Chapter 4
Adelaide
The change began as heat—a burning that started deep in my core and spread through my body like wildfire. One moment I was staring into those burning red eyes, trying to comprehend the impossible recognition I saw there, and the next I was consumed by a fever that made my skin feel like it was melting from my bones.
"Adelaide?" Thalia's voice seemed to come from very far away, though she knelt right beside me. "What's happening to you?"
I couldn't answer. My vision blurred at the edges, and every nerve ending in my body screamed with a need I didn't understand. The rational part of my mind—the princess who had planned this mission, who had sworn to find my kingdom's salvation—was drowning beneath waves of primal hunger that terrified me with their intensity.
The beast moved closer, its massive head lowering until I could feel its breath on my face. The scent of it—wild musk and something indefinably male—sent another shock of heat through my system. My body responded without my permission, my back arching as if offering myself to this creature that should have been my enemy.
No, I tried to tell myself. This is wrong. This isn't who I am.
But my body disagreed. Every cell seemed to be crying out for contact, for completion, for something only this beast could provide. The voice that had whispered in my mind grew stronger, more insistent.
You were made for this, it murmured. Made for him. Stop fighting what you are.
"Adelaide, fight it!" Thalia's sharp command cut through the haze. "This is Moon Bride awakening. You have to resist the first pull, or you'll lose yourself completely."
Moon Bride. The words should have meant something to me, but all I could focus on was the burning need that was consuming me from the inside out. I crawled toward the beast on hands and knees, no longer caring about dignity or mission or anything beyond the desperate hunger clawing at my insides.
The creature's eyes followed my movement, and it let out a sound that was part growl, part purr. When I reached its massive form, I pressed my face against the silver-white fur of its chest, breathing in its scent like a drug.
"Adelaide, no!" Thalia lunged forward to reach for me.
The beast's reaction was immediate and violent. One massive paw swept out, catching Thalia across the chest and sending her flying into the stone wall with a sickening crack. She clutched her left arm in pain, groaning as if it were broken.
The sound of her impact pierced through my fevered haze like a bucket of ice water. "Thalia!" I wanted to scramble toward my friend, the beast momentarily forgotten in my panic.
Noticing that I was about to leave, the beast let out a dissatisfied roar. I turned back to find it looming over me, its red eyes fixed on me with renewed intensity.
The burning in my body hadn't stopped—if anything, it was growing stronger. Every breath felt like inhaling flame, and between my legs, I was wet with an arousal so intense it bordered on pain.
This was what I was becoming. What I had always been, waiting to be awakened.
The beast approached again, more slowly this time, as if it could sense the change in me. When it lowered its great head to nuzzle my neck, I didn't pull away. I couldn't. My body was no longer entirely my own to command.
"I'm sorry," I whispered to Thalia, though I wasn't sure if I was apologizing for what was about to happen or for the part of me that desperately wanted it.
The beast's tongue was rough and warm as it dragged across my throat, tasting my skin. I gasped at the sensation, my hands coming up instinctively to tangle in its thick fur. When it moved lower, licking at the hollow between my breasts, my back arched involuntarily.
This is wrong, the princess within me screamed in protest. I came here to save my people, not to submit to this creature.
But that voice was growing fainter, overwhelmed by the Moon Bride awakening that was reshaping my very essence. When the beast's massive head moved between my thighs, I spread them willingly, past caring about shame or duty or anything beyond the desperate need consuming me.
Its tongue was impossibly long and dexterous as it explored me, lapping at my wetness with deliberate strokes that made me cry out in pleasure. I had never been touched by any man, had saved myself for a political marriage that would benefit my kingdom. Now that innocence was being claimed by a beast in a stone prison, and I couldn't bring myself to care.
The creature's ministrations were driving me toward some precipice I had never imagined. My hips moved of their own accord, seeking more contact, more pressure. When I finally shattered, the orgasm ripping through me with such intensity that I screamed, the beast pulled back and positioned itself over me.
Its massive member was already extended, thick and gleaming wet. The rational part of me should have been terrified—it was larger than any human man could be, promising pain along with pleasure. But the Moon Bride awakening had changed my body along with my mind, preparing me for exactly this.
When it pushed into me, stretching me beyond what should have been possible, the pain was sharp but brief. My virginity tore away on a flood of blood and natural lubricant, and then there was only the overwhelming sensation of being completely filled.
The beast began to move, its thrusts deep and powerful. Each stroke sent shockwaves through my body, pleasure so intense it bordered on madness. I wrapped my legs around its massive torso, pulling it deeper, meeting each thrust with desperate enthusiasm.
Lost in the rhythm, I found myself changing. My skin grew more sensitive, my senses sharper. I could smell the beast's arousal, hear its heartbeat thundering in its chest. When I looked into its red eyes, I saw something that made my breath catch—a flicker of the man he had once been, struggling against the madness that held him.
Lycanthar, I thought, and his response was immediate. His thrusts became more controlled, less bestial, as if my recognition had awakened something in him as well.
The connection between us deepened with each movement. I could feel his pleasure as well as my own, could sense the battle raging within him between beast and man. When he lowered his great head to nuzzle my throat, I felt the gentle scrape of fangs that could have torn out my life in an instant.
The second orgasm built slowly, a rising tide that seemed to pull me apart at the molecular level. When it crested, I felt something snap into place inside me—a connection forged in blood and pleasure that bound me to this creature in ways I was only beginning to understand.
The beast's own climax followed, his seed filling me with liquid heat as his massive body shuddered above me. In that moment of completion, I felt his consciousness touch mine fully—not the beast, but the man trapped within, reaching out across three hundred years of madness to find the woman the Moon Goddess had sent to him.
My bride, his voice whispered in my mind, clearer now than it had ever been. My salvation.