Chapter 74: Milk of the Covenant
The cold bit deep here, a dry, thin cold that stole your breath and made the inside of your nose feel like glass. Our camp huddled in the lee of the mountain, a scar of defiance in the vast white silence. Woodsmoke and the greasy smell of cooking meat clung to everything, but underneath it was the sharper scent of unwashed bodies and fear. My kind of air. It was familiar, in a twisted way. This was just another extreme environment, another survival test. The stakes were just higher.
Gena stood beside me at the entrance of our command tent, watching the warriors prepare. They moved with a quiet efficiency that was more frightening than any bluster. Their eyes, when they flicked towards us, held that same unnerving devotion.
“They’re nervous,” Gena murmured, her breath a pale ghost in the twilight.
“They should be,” I said, my voice rough. “The Clans fight dirty. They know this terrain better than we ever will.”
“They don’t have what we have.” She turned to me, her eyes glowing like embers in the dim light. “They aren’t fed from the source.”
The plan had formed between us without words, a dark, symbiotic understanding. It wasn’t about sustenance. It was about connection. About power. We would feed them our essence, a direct transfusion of the throne’s energy, to make them faster, stronger, and utterly, unshakeably ours.
“Lysander,” I called out, my voice cutting through the camp’s murmur.
He was there in moments, his large frame silhouetted against the fires. “My Queen.”
“Bring them. One by one. Start with the scouts.”
He nodded, his gaze lingering on me for a heartbeat too long before he turned to obey.
The inside of the tent was spartan. Furs on the ground, a low table with maps, and a brazier of coals that threw shifting, demonic shadows on the canvas walls. Gena and I stood in the center. There was no ceremony, no preamble. This was a transaction. A forging.
The first scout was a wiry woman with a scar across her chin. She knelt, her head bowed.
“Look at me,” Gena commanded.
The woman’s head snapped up, her eyes wide.
“You will take our strength into you,” I said, my fingers going to the laces of my tunic. The cold air hit my skin, raising goosebumps. My breasts felt heavy, tight. “You will drink, and you will become more than you are.”
Gena was already bare to the waist, her skin luminous in the firelight. She cupped her own breast, her thumb brushing over the nipple, which hardened instantly. A drop of liquid, not milk but something thicker, something that shimmered with a faint internal light, welled up.
“Come,” Gena said, her voice dropping to a hypnotic murmur.
The scout shuffled forward on her knees, her composure breaking into raw need. She opened her mouth, and Gena guided her nipple to the woman’s lips.
The woman suckled, a desperate, greedy sound. Her body shuddered violently. I watched her back muscles clench and then relax, a wave of power visibly moving through her. When Gena gently pushed her away, the scout’s eyes were no longer just devoted. They were incandescent. She looked reborn.
“Now me,” I said, my voice husky.
The woman turned to me, her mouth wet and eager. I wasn’t gentle like Gena. I grabbed a handful of her hair and pulled her head to my chest. “Drink,” I growled.
Her mouth was hot, obscenely skilled. The sensation was a lightning bolt straight to my core. It wasn’t pleasure, not exactly. It was a violent transfer of energy, a raw, sucking drain that made my knees weak even as it fed my own power. I felt a part of my essence, my will, my ferocity, flow into her. When I released her, she gasped, stumbling back. A new fierceness was etched on her face. She was mine.
They came, one after another. Men and women, all hardened fighters, all brought to their knees before us. The tent filled with the sounds of wet, hungry sucking, of ragged breaths and low moans. The air grew thick, charged with a musk that was part sex, part ozone, part pure magic.
Lysander was the last. He entered the tent, his expression unreadable. He had tasted me before, in the throne room. This was different.
“Your turn, Commander,” I said. I was slick with sweat, my body humming, every nerve ending alive. Gena stood beside me, her skin flushed, her lips parted.
He didn’t kneel. He looked from me to Gena and back, a challenge in his eyes. “From which Queen do I take my strength?”
Gena smiled, a slow, wicked curve of her lips. “From both.”
She moved behind me, her body pressing against my back, her hands coming around to cup my breasts. Her touch was electric. She pinched my nipples, hard, and a fresh wave of that shimmering essence beaded there.
“Come and take it,” I breathed.
Lysander closed the distance. He was so much bigger than me. He bent his head, and his mouth, hot and rough, closed over one nipple. At the same time, Gena guided my head to the side and covered my mouth with her own.
The world dissolved into sensation. Lysander’s suckling was a relentless, rhythmic pull that echoed deep in my cunt. Gena’s tongue plunged into my mouth, tasting of power and something uniquely, filthily her. I was the conduit between them, the source and the receiver. I could feel Gena’s energy flowing into me through her kiss, feel my own being drawn out by Lysander’s mouth.
Gena’s hand slid down my stomach, into my trousers. Her fingers, slick and knowing, found my clit. I bucked against her hand, a ragged cry swallowed by her kiss. Lysander groaned against my breast, his own hips thrusting against the air. The power was a feedback loop, building, amplifying.
“Fuck,” I gasped, breaking the kiss. “Don’t stop.”
Gena’s fingers worked me faster, harder. Lysander’s suckling became frantic. I could feel the essence pouring out of me, into him, feel Gena’s own power fueling mine. The pressure built, a coiling, insane tension in my gut.
I came with a shattered scream, my body convulsing. The release wasn’t just physical; it was a shockwave of raw force that erupted from me. The tent flaps billowed outward. The brazier flared, casting frantic shadows.
Lysander staggered back, his eyes wide and blazing with stolen power. He looked like a god carved from living stone. He dropped to one knee, his fist over his heart, his breath coming in ragged pants.
Gena held me, her body trembling against mine. She nuzzled my neck. “Now they are ready,” she whispered, her voice thick with satisfaction.
I looked at Lysander, at the transformed warrior kneeling before us. The fear was gone from the camp. I could feel it. Replaced by a single, unified, ravenous hunger.
Dawn was coming. And we would unleash hell.