Apocalypse: The Lords of Deliverance Compendium (6 page)

Awesome, right? Lilith was bored… humans are
so
vanilla… and Yenrieth resisted for centuries until she caught him one night all shitfaced on some crappy wine. Well, not so fast. Read on, dear reader, because here’s what
really
happened…

L
ilith was horny.

As a succubus, horny was her default state, but there had been something different about her level of need lately. She’d been edgy, achy, and oddly picky about her partners. She’d shunned females, ugly males, and any male with fur. Or scales.

Well, scales had always been a deal-breaker anyway.

Now she found herself seeking specific qualities in a male. She wanted beauty. Ruthlessness. And wings. Definitely wings.

She shivered in lustful anticipation. She loved wings. Leather ones, feathery ones, even the ones that were nothing but skeletal frames. A good, strong set of wings on a male stirred her like nothing else, except maybe a huge cock.

So that was how she found herself perched on a boulder and covertly watching an angel bathe in a sparkling crystal pool.

The male was… magnificent. He’d disappeared below the surface a few seconds ago, and she held her breath as she waited, her body tightening, her tongue dry. The waterfall on the far side of the pool churned the water into a froth and when he surfaced, the bubbles swirled around him, caressing his perfect skin and driving her mad with envy.

He rose up out of the water like a god, his flaxen mane cascading over the broad expanse of his shoulders, glistening water droplets streaming in the valleys between slabs of thick muscle. His thick arms flexed as he looked up at the heavens and slicked back his hair. When his tongue flicked out to catch a shimmering bead of water on his lower lip, Lilith breathlessly licked her own lips.

Closing his eyes, he turned his face to the sun, which bathed him in a golden glow. And then, to her utter wet-between-the-legs joy, he flared his wings high. They were as white and flawless as virgin snow, spanning wider than he was tall. They hadn’t developed color yet, which meant he was young. Virile. Full of stamina.

Now if he would just move to the shallow end of the pool, she could see what he had going on below his trim waist.

Not that she hadn’t already seen it. This was the third day in a row she’d spied on Yenrieth, and today, she’d decided, would be the day she approached him. Today was the first time he’d been here without the female angel who doted on him like a groveling cur. Yenrieth seemed to be oblivious, but to Lilith it was blatantly clear that the stupid bitch was both in lust and in love with him. She was just too shy or uppity or just plain daft to do anything about it.

Lilith wasn’t any of those things, and she was definitely going to do something about it. No, not the love part. The sex part. Yenrieth didn’t know it yet, but he was going to help her relieve the deep-down ache that had been driving her mad.

Oh, yes, this demon was going to finally get a little angel in her.

Someone was watching him.

Yenrieth grinned as he eased toward the shore, moving slowly to give whoever was watching a show they wouldn’t soon forget. Verrine would cluck her tongue at him and tell him he was too vain for his own good.

That was probably true.

He looked around for his fellow angel, wondering where she was. They’d been assigned the most tedious duty any angel could be given, and for two years they’d spent their nights patrolling the nearby forests for hellrats.

Hellrats.

The assignment was supposed to be some sort of training to teach them to develop their skills with holy fire. Hunting hellrats was fledgling work, and Yenrieth had progressed beyond that a decade ago. Unfortunately, his superiors didn’t agree.

He strode up onto the bank and donned the plain white robe that was standard issue for all novice angels. As he slipped into his calfskin boots, a rustling from the forest caught his attention. He waited for a sense of evil to alert him about the nature of whatever was skittering through the underbrush, but nothing struck him as odd.

But then, sensing evil was Yenrieth’s weakness, even though he didn’t admit that to anyone. His skills with holy fire couldn’t be topped, so did it matter if he was a few seconds slow when it came to identifying evil?

A gray shape flickered in his peripheral vision, and he whirled, catching sight of the spiny hellrat as it darted toward the pool for a drink. In a flap of an angel’s wings Yenrieth summoned a hot stream of holy fire and turned the demon rodent into a pile of ashes.

“Impressive.”

Yenrieth whirled, his hand burning in preparation for hurling another blast of fire at whoever had snuck up on him. Instead, when he saw the black-haired, violet-eyed female standing at the edge of the water, her curvy body wrapped in a sheer purple sheath, his palm cooled and his body heated.

