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Aylin and Isobel slipped out of Moonrise Towers. Hardly unnoticed, Isobel was certain, for Aylin’s presence alone commanded attention, and her wings demanded it. Their lack of covertness mattered little, however, if the knowing smirk Jaheira sent Isobel’s way as they were leaving was any indication. The old druid even raised a wine glass at her and mouthed ‘enjoy’ while nodding Aylin’s way.
Isobel was far too happy to finally be alone with Aylin to be flustered over Jaheira’s teasing. And her angel, it seemed, was feeling equally impatient, for Aylin swept her into her arms the moment they set foot out of Moonrise.
“Shall we away to Last Light, my darling?” Aylin asked, wings already preparing for flight. Her angel didn’t move, eagerness tempered by the need to hear her answer first.
Isobel swooned. Ever the gallant alpha, her Aylin.
“Indeed, my love,” she was pleased to say, and she was surprised when she noticed that she was already holding on to Aylin, just as she’d used to. It didn’t bother her long, not when the sense of familiarity set in as easily as she fit in her angel’s strong arms. “I’ve a room there, where we won’t be disturbed,” she told Aylin, her voice trailing off breathlessly in anticipation.
Aylin smiled and leaned down to nuzzle her, making her purr. The alpha responded with a purr of her own, so loud and powerful that most would mistake it for a growl, and Isobel found herself swooning again.
How she’d miss the sound and feel of Aylin’s purr.
Slowly, gently, as Aylin ever was with her, the alpha took to the air. They floated above Reithwin, the death and ruin no longer cloaked beneath the shadow curse’s fog. Isobel couldn’t bear to look at it, what used to be the town she lived in, her home.
To her, it was only weeks ago when Reithwin had people, had life. Of the most recent memories she could muster from the darkness in her mind, she remembered walking to the town square, Squire faithfully at her side. She remembered gazing at her father’s statue with pride before sitting down with a book, meaning to catch up on some reading while she waited for Aylin to return.
Isobel never could get much done when Aylin was around. It was yet one more reason her father disapproved of their relationship. He’d lecture her for hours, saying that Aylin was nothing more than a terrible distraction that would cost her precious years of her mortal life, while, for Aylin, she would just be a passing fancy, an amusement soon forgotten, lost and fleeting like an immortal’s skewed grasp on time.
Isobel buried her face into Aylin’s neck and closed her eyes. She breathed in her angel’s scent, sighing happily at the feeling of warmth and comfort that came with it, of safety and love.
Here, in Aylin’s arms, as they floated towards Last Light, her father’s haunting voice and visage didn’t reach her.
Aylin landed carefully on the balcony connected to Isobel’s room. Entering her room proved somewhat of a challenge, what with Aylin’s tall, broad body coupled with her wings, but the alpha managed to pass through the narrow doorway, all without relinquishing Isobel in her arms.
Isobel tugged at the collar of Aylin’s armor and pulled her angel down for a kiss. The show of strength and deftness had impressed something primal and omega in her, and she wasn’t about to deny her instincts. She never did, when it came to Aylin. Why deny herself the alpha she loved?
Their kiss, like the one they shared at Moonrise, felt both familiar and new. There was a scar in the middle of Aylin’s lower lip, and another that stopped just short of her upper lip, but they were as soft as Isobel remembered. And remember, she did often, in this very room, when she wished for respite from sustaining the moonshield.
Aylin brought her to the bed, gently setting her down. Though they had to break their kiss, Isobel kept her arms around Aylin’s neck, keeping her angel close.
Isobel took a moment to be thankful that their new friends had cleaned everyone up with a water spell after the battle against her father.
Downstairs, those who remained at Last Light were having a celebration of their own. Isobel trusted they’d keep their merrymaking to themselves. While they hadn’t been present at Moonrise when her father was defeated, word had already reached Last Light, and everyone here knew of Aylin, who the alpha was, and who she was to Isobel.
Isobel drew Aylin in for another kiss, nudging the alpha to kneel between her legs as their lips met in a hungry, heated kiss. She buried her fingers in Aylin’s hair, her tongue seeking the alpha’s and her legs closing around the alpha’s waist. Above her, Aylin growled, the power of it making her whole body shudder. Isobel instinctively lifted her hips to press against Aylin’s, and she whined in protest of the alpha’s armor and her robes getting in the way.
