InsaneJournal

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Kara woke as Carus shifted restlessly next to her, his arm tightening where it gripped under her breasts. She looked down at him and found him staring wide-eyed at nothing, his face pressed to the bare skin of her shoulder, sweat beading on his forehead. His wings spasmed across their spooned bodies, as they always did since it was nigh impossible for him to sleep on his back, and she reached up to touch his cheek.

“Rus?” she queried gently.

The blank amber eyes shifted up towards her and she felt the shudder of relief ripple through his lean frame. “Gods,” he gasped. Turning his face so his eyes were hidden, he breathed, “A damn dream.”

“You mean a nightmare.”

“Yes.”

Kara frowned then asked, “About what?”

Carus was silent then shifted his head to where his cheek was pressed to her shoulder, face cocked to the side as he looked up at her. “You,” he replied. “And…”

His arm around her shifted, moving downward so his hand pressed possessively over the small bulge of her stomach. The nightmare had been about him losing her and their child, then.

“How?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he growled in response, hugging her tightly again. “You both were just gone and I knew it. I knew it with such a clear certainty, lil’bit, that…for a moment I thought it had been real.”

Kara wrapped her arms around him then, tugging his lean frame close, and ran her fingers through his dark hair. He leaned into the touch, kissing her skin, and mumbled, “I thought I’d lost you.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” she assured him. “It was only a nightmare, Rus.”

“Nightmares can become reality so very easily.”

“You don’t believe that.”

“Don’t I?”

She frowned then asked, “Well what are you going to do about it?”

Carus shoved himself out of her grasp abruptly, one elbow underneath him so he was half-upright. His eyes flashed as he snarled, “I’ll damn well leave here if it’ll keep you safe.”

“Carus…you love being a thief.”

“I can be a thief without the damn Guild that’s sprung up around us,” he hissed. Slowly he laid back down next to her and stroked her cheek as his left wing shifted to covered her entirely, soft feathers caressing her skin like silk. “I…I love you more.”

Kara blinked then smiled, pulling him close to her again. He rested half on top of her now, his head and chest fully pillowed across her breast with his arms around her neck, but his lean frame was lighter than it looked; sometimes she suspected that he had bones as hollow as a bird’s. And she knew what those words cost him every time he said them.

Carus had had feelings for nothing before she’d come into his life. He hadn’t changed much in the time they’d lovers but since her belly had begun filling with life, something had come over him. A fierce need to protect her and their child had taken over him and he was fighting it because thieves took the advantages they saw. And if he were seen to truly care for her, she would be used against him.

But if they left the Guild…disappeared into the world – to another city…

“Ventin will be disappointed,” she observed quietly.

“The old man will just have to deal with that,” he growled back. Once upon a time he knew disappointment well…had been so very familiar with it he nearly welcomed it as family. Now…now he didn’t think he could bear to be disappointed.

He could bear to lose her. To lose them both.

“We’ll leave day after tomorrow after sunrise,” he continued. “Be gone before any knows it and out of the city before they can find us.”

“We should start packing now then.”

“No,” hissed Carus, clutching at her tightly as she made to move. Kara stilled and wrapped her arms around him again, carefully moving down his back to where the skin started to fade into the feathers and hard muscles of his wings. The spot just between them was tender and she ran her fingers gently across it now. He arched in response, fingers digging into her shoulders, and gasped, “Gods!”

“This has been horrible pillow talk,” she said firmly. “Make love to me.”

“The babe…”

“Will be fine, Rus. Babe’s know to get out of the way and women’s bodies conform to such problems.”

“Who told you that?” he asked, one eyebrow arched. But she could see the lust forming in his eyes as she continued to play her fingers across his feathers.

Kara smiled, replying, “Jirra after she had her boy.”

“Jirra was raped!”

“Yet she was with Gideon after she recovered from the trauma and her boy birthed fine. Now, Rus, make love to me. Wild, mad love. I want the whole building to hear!”

I want them all to know where your heart is, were the words that rang silently in the air between them, something she wouldn’t say but that he knew she thought.

Carus smiled and purred, “You’re certain?”

“I am,” replied Kara, smiling as he shifted so he was above her. “Carus…I…”

“Later,” he hissed as he dived down, silencing her mouth with his. As he drew back, sucking on her lower lip, he growled, “I want to hear you scream.”

“Make me,” she challenged with a smirk.

“I will,” he assured. With a negligent flap of his wings, he blew out the last candle that had given light to the room they shared then set to making his words truth.