He reached out with his angelic senses for a telltale vibration that would alert him to evil inside her, but he didn’t get as much as a tingle. She must be human.

“Who are you?”

Her gaze dropped, taking a long, slow ride over his body before she met his eyes again. “I’m Lilith.”

He had to tread carefully. He wasn’t getting a malevolent vibe off her, but if she was human, she didn’t seem to be particularly bothered by the fact that he’d just ashed a rat with fire from his hand. It was possible that she belonged to The Aegis, a ragtag group of humans who had recently banded together to fight demons. Or she could be some sort of priestess who practiced mystical arts.

Yenrieth was going to lay odds on the latter.

“You’ve been spying on me, Lilith.” He returned the measuring look—measuring her for a hole in the ground if she was an enemy, or a bed if she wasn’t. “Why?”

Lilith shrugged and padded on bare feet to the pool. “I find you to be… intriguing.”

Casting a sultry look over her shoulder, she waded into the water. He swallowed a sudden lump in his throat as she went deeper, until tiny ripples were lapping at her chin. Her lustrous raven hair spread out on the water’s surface, and when she started to emerge, it molded to her shoulders and back, draping her in a mantle of silk. Her purple wrap, now soaked, was completely transparent and skintight, revealing high, round breasts tipped with firm nipples, rolling abs, rounded, wide hips, and a shadowy
V
between slim, endless legs.

“That wasn’t much of a swim,” he said, for lack of anything cleverer to say. This female had scrambled his brain.

“I needed to cool off,” she purred. “It has been far too hot for comfort.”

Yenrieth casually dropped his hand and shifted to hide his rebellious manhood.

She took her lower lip between her teeth, and he swore she undulated as if under a male, engaging in sensual foreplay. “What about you? Have you been… hot?”

Hot? He was on fire. Steam coursed through his veins instead of blood and his skin had practically melted to his muscles. With effort, he pushed aside his lust long enough to regard her with a critical, if not appreciative, eye. She was clearly a sexual woman, perhaps a kept consort for one of the local royals. Kept or… paid.

“Are you a whore?”

Her deep, throaty laughter rolled through him in another wave of lust. “Some may say so.” She smiled wryly. “But they don’t say it twice.” A breeze rustled the bushes near the spot where he’d incinerated the hellrat, and Lilith’s smile widened, as if she approved of what he’d done.

“How is it that you weren’t surprised by what you saw me do?”

One dainty shoulder rolled in a shrug. “I have bedded men who have shown me many things.”

A vague answer, but one that made sense. She very well could have bedded someone versed in magic, or an Aegis warrior, or even a demon.

He nearly curled his lip at the thought of bedding a vile spawn of Sheoul. Not only was sex with a demon a violation of heavenly law, but there were always consequences. No, as an angel, he was required to limit his intimate play to angels and humans, and even then, there were strict rules.

“Are you married?” he asked, and once again, she laughed.

“Never.” She moved toward him, her hips swaying hypnotically. “Do you want me?”

More than he’d ever wanted anything. “No.”

“Truly,” she murmured, reaching out to trail her finger along his jaw and down his neck. Pleasure blazed along the path she drew. “Then I’ll leave you with this.”

She went up on her toes, and without thinking, he dipped his head to meet her welcoming mouth. In an instant, the fire inside him turned into an inferno, scorching him. This female was lightning wrapped in shimmering skin.

He dragged in a ragged breath, taking in her scent, seeking a sign that she might be fertile, because it was forbidden for an angel to breed with a human. But all he got was a rich, spicy aroma, as if a flower had bloomed in a field of cardamom.

Her lips were velvet against his, her tongue silk. She arched, pressing the length of her remarkable body into his. Her breasts flattened against his chest, her nipples rubbing, and he wondered how they’d taste. Her core met his hard staff, and he hissed at the contact. He felt her smile, and then she stepped back, breaking away from him so abruptly he nearly lost his balance.

Which only made sense, since this female had him off balance since she’d arrived.

“Farewell,” she murmured. “I’ll return on the morrow, if you’d care to join me.”

With that, she strolled into the forest, disappearing before he could so much as catch his breath.

Tomorrow. Maybe once his head cleared, he’d decide it was a bad idea to meet her, but right now he was wondering how to make the sun rise faster.

