Once Napolean and Nachari had performed the necessary ritual to reverse Salvatore’s trickery, calling upon the powerful god Draco to endow Ciopori with her birthright as Marquis’s true destiny—and to free Kristina from a fate that was never hers to begin with—Napolean had assured Marquis that he could go forward with the conversion. That the requirements of the Blood Curse remained the same as they had always been. But considering the length and hardship of Ciopori’s transition, Marquis couldn’t help but wonder if they hadn’t pushed fate too far.
He wanted to tell her that he loved her. To explain why he couldn’t stop, no matter what: Her human body could not survive the changes that had already taken place, and her Vampyr body could not survive still being part human. No. Once a conversion began, it could not be halted, and telepathic communication was next to impossible due to the sheer amount of concentration required to circulate the venom. If Marquis had known how much the conversion would cost the woman he so dearly loved, he would have left things the way they were.
As if sensing his growing desperation, Ciopori drew in a deep breath and slowly exhaled, her rigid muscles relaxing for the first time. Marquis felt a final surge of resistance discharge from her body, and there was a tangible shift in her countenance. His incisors retracted of their own accord. He mentally scanned her composition, wanting to be absolutely sure that the transfer was complete, and then he pulled away, slowly lowering the exhausted female to the bed in his master chamber.
His tension eased with relief. “My love, how do you feel?”
It was the first time in an entire day that he’d heard his own voice.
Ciopori licked her bottom lip and ran her tongue along the top of her teeth as if she was feeling for fangs. She smiled weakly. “Like I’ve just been run over by a thousand chariots.”
Marquis smiled. “Chariots, my love? I thought Napolean transferred our culture and language directly into your mind: Did he not?”
Ciopori laughed. “He did. But honestly, to say I feel like I’ve been run over by a bus just doesn’t cut it. It leaves out the two-thousand pounding hooves that just stomped the life out of me.”
Marquis frowned. “I cannot express how sorry—”
“My love,” she whispered, holding her finger to his lips, “I’m not. Just tell me this; is it over?”
Marquis smiled then. “I believe so.” He became deathly quiet, listening to the forest around them. “Tell me what you hear.”
Ciopori tried to sit up a bit, and Marquis quickly placed a pillow behind her back. “I hear the sap running through the trees behind the house, like blood coursing through someone’s veins.”
Marquis smiled broadly. Dear gods, could it really be? “What else?”
She closed her eyes, and then she laughed, excited. “I hear the water rushing through the river out back—and the different tones it projects depending upon the size of the rock it is sweeping over. Dearest Cygnus! I can hear the flap of a hawk’s wings soaring overhead.” She placed her hands over her ears. “How does one keep from going mad?”
Marquis laughed and slowly removed her hands, staring down into her amazing gold and amber eyes, the sparkling diamond centers gleaming with newfound wonder. “Think of the dial on a stereo, my love, or the mute button on a remote control.”
Ciopori concentrated, clearly drawing from the wide base of knowledge Napolean had imparted to her as if the memories were her own.
“Now simply turn it all down.”
She giggled. “It’s softer.”
“Yes. Now shut it all off and enter silence.”
It took her a little longer to manage his last command, but once she did, she sat straight up with excitement.
Can you hear me in your head, my beautiful wife?
The sparkle in her eyes said it all. Yes! Oh my gods—yes!
Now tune in again to the river, but keep all else shut out.
Her laughter was as radiant as her smile as she continued to follow Marquis’s instructions, trying out her new, profound sense of hearing. One by one, he took her through exercises to introduce her to her heightened senses. He taught her how to distinguish scents so faint she could name every animal that had walked across the lawn in the past month, all the way down to the squirrels, rabbits, and mice.
He taught her how to see in multi-dimension and to sense movement at the speed of light. He taught her to move her hand through the pillow and then the mattress as if both objects were mere liquid. Now that she had the ability to rearrange her molecules at will, he began to transfer small bits of wisdom regarding the laws of physics to her, for it would be these laws that would govern not only what she could do with her newfound power, but how she would ultimately focus thought to accomplish each and every feat.
Thrilled, if not a bit overwhelmed, she rested her head against his chest and simply allowed him to hold her, both of them taking in the magic of the moment. And then she looked up at him and smiled a mischievous grin. She waved her hand elegantly above them, and the ceiling rolled back like a scroll, the full glory of the heavens shining above them in a canopy of sparkling ice. Ciopori closed her eyes and held out her hand, and then she chanted in a sing-song voice so melodious Marquis thought his heart might just stop beating in his chest:
“Behold the stars that shine so bright: the gods of time, the lords of night.
Behold their glory, strength, and grace: the makers of our fearless race.
Behold the song the goddess sings; bow down to heaven’s mighty kings.
May love abound and peace arise, beneath the glory of these skies….
Within our hearts, a new wind blows; behold the beauty of the rose.”
Laughing, she held out her hand and presented him with the most perfect, long-stem red rose he had ever seen. He accepted the flower, bowed his head, and offered a silent prayer of thanks to the goddess Cygnus and his lord Draco: They had not stripped away her powers as a celestial being. As an original female. Ciopori Demir—Silivasi—was now the living embodiment of all they had been before the Curse and all they had become after it. She had the powers of a celestial being as well as all those of a vampire. And instinctively, Marquis knew that their children would too.