“Aylin, I need you,” she told her angel, both pleading and demanding. She pawed at Aylin’s armor, palms sliding along the breastplate, seeking a way to be rid of every piece of metal that hid her angel’s bare skin beneath. “Now. Please.”
Aylin caught her roaming hands, kissing her fingers. “Isobel,” the alpha murmured her name with reverence, as if speaking a prayer, “I am a willing servant to your every whim.” With a flash of divine magic, Aylin’s armor disappeared, leaving her angel gloriously naked, broad shoulders and large muscles for Isobel’s eyes to feast on.
The wings, of course, stayed, as was their natural state. It was with the same divine magic that Aylin hid them away, but the alpha preferred not to, and Isobel wouldn’t have it any other way. She loved to touch Aylin’s wings, a privilege meant only for her, like the rest of the alpha’s body.
Isobel was about to touch, to indulge in the physical perfection presented before her, when she noticed that she was still wearing her gloves. Not only that, but she was still fully clothed. She stared at Aylin hungrily, her gaze dropping to the alpha’s cock, standing proud and ready. The sight of it made Isobel squirm in need, an omega in need of her alpha.
Suddenly, her robes felt too hot, almost suffocating. She needed to feel Aylin, skin to skin, to have the alpha’s cock nestled against her cunt, and then inside.
Desperately, she took Aylin’s hands and guided them to the front of her robes. “Off,” she commanded, and when she saw how that excited Aylin further, she growled at the alpha. “Off.”
Aylin didn’t need to be told a third time. The alpha tore her robes open with startling, arousing ease. Isobel hastily pulled off her gloves while Aylin made equally quick work of her pants and undergarments. Isobel gasped in delight. A demonstration of Aylin’s strength never failed to thrill her.
With her hands now free from the gloves, Isobel indulged in the beautiful alpha body only she could touch. Aylin was distracted with discarding what was left of her robes, and she didn’t mind. In fact, she quite enjoyed feeling the alpha’s muscles flex and tense under her wandering hands.
Aylin hovered above her, gray eyes dark with love and lust. “Let me look upon you, Isobel, I beg of you,” the alpha rasped out. “It’s been so long. So long. Allow me a moment. Please.”
Isobel held still under Aylin’s adoring gaze. She cupped her angel’s face in her hands, her thumbs brushing against golden scars on pallid cheeks. “I’m here, Aylin,” she told the alpha. “I’m here, with you, and I’m not going anywhere. I swear it.”
Aylin kissed her palm. The look in her eyes had changed, now troubled and uncertain. “Forgive me,” the alpha implored, her wings folded tight and hanging low. “I fear I’ve forgotten this beautiful sight, of your body laid bare before me. How shameful it is that I’ve lost a memory so precious, that I’d let it slip from my mind.”
“Then come here,” Isobel urged. She made certain Aylin was looking at her, and then she took the alpha’s hands. “Touch me,” she told Aylin, guiding the alpha’s large hands up her body, to her breasts. “Make a new memory with me, my love, here and now.” She used her legs next, drawing Aylin close until the alpha’s cock brushed against the folds of her cunt. She raised her hips eagerly, breathless when she spoke her next words: “Make love to me.”
“Make love to you,” Aylin echoed, as though in a trance, in disbelief. Then, the alpha growled, primal and possessive: “Make love to my darling. My mate.”
Mate, how Aylin said it with an almost feral frenzy, nearly had Isobel baring her neck to the alpha. At the moment, she struggled to think why she shouldn’t, why should deny this powerful, gorgeous alpha, whom she loved, from claiming her completely.
Aylin nuzzled her neck, the alpha’s hot breath on the very spot where a mate mark would be. Should be, cried Isobel’s omega instincts. Aylin’s sharp teeth grazed there, as if meaning to bite, and Isobel almost came undone.
They couldn’t. They shouldn’t. Not now, and not ever. A mating bond was permanent, eternal like Aylin herself, one not even death would sever. Immortals didn’t mate, not each other, and certainly not mortals like Isobel.
“Aylin,” she gasped, fingers digging into the back of her angel’s neck, a wordless plea to stop.
Aylin whimpered, pained by her rejection, though respecting it, as always. This was not the first time they had been tempted, and it wouldn’t be the last. Aylin’s teeth were replaced by her nose, as the alpha instead breathed in her scent, for that very spot was also where her scent was strongest.
