Chapter Six – Two Months Later – Geraline
Geraline groaned as she rolled to her side. Back in the Spine encampment, most of their remaining army had taken the time to lick their wounds, mourn their dead, and speculate about the future.
She knew that white haired Supreme, Helena, was in the process of trying to negotiate with the more moderate members of Shadow society, and assassinating extremists.
She also knew that although the war still wasn't over, they had inflicted tremendous damage upon the Fractured City. They had turned an impossible situation and a pervading threat into something containable. The only way the Shadows could bolster their numbers was through creating inferior mindless, rather than obtaining the intelligent Supremes, who were capable of possessing magical bodies, or making a non-magical body wield power it never formerly held.
The Fractured City lay in chaos, the Shadows assaulted by the humans and werewolves they considered beneath them – but at a cost.
So many died. I just... I wish our victory had been more conclusive. Geraline rolled to her side, coming face to face with the slumbering form of Malek. Her protector. Her saviour. He seemed to be dropping in more and more lately, as they lapped up the aftermath of their campaign in the Fractured City. Rumors persisted of another one perhaps in the works.
Geraline didn't care. She'd gone face to face with the mouth of evil in that place, and never wanted to see something like that again.
She examined the werewolf, with his delicate curves, those long and slender fingers, the growth of a beard that sprouted over his face, the long, moppish hair that now curled to his neck. Attractive, for sure. Quite heroic, too.
And the whole isolated by his tribe thing held appeal to her. Without any attachments, he was free to roam the world without worrying about family. Instead, he chose to stick around Geraline, citing that she “wasn't too bad looking.”
Geraline assumed that was a compliment.
Her best friend, Faith, avoided company for the most part, hanging around Erlandur, glum with the discovery and loss of her grandmother. Yarrow stuck with Raine, trying to work on something that inhibited the voice chanting inside her mind.
And Geraline, well. Geraline didn't feel like doing anything. Twenty something thousand or so werewolves left for the Fractured City. Less than four thousand made it back in the end, as despite Helena's newly controlled minions, Shadows were still able to nip at their numbers during the mass retreat.
Her heart was in turmoil, unsure what to think or feel. Malek's company helped dull some of the thoughts and soften the emotions, but it still wasn't enough to wipe out the fact that they suffered great loss.
“I can feel you staring at me,” Malek said, his yellow eyes fluttering open to fix on her face. “The quality of the air seems to change. Like you're stabbing needles into my eyes.”
“Oh.” She shrugged, plastering on a smile. “Only because I could happily look at you forever like this. You're not 'bad looking,'” she said, imitating his phrasing for her.
“Sure.” Malek stretched, before latching his arms around her and drawing their bodies close. “So, what's with the worry? Not thinking about what happened in the city again, are you?”
“I am,” Geraline admitted, feeling a strange urge to cry, though she suppressed it as best as able. Though she'd destroyed the Heart with her own magic, though she often envisioned the melting of that artefact in the back of her mind, she still didn't hail it as the astounding victory Helena claimed. “I just... I don't understand, I suppose, why some people are treating it as a success when it feels like it cost everything. And the situation in the Fractured City is still there. We're outnumbered. There's still thousands of those Supremes. All we did was destroy some stupid artefact. That was the great plan.” Geraline huffed into Malek's neck, taking comfort in the strong, manly scent of him, and the powerful muscles wrapped around her body.
“You're just unhappy we weren't able to wipe them all out in one sitting,” Malek pointed out, making Geraline flush. “So you don't see what we've actually done. Their numbers are no longer infinite. Helena controls a small faction of the City now, with the intent to eventually control the rest of it. We've sent word to the Lunar Waste tribes and inns and sentry posts along the northern borders about the tunnel. We have the knowledge to pass along to every single werewolf clan, and every single southern clan on how to beat them. Even if you're not a werewolf. So, I'd say it's a victory.”
“Most southern people don't even know werewolves exist,” Geraline said. “They never leave their comfy and sunny towns. They just run trembling under their beds at the mere mention of a Shadow.”