If only through their offspring, the original peoples would live again.
Not wanting to disturb such a private moment, but unable to contain such an important revelation, Marquis sent a telepathic communication to Napolean. He knew the fearless leader was not going to rest until he was assured that Ciopori had come through the conversion safely anyway: He had felt the Great One’s push against his mind several times over the last twenty-four hours and knew that he was waiting….
The moment the most powerful living being of their kind received the information, Marquis felt a strange void—the complete absence of the Sovereign’s presence. As the keeper of the house of Jadon, Napolean carried the blood of every member in his veins—males, their destinies, and even their children. His pulse was the electrical current in all of their heartbeats, so even when he was far away, they felt him. Just as Napolean always felt them.
Never before had Marquis felt an absence of that pulse—not even for a fleeting moment—and he wondered if the great king’s heart had failed. But then again, that simply wasn’t possible. He gently pushed back against the current, hoping to sense their leader once again, and felt a barrier so powerful the gods would have trouble getting through it. And then he knew. As sure as he knew the love of the woman before him, the noble king of the house of Jadon—the only remaining male from the time of the Blood Curse—had briefly closed himself off from his people for the first time in twenty-eight centuries.
The Great One was weeping.
Ciopori reached out and stroked Marquis’s face. “What is wrong, my love?”
“Nothing,” he replied, taking her hand in his. He turned it over and kissed the center of her palm. “Everything is right.” He cupped her face in his hands. “Do you have any idea what you mean to me? What you mean
to our people?”
Ciopori smiled a wise, knowing smile. “I do, warrior.” And then she leaned forward and brushed her lips against his. “But tonight, on this blessed occasion, I want to think, feel, and know nothing but you.”
Marquis growled deep in his throat, his body coming instantly alive. He looked down at the beautiful woman before him, sighed with contentment, and quickly stood, sweeping her up in his arms. He carried her to the large white marble bathroom and, holding her effortlessly in one arm, turned on the 360-degree row of large shower heads in the master shower with his free hand.
Ciopori watched him, her eyes glazed over with something much deeper than love, and he felt his fangs stretch against his gums. Gods, he had waited so long to have her in his arms again. He had imagined this so many times. He had grieved the loss of her as if their love would never be again. Now, with her lying there so trusting and malleable in his arms, he could hardly restrain his desire to take her. But she deserved to be loved like the princess she was, and it would be rude to just throw her up against the wall and feed from her the way his mind was begging him to do.
Be patient, he told himself. You have...forever.
Testing the water once again, he stepped into the large shower, not bothering to remove their clothes. As the powerful jets washed over them, he gently set her down and grasped her by the waist, more forcefully than he intended, but hell, what did the gods expect of him?
Ciopori laughed, reading his mind. “Do you always take showers with your clothes on, warrior?”
Marquis tried to answer but snarled instead. He cleared his throat and tried again. “I don’t ever want to see these clothes again—the ones you’ve suffered in.” He reached down and grabbed the bodice of her wet silk blouse and ripped it in two. Pearl buttons flew in all directions, bounced off the shower walls, and echoed as they hit the floor.
She gasped, and his manhood jerked in response, heating his blood another few degrees. Releasing his claws, he drew a line from her beautiful, pulsing jugular all the way down to her soft, ample breasts stopping at the front clasp of her silk bra. With quickness and dexterity, he shredded it into a dozen pieces using nothing but the flick of his wrist, never nicking her flawless skin.
She shuddered and her rose-colored nipples grew hard in response. The flat, silky expanse of her stomach quivered with anticipation beneath her narrow waist. He dropped to his knees then and tugged at the soaked, ruffled skirt, pulling it deftly away from her body, along with her thin, matching panties, in one hard pull. His head fell back and he moaned as his eyes swept over the soft black triangle before him. His hands gripped her thighs hard, his fingers kneading in rough, sensuous circles, as he slowly spread her legs.
Ciopori inhaled sharply and let her head fall back, gripping the sides of the shower with two open palms, her legs quivering in his hands. “Marquis,” she groaned, her voice low and seductive.
He gently brushed the back of his hand against her core, drawing out liquid heat as he repeated the motion, and then he turned his hand palm facing up, allowing his fingers to trace her inner folds. His head fell forward against her thigh, and he struggled for breath as he swept his hand over her warmth again and again, each time adding more pressure.
She fisted her hands in his wet hair and then grasped again at the shower wall as if she didn’t know which one to hold onto. Marquis stood up then. He gripped her slender waist with his powerful hands and bent to claim her mouth, his kiss alternating between tasting, probing, enticing, and claiming. When he ran his tongue over the soft fullness of her bottom lip, he couldn’t keep himself from nipping it gently. His tongue swept over the small droplet of blood, and he gently pulled her lip into his mouth, suckling the taste of her.
His hand found the back of her neck and held her head in place as he deepened the kiss and clutched her with a force he was fighting to restrain.