Isobel murmured an apology against Aylin’s hair. She pressed a bittersweet kiss on the alpha’s neck, where she, as well, longed to bite, to mark and to claim Aylin as her alpha and her mate. “Make love to me, Aylin,” she whispered the reminder into the alpha’s ear. “Please.”
Aylin responded, not with words, but with kisses, first on her lips, and then down her throat. The alpha’s hands, as if remembering where they were, gave her breasts a gentle squeeze. Isobel encouraged Aylin with a purr of approval, which grew louder when the kisses along Isobel’s throat and shoulders became bolder, accompanied now by tongue and teeth.
Aylin murmured prayers against her skin, touched her as though, between them, she was the one divine. The alpha’s wings rose high and fluttered in excitement, raining feathers upon them.
When Aylin’s mouth made it to one of her breasts, sharp teeth brushing against her nipple before gently biting down, it sent a spike of excitement straight between Isobel’s legs. The alpha moaned, no doubt feeling how much wetter she had gotten. Aylin’s hips bucked, and Isobel let loose a moan of her own when the alpha’s hard cock slid along her folds. It drew Aylin’s attention as well, the alpha’s hungry gaze dropping from her breasts to her wet cunt.
Isobel knew that look, even though she hadn’t seen it this intense before. Aylin was starved, and she wanted to feast. Normally, Isobel would be happy to let Aylin partake, but this time, she stopped Aylin. “Later, my love,” she said, and when Aylin whined in protest, Isobel reached down and grasped the alpha’s cock. “Right now, I need you here,” she insisted, already guiding Aylin into her entrance. “Here. Inside.”
They’d have time for slow later, time for her to thoroughly enjoy Aylin’s mouth, for Aylin to savor how she tastes. But later. Right now, Isobel craved Aylin as an omega craved alpha. She wanted - needed - her alpha inside her.
Aylin, never one to deny her, began to slide inside, slowly and carefully. Isobel held on to Aylin’s hips, welcoming the alpha with an eager moan. This. This was what her body had been needing ever since caught Aylin’s scent at Moonrise, to have the alpha sinking inside her, deeper and deeper with every gentle rock of her powerful hips.
“Isobel,” Aylin whispered when there was no further to go, when she was completely sheathed inside. “Oh, Isobel. My darling. My mate.”
Mate. That word again. Isobel couldn’t bring herself to protest, not when her angel spoke so sweetly, so adoringly, and not when it sounded so, so right.
“This long, long century…” Aylin trailed off, and there was a lost look in her eyes.
Gray eyes, Isobel couldn’t help but notice. Dull and gray, when before, they were bright and silver like moonlight.
Isobel reached for Aylin’s hands.
Ever since she was brought back from the blackness of her death, every quiet moment was an agonizing reminder that she was alone, that she’d lost Aylin, and she’d never again have her angel in her arms.
She couldn’t imagine the torment of feeling such loss and pain for a hundred years.
Isobel kissed the golden scars on Aylin’s fingers and palms. Thankfully, that was enough to bring Aylin back, present with her once again.
“This long century,” the alpha repeated, but more grounded this time, “never, not once, did I allow myself to yearn for this, Isobel. The pain of your loss hurt more than a hundred Sharran daggers to my heart. But now, here you are. And here I am.”
“Yes,” Isobel agreed breathlessly. She wrapped her legs around Aylin and clenched around her, reminding her angel exactly where they were. “I’m here, Aylin, my love, and I’m yours, all yours, as I have been since the moment we met.”
Aylin touched her face delicately, as though fearing she’d disappear. It was a fear, among others, that Isobel understood and shared.
“And I am yours, my darling, my sweet Isobel,” Aylin whispered, bending down to kiss her.
The kiss was slow and soft. Isobel winded her arms around Aylin’s neck, silently asking for more. Her angel obliged, deepening the kiss, and then, to her delight and great relief, Aylin finally began to move her hips.
The pace, like their kiss, started off slow, as Aylin reacquainted herself to this, to being inside her and making love to her.
As Aylin’s wings closed around them, Isobel’s heart raced, not out of excitement, but out of fear. In this small space, exposed to Aylin’s divinity, would her angel sense the rot in her? Did it stain her scent, seep out from inside her chest and spread to the rest of her body?
