Kahlan unleashed a veritable flood of words - torrents of her past spilling rushed and angry past tight velvet lips, condemning Kira’s petty “mommy issues” beneath a heartbreaking horror story. Kirastasia could only blink in surprise, expression going blank and passive to smother the frantic hopeful flutter of her heart. Yes, my love. Tell me of your beginnings. How your roots were ripped raw from the ground. Her pulse thrummed beneath her skin. Little wounds inflicted by her teasing vocals . . . wounds that bled, proving Kahlan still lived. The ex-healer gritted her fangs, the serrated edges of her pearls gleaming between the taut curtains of her lips, and the yellow fire in her eyes flared at Kira - resentment for the family Kirastasia supposedly had claim to, the brother who still existed somewhere in the world, and yes, the tundra bird could see at last how despite her harsh bravado and icy exterior Kahlan’s mask was cracking and crumbling useless to the ground. Mocking jabs and deliberate barbs had dug ruthlessly into unfeeling stone to stab at vulnerable emotion. Feeling. And somewhere in the tangle of hurt, the armor of denial, the true Kahlan drowned and waited to be rescued.

But I cannot throw the lifeline yet, my love. I cannot give you time to gather your calluses again.

It was the hardest thing Kirastasia had ever done . . . letting Kahlan writhe in pain in front of her without remorse. Kira had done this . . . her efforts had finally produced some reaction, some evidence that the autumn queen was not utterly lost to her self-imposed solitude. Except . . . as spittle flew like venom from the spice-colored lady’s maw, as her citrine eyes narrowed in hatred, as her previous rigid form quaked and bristled and seethed, panic needled at Kirastasia’s aching insides. It hurt, the loathing that Kah speared her with. But worse than that, the vipera damsel suddenly worried that she’d pushed so hard and so fast and so mercilessly that there would be nothing left of Kahlan but a maddened laceration of fury. The pallid lass had meant her attempts to be scalpels: a precise excavation of her paramour devoid of anesthesia. Except Kahlan looked so miserable, so sick with rage, and it was all directed at Kirastasia and she must have done something wrong, she must have gone too far, she must have cut too deep and too imprecise and now Kahlan was never going to forgive her and all at once the realization that this version of Kah, this pulsating injury of a wolfess, this might be worse than the unfeeling sculpture that Kira had so dearly wanted to rescue. Kahlan was right. She was always right. Henadin was wrong - Kahlan had already saved herself by choking her emotions in a premature grave and what she had always needed was to be left the fuck alone.

The white bird had flown so close to the trembling woodland creature that she could feel the others hot, uneven breath stirr the ivory hairs of her jaw and throat. Kahlan could have snapped at her then. She could have retreated into her den, or sunk those gnashing knives into the hapless surgeon clumsily grasping at her heart. Kah did neither. Kirastasia’s wanton tongue massaging the inside of her mouth must have tempted those sputtering sparks into a smoldering inferno, because in the next breathless beat Kahlan was pushing her own tongue past Kira’s teeth and tangling their mouths into a kiss hot enough to burn, deep enough to drown, fangs clicking together and saliva forming silken ropes between parted lips and breath intermingling. Kirastasia gasped, moaned, shoved forward when Kahlan shoved back, not caring that her muzzle bruised beneath the forcible contact. Nothing had ever tasted so sweet and perfect. She wanted to inhale all of Kahlan into her lungs, hold her there within her, close to her heart, wanted the flavor of her first love to stain deep into her throat. “K-Kahlan!” A pathetic whimper, white-hot with need. When the cinnamon-robed lady gripped her by one ear and wrenched her toward the dirt, Kirastasia did not fight back. The snowy princess had done her share of torturing. Now it was Kahlan’s turn to do as she wished.

And gods, did she do it. For several moments they became one entity - a mass of flailing limbs and undulating muscles that sought to unite themselves as quickly as possible. Kahlan rubbed herself down the length of Kira’s side, and the scaled beauty arched herself to meet that rough embrace; Kahlan’s muzzle nudged hard into her chest, and Kira gripped the earthen goddess with her forelegs, encouraging the touch, using their proximity as an excuse to cover her love’s crown in frenzied kisses. Mine. All mine. My Kahlan. Air jumped jaggedly in and out of Kirastasia’s lungs, spreading her adoring whispers paper-thin and feathery, and she barely had time to inhale between bathing Kahlan with vigorous swipes of her tongue. Lower and lower the broken dusky fae slid down Kira’s bodice . . . mussing the alabaster canvas of her chest, her belly, the sensitive planes on the insides of her thighs . . . and when at last her kiss reached Kirastasia’s most secret place the vipera punkette bucked her hips and whined like a child. She was already soaked from their hopeless foreplay, and now as Kahlan’s tongue slicked down her slit Kira melted down toward the core of the earth. Her hind limbs clenched around the yellow-eyed empress’s face, worship pouring deliriously from her mouth. “Yes, Kahlan, yes sweetie, I missed you, I missed you so fucking much.”

It did not take long for Kahlan to plunge her over the waterfall into a violent climax, every nerve in her body firing at once with floods of pleasure. For a heartbeat, Kirastasia squirmed, mewled, went limp. Then before Kahlan could draw away - before she could think twice of what she’d done and withdraw - Kirastasia shimmied down to pull Kahlan upward with her armored forelimbs, meeting the older femme with a sloppy open-mouthed kiss. Her own flavor intermingled with the taste of Kah had her tingling all over. I missed this. “There she is . . .” Lyrics murmured low and lovingly, pink muscle wiping away the salty tears tracing down Kahlan’s cheeks. “It hurts, doesn’t it? It’s part of being alive. But don’t worry, Kah . . . I’ll make you feel so exquisite, you won’t be able to think of anything else.” She nuzzled the tip of her muzzle against Kahlan’s nose, an innocent butterfly kiss completely at odds with the fiery nature of their dance. “You don’t have to think. Just feel. I’m not going anywhere. And neither are you.”

Now it was Kirastasia’s turn to lathe her way down Kahlan’s incredible body, bejeweled front legs pinning the earth-born goddess beneath her. She used her tongue and teeth to comb away the soft fur lining Kah’s stomach, letting the cold shock of her nose trace the bare skin she uncovered. The same treatment was given to each of Kahlan’s teats - their peaks taut with arousal, sensitive to Kira’s expert ministrations. This was a different sort of teasing, not meant to harm, but to glorify. If this were just mindless fucking, simply physical exercise and nothing more, Kirastasia could bear that. She could become a tool Kahlan pleasured herself with if that meant keeping away the terrible frigid cold that had robbed her love from this world. Because as long as Kirastasia was with Kahlan, she could bask in her wonderful glow like the snake whose scales she wore . . . and that, maybe, was enough.