my fingers"—his claws slashed open my trousers—"into this tight cunt of yours... ah yes, as I suspected. You're soaked, kitten. You'd be a good girl and fuck Anna with me, wouldn't you?"
I moaned, the erotic image he was painting in my head mixing with the flash of desire I'd felt earlier, heightened by my fear and his clever fingers gliding over my clit to thrust inside me. I rode his hand as he curled two fingers and pounded them into me.
"Answer me, and I'll let you cum," he demanded as I squirmed with shimmering heat coiling and building, the pressure intensifying.
"Yes. Yes, my lord," I cried out as my back arched and toes curled.
He scraped his teeth on my neck again. "Then cum, kitten. Soak my fingers."
The trembling in my core expanded, bursting outward and I swore, my body bucking as the waves of sensation flew up nerve endings to explode behind my eyes in a white starburst.
His fist tightened at my nape. "Such a good girl." He withdrew his fingers, licking them. "Mmm... I want more of your wet, little cunt, but I'll have to enjoy it while I listen to petitioners." Shifting a finger to a long razor-sharp talon, he cut the remainder of the tunic and trousers from me. I knew better than to protest. My clothes never lasted long around him. He left the scrapes of fabric on the ground and took my hand in his now fully humanoid hand to lead me inside.
We stopped at his massive bedroom just long enough for him to remove my boots and give me a black silken shift to cover my naked body. Not that it would stay that way long, but at least I was covered as we continued through the spacious palace halls. Walls and ceilings gleamed, the obsidian shining with the glow of red light coming in from the occasional doorway or window. Blue-grey slate lined the floors and Pazuzu's boot heels rang with each step. My bare feet were silent next to him, but he always either slowed his long-legged stride to allow me to walk and not have to run to keep up, or he wrapped a powerful arm around me and carried me when he wanted to move faster through the palace.
The palace was enormous, both in terms of every hall and room, but also in overall size. Perhaps to accommodate his massive dragon body, but it took ten minutes to even leave his private wing, and another ten to reach the audience chamber with his throne. Far more massive than the throne room on Asgard, there was a raised platform he lounged on in dragon form, or set back on the later part of the platform, a wide black opal throne that held a universe of colours sparking within its depths. And along the sides of the room and at the two entrances—Pazuzu's private entrance in the back left corner of the chamber, and the front center public entrance for everyone else—his black-clad palace guard held station, prepared to defend their lord or carry out his wishes.
Yet I couldn't imagine anyone being foolish enough to threaten Pazuzu, except another Apkallu dragon lord. Still, the harpies, gargoyles, manticores, and scorpion demons were fierce in keeping their eyes on anyone wishing an audience with their prince. That included demons coming to pay tithes or provide reports on Pazuzu's various business endeavors. He seemed to have his talons in all sorts of pies.
Not that I always managed to hear the details. He kept me busy and distracted.
After seating himself, he bound my wrists to one arm of his throne with the leather straps installed there and my ankles to the other, leaving my body draped sideways across in his lap. His fingers strummed over my aroused flesh and the hard nub of my desire, playing my nerve endings with the instrumental proficiency of a maestro. And that long, clever tongue dove inside my sex to drink every drop when he allowed me to cum, sending another shockwave arching through my sensitized body.
"I swear, kitten, if I didn't have your luscious body to feast on and your wet mouth wrapped round my cock, half of these idiots would not survive their meeting," Pazuzu growled, his fingers tugging a chain he'd connected to clamps on my nipples only minutes before.
Lightning flashed through me and I moaned around the prehensile cock fucking my throat with savage intensity. My eyes streamed and I sucked in sips of air when I got the chance. A lightheadedness grew, my vision blurring and darkening.
His cock retreated and I gasped in desperate air, my lungs heaving despite the biting pain it set off in my nipples as my chest rose and fell. Yet with each bite, my clit throbbed, a heartbeat in my centre.
"Still good, kitten? You know to signal me if it's too much, although you've never yet safeworded," Pazuzu's dark eyes gleamed as he stoked the heat at my core with a hand that always knew exactly how to touch me.
I nodded, eying the deep maroon flared head weeping pearly drops onto my flushed face as it hovered just above my mouth.
He gripped my chin, turning me to meet his narrowed gaze. "Words, Valkyrie. When my cock isn't in your mouth, I want to hear your words."
My inner thighs trembled, sex clenching around his plunging fingers. "Yes, my lord. I'm still good." Fuck, I was so close, trying not to give in to the rippling pleasure shimmering over my skin.
"Then I'm going to feed you my cum, and only after you've swallowed it, do you have permission to orgasm," he growled.
Damn it. "Yes, my lord," I panted, fighting off the coiling sensations, the heat shifting, churning, demanding inside me.
His grip shifted, grabbing my throat as the engorged head of his prehensile cock teased my lips. "I mean it, kitten. Every single drop before you are allowed to cum." His fingers sped, thrusting hard and fast into my core to devastating effect.
I swallowed hard, shivers rippling over my skin as I fought to keep the orgasm at bay, licked my lips clean of the slightly smoky precum, then opened my mouth. His cock dove, sinking multiple inches into my throat, before retreating to plunge again. Desperately, I curled my tongue around him, sucking and swallowing around him. Norns, I needed him to cum. Now.
He groaned and his cock swelled.
Yes, fuck yes. My hands fisted, my body tightening.
He roared, and as he began to erupt, he ripped the clamps from my breasts. Fire burned from my nipples to my core, searing nerve endings. A muffled scream tore from me as my spine arched off his lap, the inferno within detonating with nuclear intensity to whiteout my vision. Helpless to deny it, I shook, even as I swallowed over and over, trying to keep up with the pulses he released into my throat and mouth.
Sweaty, limp and trembling with the intensity of the orgasm, it took me a few minutes to catch my breath once he withdrew from my mouth. His finger traced over my lips and I opened my eyes to the dark flame of his gaze.
"Such a wonderful mouth you have, kitten. I especially like it flushed red and your lips a little swollen from me. Almost as much as I enjoy reddening your ass before I enjoy it." His voice grew steadily lower until the rumble of it rattled my lungs.
My eyes widened. Oh shit.