Aylin stopped, and Isobel dreaded the worst, but her angel regarded her with concern, not contempt or disgust like she expected. “Isobel, did I hurt you?” she asked, sounding pained at just the notion of it. Her wings began to retreat. “Forgive me, my love, I—”
“No, no,” Isobel hurried to say, hushing her angel’s worries. “You didn’t hurt me, Aylin. Not at all.”
Aylin’s wings quivered in uncertainty. With her godly strength and sheer size, Aylin was always wary of getting carried away and hurting her. It wounded Isobel’s omega pride that her alpha didn’t think she could handle her, that she couldn’t take her.
Normally, Isobel took it as a challenge. She’d growl and push Aylin on her back and ride her angel until she was panting and groaning under her, unable to say anything but her name.
But Aylin needed tenderness right now, assurances and sweetness.
“I’m fine, my love,” she told Aylin, cupping her face and pulling her down for a kiss. “You could never hurt me,” she said between kisses, “my angel, so precious, so good.”
Aylin returned every kiss, growing bolder with each one until Isobel was breathless. Her wings flared and then folded around them, and this time, Isobel welcomed them, as she welcomed Aylin’s hips moving once more.
How tainted could she be, if Aylin kissed her like so? If Aylin wanted her, loved her, like so?
From Aylin’s face, Isobel’s hands slipped lower, first to get tangled in her hair, and then lower still, where her angel’s wings sprouted. A sensitive area, only for a lover to touch. Only for Isobel to touch. Though it felt a little different - scars, there were so many scars - Aylin’s reaction was as familiar as her kiss, and very pleasant.
Aylin groaned against her lips, the alpha’s hips snapping forward, a drastic change to the slow, careful thrusts just moments ago. Isobel gasped, suddenly so full, taking all of Aylin at once.
“Again,” she demanded before her angel could mistake her gasp for anything but desire. She clutched at Aylin’s back, her fingers digging into that sensitive spot.
Above her, Aylin growled, sharp teeth bared as she shuddered from the touch. “My love,” she panted, and Isobel loved how rough her angel’s voice sounded, “you’ll risk making me feral with want if you keep touching me there.”
Isobel smiled, pleased with herself. Aylin’s confession made her feel a primal, omega sort of satisfaction. “Perhaps, then,” she teased, purring in delight, “you should convince me that needn’t be necessary.”
Aylin blinked, and then melted into a laugh. Isobel held her angel, laughing with her. She combed her fingers through Aylin’s hair, enjoying the weight of the alpha on her, how warm and safe it felt.
“I have been a poor lover, have I not?” Aylin murmured against her neck. “Pitiful. Dreadful—”
Isobel hushed Aylin, nuzzling her. “Never,” she declared, and made sure Aylin knew she meant it by clenching down on the alpha.
Aylin made a pleased sound and kissed her throat. “Then let me prove it true,” the alpha growled, and then bit down, very close to where a mate mark would go.
Before Isobel did something regrettable like expose her neck more and demand a proper mating bite, Aylin sat up. Isobel whined at the separation, wanting the alpha’s comforting weight back on her. She whined even more when Aylin’s hips drew back, cock almost slipping out of her.
Aylin swiftly quieted her protests by plunging back inside, burying herself to the hilt at once. This time, the alpha didn’t stop, her thrusts steady and deep, and Isobel eagerly lifted her hips to meet each one.
“Such beauty for my eyes only,” Aylin growled, the alpha’s heated gaze on her breasts. “To see you again, Isobel, to touch you. To make love to you again, I can scarcely believe it.”
“Yes,” Isobel agreed, her cunt squeezing so tightly around Aylin that the alpha’s hips stuttered for a moment. “Have me, my love. Take me.”
Aylin growled so powerfully that Isobel felt it. Suddenly, the alpha’s hands felt like they were everywhere at once. On her breasts, squeezing and teasing her nipples to tautness. On her clit, stroking in time with the thrusts. Aylin’s hips worked tirelessly all the while, leaving Isobel a desperate, moaning mess.
“More,” she gasped, her mind a jumble of thoughts, all about Aylin.
How majestic her angel looked, looming over her, wings spread out. How Aylin’s muscles flexed with every deep, full thrust. How good the alpha felt inside her, how perfect a fit.
How good it would feel to mate with Aylin when she came undone.
Come undone, she did, to the thought of Aylin’s sharp teeth on her neck, sinking in and making a mate mark.
