TOGETHER
Ihave no idea what I’m in for as I crawl up onto the large birch table in Baldur Sigurðsson’s studio. He watches me all the way, his dark blue eyes roving me now as I have to go on all fours upon the tabletop. It’s a carnal sensation to be up here in a decidedly sexual position, yet still have no idea what I’m doing here. Baldur doesn’t join me on the table, only watches.
Until I need instructions on what comes next.
“Am I just going to sit up here, or what?” I pause.
Hot and bothered, yet curious, all at once.
“Strip down. Lay on your front.” Baldur is calm as he speaks, but that scorching sensation from him hasn’t lessened. I feel it expand into the room now, though he’s got the deep, star-bright heat of his dragon controlled. He’s calm, even as his hot eyes pin me and his dragon rises, roiling through the solar. I lift an eyebrow at him, and he lifts one back.
In the sexiest standoff I’ve ever had.
Though a small part of me worries Baldur might lose control of his drake and force me to bond him, much like Mikkel, another part of me knows better.
I can feel Baldur has effortless control over his inner dragon; unlike Mikkel, he can let his Blood Magic roar and careen through this space without bonding me, crafting its star-hot brightness and rage into an incredible artistry I don’t even know the half of yet.
Because real control isn’t blocking our beast’s instincts; not like Mikkel has done for decades. Real control is movingwithour dragon’s energy, shaping and crafting it into what we have a use for.
And Baldur’s been doing that for centuries.
Slowly, I strip down. It’s weird, because I’m not an exhibitionist, and I’m not into being ordered around by any drake.
Something about Baldur and this situation is tantalizingly perfect, however, as he watches, devouring me with his gaze. Heat careens between us in the room. It’s not just from his dragon powering up for whatever he’s going to do to get the False Knights’ curse out of me, but also from my own.
My inner Blood Magic drakaina has caught his scent of power and passion; she’s roaring through my veins now at the prospect of interacting with a truly powerful mate, one she very much wants to take as hers.
But a deep part of me is still fighting that this is my fate; I haul my bright drakaina back now, not yet ready to give in to mating Baldur and everything that might mean for my destiny, for good or for ill.
He sees it; I see the quirk of his lips as he feels me resist, and the hot darkening of his eyes, but he will not blast his magic through my resistance and force anything to happen between us.
Only tempt me, with everything he can do for me and my power.
It’s hot and maddening, as he gestures me down to the table. Making eye contact, I put a subtle warning in my gaze for him not to try anything stupid, then resume my all fours position and slowly lay down on my front.
The table is hard beneath me, but strangely warm; as if Baldur’s power has warmed the smooth birch wood, it’s comfortable as I lay on my belly and fold my hands beneath my cheek as a cushion.
But this isn’t a massage table, as I stretch my legs out now, getting as comfortable as I can be. It’s a place of power, as Baldur changes his magic into a deep flow all around me and the table, both.
Incredible blue and white sigils lighting up all over it now.
I startle as that powerful wave of magic happens, jerking my head up as I gaze down now at the amazing vortex that’s been activated beneath me, and all around.
Baldur’s scalding-cool starlight magic rushes around and through the table now like a river’s flow. He’s got it well controlled from eons of practice, and I feel how creating a magical vortex inside this room to heal someone on this table is something he’s done countless times.
But as that deep-hot whirlpool seizes me now, like a river’s glacial current with the warmest hot spring running through it, I feel it spiral up, right through me.
It sweeps me up inside its gargantuan flow as it spirals to the sky; far above, I feel that power harness not just the motion and flow of the earth and the water that rushes beneath the house and this table, but also the ancient movement of the aurora, visible through the skylights again as evening comes.
I’m caught in the power of the ages, as all that earth, water, and sky energy is harnessed for this ritual. And then Baldur adds fire, like the ancient thunder of stars being born.
Power explodes through me—my inner drakaina brightening like a comet, on fire with burning light.
As Baldur harnesses the ancient magic of the cosmos into our ritual, a heat so blistering rips through me that I jolt and cry out. Everything about Baldur is all about the light, I understand, as that incredible brightness breaks through me like a star going supernova now, ancient and uncontainable.
Baldur is the consummate light to Mikkel’s darkness; the brightness and fire I desperately need to finish balancing my inner drakaina and help Bjorn weather our bond’s Bone Magic.
Baldur has intimate control over his light, however. His connection to the stars complete, I feel him pull all that heat and brightness back now into a beautiful balance with the other elements.
