Chapter 402: Morning After
Morning After
The initial beams of the morning sun spread out across Galvia’s sky like a brushstroke of a painter. Pale gold faded into veins of rose and amber, covering the horizon in warmth. Clouds sailed in lazy clusters, colored at the periphery with fire, the air trembling lightly as the land woke up.
In the distant west, beyond the length of mountains and rivers, the city of Blackthrone was beneath the arms of dawn. It was a city that wore both threat and grandeur—the capital of the Duchy of Nova, where black and silver banners waved from great ramparts and merchants bellowed in early markets that spilled onto cobblestone roads.
On the north rim of the city, above smaller manors, stood a grand mansion of dark stone and silver embroidery. Its sprawling wings and towering spires displayed the crest of Duke Nova, lord of Blackthrone, an emblem of power that reached far back into the kingdom. Guards marched its walls, and the clang of horsehooves was distantly heard from the courtyards below as another day of politics and power commenced.
But in one of its rooms, the air was a different world.
Outside: fresh air, dawn, the smell of bread from the bakeries, hawkers calling to start the day’s business.
Inside this room: the air was thick. Laden with the residual scent of sweat, sex, and the delicate musky smell of skin mashed against skin for hours. The drapes were pulled close, dulling the light into a faint spill that only strayed through a slight slit. Through it, one sword of sunlight cut into the darkness, sending dust motes drifting in the quiet. They drifted slowly, indolently, lit specks drifting like pale stars in an extinguished firmament.
The room reeked of what had moved through the darkness: passion, tiredness, liberation. It lingered in the sheets, in the sheen on the floorboards, in the slow, indistinct rhythm of breathing.
Two bodies lay entwined on the enormous bed at the center of the chamber, beneath a drape of grey silk cast thoughtlessly over them. Naked, bare, each inch of them crushed in remembered desire.
Leon’s body was relaxed in peaceful ease, his raven-black hair disheveled and falling over the pillow. His chest rose and fell in regular motion, each breath deep and tranquil, golden eyes concealed behind long lashes. His arm was bent over the woman lying on him, fingers curled around the small of her back as if even sleeping he would not relinquish hold.
The woman was Cassidy.
Her dark hair was a tumble of silk over his chest and onto his shoulder, hairs knotted from sweat and mouths, some stuck tenaciously to her face. Her cheek lay against him, lips slightly parted as she breathed, her form sculpted against his like water filling stone. Under the blanket, her curves leaned into him, warm and smooth, the light weight of her breasts resting on his chest. A thigh of hers was wrapped over his waist, possessive even in sleep.
There was a long silence, interrupted only by the slow music of two bodies unwinding from a night that had been so much more than just passion.
Then Leon moved.
A slight quiver of his brow, the gentle curve of his fingers against her naked back. His breathing changed. His golden eyes opened slowly, foggy at first, and then sharpening as the morning sunlight illuminated them. They glowed like melted amber, their depths etching both strength and the gentleness of a man who had found heat in forbidden arms.
He gazed down.
Cassidy slept on, lips slightly parted against his chest, lashes casting shadows on her cheeks. Black hair had fallen over him in a veil, her body heavy with weariness but exuding a tentative kind of peace.
A smile had creased his mouth—unusual, soft, gentle.
"Cassidy..." he breathed softly, removing a wandering lock from her face with tender fingers.
She came to life at his touch. A soft hum escaped her lips, her body naturally coiling tighter against his heat. Her hand tensed, nails lightly skimming his skin before resuming its position on his chest.
Her eyes opened.
Black met gold.
For a moment she just blinked, disoriented, as if her brain was attempting to reconcile waking up with the man she’d spent the night with. Then the memory struck, and her lips parted on a soft gasp.
"Oh..." Her cheeks pinked almost at once, scarlet deepening as she caught her position—the position of her naked body covering his shamefully, the way his arm tucked her in as if she were meant to be there.
Leon laughed, low and deep.
"You’re lovely waking up, you know."
Cassidy flushed harder. She hid her face against his chest, shushing her embarrassment into him. "Don’t say stuff like that all of a sudden..."
"Why not?" His hand trailed slowly along her back, following the line of her spine, his touch languorous but possessive. "You are lovely. And after last night... I don’t think I can ever remember how you looked under me."
She clamped down hard on her lip, the words shredding her calm. "Leon..." she breathed, her voice half-rebuke, half-plea.
But when his hand crept lower, his fingers skating the curve of her hip and skimming along her thigh, her breath caught audibly. She remembered what they had done—how many times, how deeply, how completely—passed through her mind, and she shivered in spite of the game-for-game bravado she was attempting to maintain.
"Sensitive still?" he teased, his lips curving against her hair.
"Mm..." She made a strangled noise, attempting not to release the moan, but it broke free anyway as his fingers drew circles along the inner part of her leg. "Y-You know I am..."
Leon’s smile grew wider. "I do. That’s why I can’t stop."
Her heart pounded. Not just the burning of his touch—it was the look in his eyes, the look that made his golden eyes see her not as Mia’s mother, not as some taboo pleasure, but as a woman he wanted, a woman he loved. That look seared through all her defenses.
"Leon..." She raised her face at last, black eyes glinting, torn between vulnerability and strength. "Last night... I was going to shatter. I’ve never experienced anything like that. And when your energy engulfed me, it was like fire—no, like light. The venom in my veins... it disappeared. I knew. I shattered through. Second Realm of cultivation, Novice Realm... because of you.".