Isobel clung to Aylin as the rush of her release, so sudden, had her squirming, shuddering, and whimpering her angel’s name. Her legs tightened around Aylin, wanting all of the alpha’s cock inside her while her cunt squeezed and seized.
Itching to bite, Isobel pulled Aylin down, and, by some miracle, she mustered enough self-control to bite down on Aylin’s shoulder instead of her neck. It wasn’t the mating bite both of them craved, but it had Aylin groaning and coming with her, the alpha’s hips pushing into hers even though there was no space left between them there.
Isobel held Aylin close as they both shook in bliss, the maddening howl of her instincts calmed and satisfied enough that she could think of more than having Aylin fill her.
Realizing she was still biting the alpha’s shoulder, Isobel reluctantly withdrew her teeth. “I’m sorry, Aylin,” she whispered, though she couldn’t help but feel wistful when the wound she left on her angel healed in an instant, the only trace left of it was the taste of divine blood in her mouth.
The wound wouldn’t have healed had she bitten where she actually wanted to.
“I’d say I don’t know what came over me,” she said, smiling sadly, “but we both know that’s not true.”
Aylin frowned and cupped her face. “Isobel, you know you need only say the word, and we will be mates, as we should be.”
Isobel nuzzled Aylin’s hand. “I know, my love. I know. But you know we can’t. I can’t. I won’t,” she paused to take a breath, to steady her trembling voice. “I won’t do that to you, Aylin. I won’t keep you to myself when I won’t be around forever.”
Aylin rested her forehead against hers and sighed. “My heart is yours, Isobel, and it will stay yours forever.”
Isobel selfishly hoped it was true. It hurt to think about leaving Aylin yet again. It hurt to think of Aylin loving someone else.
Would Aylin forget her one day, when too many years, too many centuries have passed?
She shut her eyes, feeling the sting of tears. “I love you,” she told Aylin, holding her angel as close as she could. She breathed in Aylin’s scent, hoping it would soothe the hurt somewhat.
Isobel woke up in the middle of the night. Aylin stayed asleep, even when she managed to slip out from under the alpha. Isobel was thankful for it. Aylin hadn’t rested in a century, after all.
She sat by Aylin’s side, watching her angel. Aylin slept on stomach, and her wings, with their great width and size, were draped on the edges of the bed like a massive blanket of feathers. Isobel was tempted to touch, to pet her angel’s wings and her hair, but she didn’t want to risk waking her.
Her eyes were drawn to the base of Aylin’s wings. She’d felt the scars there earlier, when they were making love, but it was the first time she’d seen them.
Aylin’s back was more scars than flesh.
There was no mistaking what had happened. She’d always known that the rotten, grotesque wings Marcus preened around with were not his, but she had hoped that what she feared - that they were Aylin’s - had been wrong.
She never believed her father when he told her Aylin was dead, but she also never believed he’d be capable of such cruelty. He had to have known she’d think of Aylin when she saw Marcus with those wings.
The scars on Aylin’s back were large and jagged. Isobel couldn’t imagine how painful it had been when they were taken.
There was a scar right across Aylin’s left eye, exactly where Jaheira claimed to have struck her father with an arrow. A scar on Aylin’s neck and chest, matching the wounds her father had invited to flaunt the immortality he had brutally stolen.
He seemed to suffer no pain, Isobel was told, and now she saw why. Aylin bore the pain as she did the scars while her father threw himself from one death to the next.
How she wished she could have gone to Moonrise, so she could kill him herself.
Pain flared in her chest, squeezing the breath out of her. The rot inside, making itself known and reminding her of its presence. Isobel fought not to cough. She didn’t want to wake Aylin with it, didn’t want the questions it would raise.
Though she managed to stifle the cough, Aylin stirred.
“Isobel? Is something amiss?”
So it was her absence that woke Aylin, Isobel realized, relieved.
“I was just coming back to bed, my love,” she lied, and hoped that Aylin was too tired to see through it.
Aylin smiled and folded a wing around her, pulling her close. “Come, then, my darling. I must hold you while we sleep.”
Isobel smiled back, happy to get swept back into her angel’s arms. Here, in Aylin’s embrace, the pain in her chest faded, and Isobel could breathe easy once more. As Aylin’s wing blanketed her, she snuggled up to her angel.
She fell asleep, eventually, listening to the sound of Aylin’s heart beating.