Holier Than Thou

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad groaned, his control growing unsteady and his voice no longer able to stay quiet. He leaned low over her and sucked on the skin of her neck. "I want you to feel me," he moaned against her skin. "I want you to compare, and see how-" his words broke apart into a moan as he started to feel his control slipping. "How crazy you make me," he gasped out. His teeth slid along her neck, and glided in slowly. Magic swarmed through the bite. As his tongue swept up her lifeblood with tender abandonment, he thrust pulses of pleasure through her nerves, enough to bring even a sober stranger to their knees. His mind opened to her. No walls needed to be ripped down or pounded apart; he was simply open to her, and the connection flayed him wide for her to feel. Even the touch of her thoughts was like a caress, especially now that Vlad's hips had begun to jerk more urgently against hers. He moaned against her neck and pushed as deep as he could. His control was melting apart, his body mounting on a fierce crescendo of ecstasy.

[Emora Deen]

Tenele lost her control when his teeth sank into her skin and his thoughts poured into hers. There was no doubt, no veil of mystery to how he felt for her, how much he wanted her, or what she did to him. It made her heart swell with pride and pleasure and happiness.

"Vlad!" she called, her legs tightening over his shoulders as his power drove pleasure too great through her system. She clutched at his body, trying to grapple for some hold to ground her when she felt so close to spinning off. "Ah!" she screamed, a hand clutching the hair at the back of his head.

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad snarled, that small tug at his hair becoming exactly the small abuse he needed to be driven wild, where Tenele was concerned. Everything with her felt so intense that if she ever did discover a way to engage him with Atul's level of force, he suspected the rapture would put him outcold. *Tenele!* he cried, inside her head now as he bit down a little harder. *I'm coming, now. Shit.* He pushed faster and harder, clutching her tight against him, until the feeling blew stars across the inside of his mind and his body jerked in pulse after pulse of release.

[Emora Deen]

Tenele arched against him, as much as she possibly could in the position he'd collected her small frame. His release sent her over that white hot edge into oblivion, leaving her shuddering with the aftershocks. She relaxed, like every muscle she had melted into that heat. Her breath fanned in hot waves against his shoulder while her cheek pressed against his. While she slowly came down from that mountain he'd driven her up, she ran warm fingers through his hair gently.

"I will never doubt you again," she murmured to him, as the cool wind kissed her damp skin. "Never."

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad withdrew slowly from her neck and licked the skin with breathless affection, his tongue gliding over the wound until it began to heal up. Even then, he nuzzled into her skin and made an occasional lap against it, just to claim it as his while his body thrummed with ecstatic exhaustion. "If you do, I'll have no choice but to remind you again," he promised in a sleepy, sultry tone. "I love you, Maiden Girl," he smiled against her skin.

[Emora Deen]

Tenele grinned. "I love you, too," she mused, wrapping her arms around him. She enjoyed laying with him out in the open air, with his firm weight pressing down on her and the feeling of him still inside.

She knew she couldn't stay like this for very long, or she'd risk becoming too relaxed. It was getting close to sunset, when she turned her eyes to the ocean and the slowly sinking sun. She wasn't really sure how much more her body could take, but she planned on enduring. But, if she lay with him there she knew she'd be to comfortable and content and end up drifting off as she often did.

"I'm nervous," she whispered into his ear, admitting it for the first time out loud. "He's intimidating, though he doesn't mean to be. Not to me at least. And he knows me inside and out, has memories of me. He'll remember this moment, and what transpired between you and Atul. I have only a few memories and encounters with him. But, it is silly for me to be intimidated or nervous by him."

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad rested on his elbow and ran his opposite hand gently through her hair. "It is alright to be nervous. There is no need to hide it from him. Atul and I already know, and so he understands as well. He may be intimidating, but he will not hurt you. If he is truly a composite of the two of us, he will be incapable of living with himself if he hurts you," Vlad's eyes gleamed certainly.

[Emora Deen]

Tenele nodded. "I know he won't hurt me," she mused softly, green eyes fluttering to look his face over. She let out a heavy sigh. "Everything is going to be fine." She brushed her fingers across his handsome pale face before planting a kiss on his lips. "Will you hand me my dress?" she asked him with a smile.

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad glanced over his shoulder at her dress, and sighed disappointedly as his body had to slip from her warm embrace to retrieve it. He shook the garment loose of sand and held it out, ready to slip it over her shoulders for her.

[Emora Deen]

Tenele sat up and held her arms above her head while her husband helped her dress. She took the blue sash and tied it messily around her waist. "Thank you," she told him sweetly as she reluctantly climbed to her feet and gathered the silk garment they'd been lying on from the ground and shook it for him. She wrapped it around his waist tenderly, pressing a kiss to his lips.

"Let's go back to the house," she told him, taking hold of his hand and drawing him back towards the cabin.

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad's strong fingers closed over hers, and in the mood he was in, he'd have allowed her to lead him straight into the sea if that was her desire. He felt euphoric as they climbed the steps of the cottage. At the top of the deck, he went still to take in his surroundings. Everything had been cleaned and lit up like someone was preparing for a virgin night. Well, he thought, technically, it was a bit like that. Slightly overwhelmed by Atul's romanticism, he wondered for the first time if Knight might exceed either of them in the bedroom.

"Atul?" he called into the cottage, stepping around the romance to avoid knocking anything over.

[Emora Deen]

Atul popped his head out of the kitchen. "Hello!" he called. "One second. Tenele have a seat at the table."

Tenele eyed Vlad, and the cabin, and hesitantly went to the table. "What's going on?" she asked him with an amused chuckle as he waltzed out carrying a plate of food to the table and he sat it in front of her. "You made me dinner?"

"And drew you a bath," he chuckled. "Hey, don't look at me like that. I saw you rolling around in the sand, I thought you might want to wash up."

"I feel like I'm being fed my last meal," she told him as she took a bite. "Wow!" she said through chewing. "This is good."

Atul beamed, looking at Vlad.

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad smiled at Tenele's reaction, and his eyes skipped up to Atul's. "My portion?" he demanded. He meant it to come out as a joke, but there might have been a small part of him that actually felt left out.

[Emora Deen]

Atul smirked. He turned back into the kitchen and then returned with a small plate made up of what was left in the pot and sat it down in front of the chair at the head of the table. "I ate while I was cooking, but if you want to try it there you go."

Tenele chuckled as she ate, watching Vlad with sparkling eyes. "You silly, vampire..."

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad looked approvingly at his plate. For some reason, Atul's cooking seemed like such an intimate gesture that he wanted a part of it, though he knew perfectly well he couldn't taste it. He felt a bit gleeful eating a mortal meal with a fork and everything. It hadn't occurred to him to try such a thing....probably since before his "training" with Maxwell.

He didn't say much more about it. He just smiled to himself and quietly ate in their company, like they were an ordinary family having dinner.