Time of the Necromancer: Chapter 16

“Please hold still,” Alistair chided as Morrigan threw another glare his way.

“She’s stubborn Al. She’ll say she’s been holding still this entire time when we both know that is not the case,” Benidict said chuckling from beside her on the bed. Just like Morrigan he was shirtless, bandages criss crossing his chest.

“Keep talking Ben and I’ll remind you why I’m the dominant between us,” she growled and shut her eyes. “Ow.”

The wounds she suffered at the castle were what Alistair was treating now except her back was a painting of previous battles. He cleaned another long cut along her back slowly, the cotton swap deeply red but he traced over a pattern of scars. Scars that had long since healed over. It wasn’t the first time he’d seen them and there were many stories surrounding them.

A trio of thin scars raked across her back, from an experimental tool that they had been developing in Cerise. She was training against someone wielding. She’d gotten careless and been winged across the back. The weapons were discontinued for being a few steps too impractical but a knight or two still alive were using them.

He touched another one of them, a burn at her hip that had burned the skin almost white. She had led a mission through the Sanctum and the mage hunters sprung upon them. Their holy light had seared through her armor and nearly taken her with it. It had healed mostly but sometimes the scar burned as a calling card from the Sanctum.

But the one just to the left of her spine was one that she didn’t boast often about. It had taken a while for her to even remotely talk about it. Cerise had been infiltrated by a member of Noria, an assassin sent to eliminate the queen. Morrigan had been in her presence when it happened. A spear meant for her majesty, Morrigan took instead and nearly died. But her Queen survived and so did Morrigan. It was one of the things that earned her her title as the knight.

Reaching to the dresser he pulled a roll of bandages and wrapped it around her chest slowly. She relaxed as he finished, snipping the bandage with his fingers. He pulled her hair back from around her shoulder and stroked his fingers through it.

“That’s just about done,” he said and wrapped his arms around her gingerly but held her tightly. He felt Morrigan’s hand on his wrist and her head against his chin. “You sure you’re okay?”

“Okay is relative right now,” she told him. “But being back here with you two, I am better.”

Benedict turned and brushed his hand against her cheek. The transition between bandage and skin was odd to feel. She looked at him and his eyes tried to hold the light of teasing but it was like a flickering flame. A little too tired, too drained, been through too much to keep it up.

“We almost lost you,” Benidict said softly taking her hand in both of his. “Okay is just as good.”

Morrigan was shaking her head against Alistair’s chin. “The things I did to you two. The things that I said. It’s unforgivable.”

“Mori you weren’t in control of yourself,” Benidict looked up into her eyes. “The things you said may have been cutting but they weren’t you. Not the you before us now. Not the you that we fell in love with.”

 Alistair nodded slowly and kissed the back of her head, “We could see your pain Mori. We knew that wasn’t you. You were fighting in there the entire time.”

“I couldn’t fight hard enough,” she said staring at the ground. “I knew there was something wrong, knew that something wasn’t quite right but She was there. My Queen was there. She was alive and I just wanted to believe it. I wanted to believe it so damn badly.”

Her teeth grit together hard and her shoulders shook as she fought to keep her breathing steady. Fought to not break into tears. Benidict leaned forward and kissed her lips softly, catching her off guard but she didn’t flinch away. “It’s okay Mori. Put in the same situation I cannot say I would have been able to fight against it either.”

“If I had lost my sister I would have done anything to get her back. Or at least to see her again,” Alistair said gently. “I know that isn’t the same thing but it’s the closest I can come to.”

“I know and I appreciate the attempt,” Morrigan told him turning to face him and kissing his lips stroking his cheek. She moved to say more but her vision swam slightly. Red hazed her vision and her hand on the bed kept her from falling over.

Alistair almost panicked reaching out and pulling her closer, “Are you okay?”

Her vision swam slightly and as she looked her hand she saw it growing frailer, wrinkles slowly forming across it. “Not as okay as I had believed. I need to feed. Soon. After everything my blood is weakening.”

“Then feed Mori,” Alistair slid away from her and pulled off his shirt. His skin was still smooth but the efforts of his training and fighting with them for the past few years had paid off in his abs and definition of his chest. He wouldn’t ever bulk of massively without magic but he was far more in shape than before.

Morrigan traced her fingers across a scar against his shoulder. A crossbow bolt that came from an ambush from a rival gang. She, him and Lionel were on a reconnaissance mission, checking a convoy route that a source informed them of. It turned out to be a trap to try and kill Lionel. They survived and found the gang responsible. Their retaliation was swift and brutal.