This female was his.
The gods had given her to him to keep, to pleasure, to stroke, to taste...to love.
And to claim.
The male warred with the vampire, the intellect with the instinct. One desired to gently make love to his wife; the other was desperate to claim her for all time, to mark her with his scent and his touch, to command her into full submission so that she never thought of another male again. He wanted to give her everything: his heart, his blood, and his seed. And he wanted to take everything from her.
Dear gods, he wanted to drain her of every drop of her pure, celestial blood until he passed out from the strength of it; and now that she was no longer human, there was no danger of harming her. She would simply strike him back and siphon what she needed long before she would allow herself to be harmed. Her instinct would war with his.
His shaft became so hard at the thought it felt like a spear of granite straining to push its way through his pants, and the restricting cloth grew painful against the sensitive head.
He quickly shrugged out of his shirt and ripped at his trousers, kicking them from his feet. Smiling, Ciopori removed his remaining undergarment and ran her hand back and forth over the length of him, purring as she stroked him.
Purring.
His woman had just growled in lust.
Marquis’s fangs shot through his gums like a firecracker exploding on the fourth of July, and he dipped his head, his hands riding up her shapely curves to cup the weight of her breasts. His thumbs found the sensitive nipples and flicked, caressed, making circles before he finally bent to taste them. His sigh was so deep and primitive that the glass on the shower door rattled.
Slow down, he told himself.
Before Ciopori could move against him, which he knew would shatter his control, he fell back on his knees and pulled her velvety thighs apart. His hands grasped her at her middle, his thumbs at her hips, his palms at her buttocks, clutching and massaging the shapely curves as his head fell forward and his tongue took its first taste.
He almost lost it right then and there.
Holy Pegasus. How embarrassing would that be? He trembled, trying to regain control. He slowed his breathing, and then he dipped lower to get a deeper taste. His tongue traced every outline and curve, his lips opening to press his mouth to her warmth and suckle; he swallowed all he could like a man dying of thirst. He flicked his tongue over her cleft before taking it into his mouth and gently sucking, tracing…teasingly scraping his teeth against her core.
Ciopori cried out, fisting his hair in both hands, her body building to a rapid climax. Her hips moved in sweet, passionate circles against him, taking all he could give her and pleading for more. Her leg came up time and time again, the inside of her beautiful thigh brushing against his hair as she arched to give him better access.
Marquis was like a man possessed. The more she moved, the deeper his tongue dove. The harder she squirmed, the louder her pants and sighs. The rougher his lips became, the more she whimpered—and the fiercer he claimed her with his mouth. Sensing the inevitable, he released one of his hands and buried two fingers inside of her, careful not to lose the rhythm of his tongue, his own moans barely drowned out by the rushing water.
Ciopori thrashed against him in ecstasy, calling out his name until finally, her eyes filled with tears and she tried to pull away. “I can’t take it! Marquis, stop.”
Enfolding her hips with a powerful arm, he pulled her to him and held her still. As three fingers entered her, he took her cleft into his mouth and suckled hard, the thrusts of his hand demanding and urgent. She struggled to move, but he held her still as she screamed the names of the gods.
And then she went over the edge.
Trembling from head to foot, her body shook and her womb contracted over and over as powerful waves of pleasure took her. Marquis used his mental powers to send electrical currents into the sensations already overwhelming her, and he held her steady as the powerful bolts shook her body along with her orgasm. Catching it at its peak, he suspended time and held it there, allowing the primal pleasure to go on and on for we
ll over a minute. When finally, her cries became sobs and her sobs became a pleasure so agonizing that she fought to get away, he released the peak and allowed her body to unwind.
The prolonged orgasm, along with the harsh restraint, had left her so physically and emotionally exposed that she trembled from the vulnerability. She had surrendered her control in a way that was difficult for any soul to do—for a length of time that had broken down every barrier she possessed, and tears streamed down her face. She was part of him now. He had marked her, claimed her, taken her beyond the edge and held her there with total authority while she gave herself up to his absolute command.
Marquis massaged her hips and stayed with her, taking long, lazy laps with his tongue, gently scraping his fangs along her thighs, teasing her and pleasing her gently while she came down. When all of her tremors had finally ceased, he stood, grasped her face in his hands, and kissed her long and slow. And then his eyes heated, and he knew they were glowing feral red. A deep, primordial growl began in his chest and rose to his throat, vibrating against his tongue as he felt his fangs lengthen even farther. His shaft swelled to a heavy, painful ache.
Ciopori reached down to catch the first drops of moisture as they seeped from the weeping head, rubbing the swollen tip with her thumb. Her lips parted, and she bent to take him, to return the favor, her glorious eyes catching his with a wickedly sexy glance, but he wasn’t having any of that. His need was too great. He did not possess the restraint necessary to keep from heavy thrusting.
Shaking his head, his eyes bored into hers and his lips twitched in a snarl. It was instinct not menace…passion not anger…but a warning just the same. And Ciopori took it exactly as it was intended. She stood back up. Her body became liquid compliance, her eyes begged for his touch, and she threw back her head, offering him her throat.