“We can change all that,” Malek said. “I've learned so much since joining this campaign. Before, all I knew about the Shadows was that they were nasty and killed people, and there were rumors that they came from a city in the north over the mountains. Now look at us. Professionals in understanding our foes. When you know where your enemy comes from, you control the situation better. Don't you see, Geraline? It's brilliant.”
When he put it like that, Geraline admitted to herself, it did sound pretty convincing. Cheered up slightly, she rewarded Malek with a kiss, soft and pliable on his lips, and it quickly heated up into something else. Emotions sizzled between them, trapped by the excitement they shared together. Malek, buoyed by his sense of triumph, ramped up the kiss, devouring her lips, heart and soul, hands gripping her tight, transmitting his heat onto her skin.
So easy, Geraline thought, to forget everything like this. To feel we succeeded. Also, to feel pleasure by the various sexual urges they felt, to have herself scrutinized by him and appreciated physically. To learn more about him, his family, his home, his hopes and ideals.
To know they survived, and that any children they might have would be brought into a better world.
The scar upon her thigh throbbed slightly as she tensed her legs, allowing him to fall onto her, his hips between them. She didn't want soft and slow, she wanted hard and fast, and frantically wrestled him out of his pants, to allow his erection space to breathe, before he grabbed at her underwear and yanked it off with a ripping noise.
He bit her neck before pushing his erection inside her, slipping through the growing arousal down there, rough and delicious with her. Geraline moaned her delight, her brownish red hair splayed out on the pillow beneath her, eyes jerking backwards, fingers balling into claws as she clutched at his arms. She left scratch marks there, and he grunted, closing his eyes for a moment, delving into her with passion. Both of them had been lonely, one way or another. Both of them needed something like this.
Two months into a relationship with him, and she still kicked herself every day for feeling like it was still their first week, and they hadn't been together for that long at all.
Feeling him here with her came as a welcome relief. Instead of death and destruction, she focused on love, lust and the physical effort of their bodies entwining together. Geraline liked being bound to someone, able to drink in every asset of them, from the corded muscles of Malek's body, to the eyes that hazed in pleasure above her.
When they came together, the bedsheets thoroughly rumpled between them, the sweat pouring off their bodies, and the luscious glow of her orgasm stroking every nerve ending, Geraline sighed, closing her eyes and resting her face on Malek's arm.
“Don't know about you,” Malek whispered into her ear, kissing her hairline, “but I'm glad we survived. And I'm glad we both chose to risk our lives to fight the Shadows in the first place. It says a lot about you.”
Geraline frowned. Admittedly, it was Faith's determination more than anything that spurred her to leave Ghost Lake and potentially sacrifice herself for a greater cause. But she wanted Malek to maintain that heroic image of her, so said nothing.
When they stepped outside about an hour later, the cold gleam of late night greeted them.
The mountains provided a misted backdrop to the Spine clan's fort, and sentries paced the walls. They hadn't experienced Shadow attacks for over a month. Geraline spotted Erlandur, Alyssa and Faith talking together, huddled by one of the Eternal Flames Geraline had created.
Strolling beside Malek, Geraline contemplated what lay next for them. The future was far from defined. They still had a long way to go, and had suffered awful losses.
They'd also potentially saved the world. That meant something, Geraline supposed.
Together, bit by bit, they would rebuild what had been lost. Show the south that the Shadow threat was no longer so threatening. Recruit more to their cause, and help Helena seize control of the entire Fractured City.
And live.
Geraline breathed in deep, taking lungfuls of crisp, chilled air.
Then, with a smile, she held Malek's hand, determined to do everything they could to make the future they fought for happen – and to have the Lunar Wastes experience peace for the first time in centuries.
Thanks to people like them, it was possible.
The End
Get Your EXCLUSIVE & FREE Copy of
TAJA’S DRAGON
CLICK THE LINK TO RECEIVE YOUR COPY