Lilith was in dire need of sex by the time she arrived at the shack she shared with her sister, Sabbet. She hated living in the human realm, but until a succubus of her species became pregnant, she couldn’t make a proper home in Sheoul. And the bitch of it was that her species wasn’t fertile until somewhere between their five hundredth and one thousandth year.

She found Sabbet midcoitus with a half-demon male who had serviced them for decades when they were too lazy to find a human male to fuck. Sabbet continued to ride the male, Ashan, who was on his back on her pallet, as Lilith entered the shack. The scent of sex drove Lilith mad with want, and she clenched her teeth against the desire to either shove Sabbet off the demon or go back to the pool to see if Yenrieth was still there.

She would do neither. Just a few days ago, she’d have spent hours with Ashan, but she was saving herself for Yenrieth.

Saving herself? She shook her head to clear it. Why in the name of all that was unholy would she save herself?

Frustrated, she snarled, kicking the demon as she strode past, seeking the flagon of wine they kept on their rickety wooden table. She drank deeply, hoping the liquid would ease the fever in her body. Yenrieth’s kiss had stirred her into a frenzy, and it had taken more self-control than she’d ever needed to keep from palming his cock while they kissed. Visions of dropping to her knees and taking him in her mouth had filled her head. She took almost as much pleasure from watching a male come as she did from coming herself, and she instinctively knew that Yenrieth’s climax would be nothing short of remarkable. His hard body would strain, and all that magnificent vitality and strength would be unleashed inside her.

Finally, the sounds of sex reached the peak, and a moment later, Sabbet joined Lilith at the table, wrapped in a sheer robe. Ashan dressed quickly and scurried out the door.

“Where have you been?” Sabbet asked.

“I was seducing an angel.”

Sabbet went taut, her eyes narrowing into angry silver slits. “Yenrieth?”

Interesting. “Yes. Why?”

Sabbet’s hiss sprayed droplets of spittle. “I want him for
my
heat.”

“Your—” Lilith sucked in a breath.

Heat
. Dear dark lord,
that
was what was wrong with her. It also explained why she’d walked away from him instead of pressuring him into copulation. A breeding succubus needed a male to be as worked up and fertile as possible when she took his seed.

Her fingers fluttered to her belly, which, if things went right, would soon be swollen with an angel’s baby. And oh, giving birth to the offspring of an angel would take her far in Sheoul. She could use the child in so many ways to bring herself power and glory.

Smiling, she brought the clay flagon to her lips, but Sabbet knocked it away, spilling wine the color of blood down Lilith’s chest.

“Stay away from him,” Sabbet growled. “He’s mine.”

Fury twisted Lilith’s heart, wringing out every drop of affection for her sister. Now was not the time to play fair. This was Lilith’s future at stake, and the angel’s passion would secure it.

Spinning, she grabbed one of the knives hanging on the wall and brought it down in the soft spot between Sabbet’s neck and shoulder. Her sister screamed, then screamed louder when Lilith plunged the dagger into her abdomen. Sabbet staggered backward, tripping over her pallet and crumpling to the ground. Lilith fell with her, stabbing over and over into her sister’s belly, reveling in the grotesque, squishy sounds.

When her sister fell silent, Lilith stood, bathed in blood. Oh, how she’d love to get Yenrieth here to fuck in the slippery warmth. Not that he would. Angels, by all accounts, tended to be prissy.

Lilith licked the blade as she hovered over what was left of her sister. Oh, Sabbet would recover in time, but it would be a decade, at least, before her ruined womb could support a child. By then, her heat would have passed and she’d have to wait another couple of centuries for another. In the meantime, Lilith would become a force to be reckoned with, and Sabbet wouldn’t dare challenge her once she arrived in Sheoul.

Oh, yes, Lilith had it all figured out. If all went according to plan, she would become a legend in Sheoul, practically godlike… perhaps she could even take a place next to the dark lord himself.

All she needed was Yenrieth. And tomorrow she would have him.

Yenrieth spent the longest day of his life in the forest hunting hellrats with Verrine. She’d noticed he’d been distracted, and she kept asking what had happened and if there was something she could do to help. How could he tell her that the only thing on his mind was wicked, raw sex with a woman who all but oozed sensuality?