She then traced another across his chest. A long slash that even healed was deep.  She knew it came from a Norian axe. One of the first wounds he taken during their training. He’d gotten overpowered and had taken a massive hit to the chest. He’d managed to kill his assailant but almost died in the process.

Finally, she traced her fingers across his throat and saw the faded red marks. Two holes that would never go away and red lines that criss crossed his throat like an imprint of a necklace. Those were the marks that she left on him when she turned him. Gave him the gift of her Queen. He had never asked for it but when she offered, he took it as the honor that it was.

She sat up entirely and was at his eye level, if a little taller. She cradled his face in her palms tilting his head upwards. Leaning forward she clamped her lips on his neck piercing the skin. Alistair stilled and wrapped one arm around her for support as she drank.

He could remember the first time she had done this, the pinpricks of her teeth piercing through his skin. The feeling of his blood leaving his veins and the pull from Morrigan’s lips as she drank. Even more than the magic in his veins lighting up like fire, he felt the magic that coursed through Morrigan.

The pleasure that came next hadn’t been what he’d expected the first time and now his legs shook with an unspoken craving for it. She grasped his back, pulled away from his neck and licked the spot lightly. He leaned against her, pressing his forehead against her shoulder.

Morrigan licked her lips slowly sighing contently. Her skin glowed like she had spent the day pampered in a spa. She looked like a woman in her prime, radiating life. Her eyes were a pure ruby, no hint of her natural emerald color. She looked down at him and kissed him with a hunger that had nothing to do with sustenance.

He answered the call pulling her closer having nearly forgotten what it was like to kiss her. His lips hungered for her own, biting, licking, and more as his hands roamed her hips, her behind, and legs. One of his hands was caught by another and Alistair paused glancing at Benidict who looked at him with the same red hunger.

Letting go of Morrigan for a moment he looked at him and smiled before being pulled into a kiss no less eager. Benidict grabbed his shoulders and yanked him back onto the bed so that Alistair was now atop him their lips never parting from one another. Benidict winced away from his lips for a moment and Alistair stared at him shocked but the man was just grinning.

His own smile came back and he glanced up at Morrigan who stared at the two of them like a well prepared meal. Morrigan had been the first woman he’d been with and likewise Benidict the first man. It was like a star bloomed within his chest every time he saw them.

“Aren’t you two supposed to be recovering?” he asked feeling both their hands against his chest.

Morrigan shrugged, “Well two of us are already half naked. I don’t see why Benidict cannot join us.”

“And once that happens, well there’s no stopping things is there Mori?”

“Not at all Ben.”

Alistair looked between the two of them and just laughed. “Who am I to argue with that logic then?”

To call Benidict and Morrigan gentle lovers would be a half truth. When they had first become intimate together, they had simply asked him if he had ever been with a man or a woman. And when they learned the truth, they taught him both how to pleasure them but also figured out what he enjoyed.  Once Alistair was on the level the dynamic in their bed changed.

Morrigan was a very aggressive lover, both in inflicting and receiving. If it weren’t for the fact that they healed a bit faster than normal the amount of scratches and hickeys they received at night would be more readily apparent. But Morrigan would never own up to that. When she wanted either of them, she didn’t mince words or drop hints. She just gave them a look and it was up to them to tell her early if they wanted to or not. The answer was often times yes.

Benidict on the other hand was a big tease. Spending the entire day with heated kisses, inappropriate touches and whispered acts to bring a blush to their faces. And once they were in bed his hands, mouth and tongue could continue the teasing he started throughout the day. His end goal was always to force them to beg for what they wanted. But he enjoyed it even more when either Morrigan or Alistair stopped his games and took full control.

Like often once the act began it ended with the three of them huddled around one another. Alistair in the middle with Benidict at his back and Morrigan in front all of their arms and legs tangled together. The smell of sweat, sex and an undertone blood permeated their bed as a comfortable fragrance.

“Mmm, I think I needed that,” Benidict mumbled against Alistair’s neck.

“We all did,” Alistair whispered reaching up and dragging his fingers through his curls slowly. “And now let’s sleep. Please.”

“I second that,” Morrigan mumbled pressing her head atop Alistair’s and pressed her nose into his hair.

One by one they did, falling asleep slowly in their bed tangled together and trying to put the worries and stresses of their night behind them. If for only a few hours.