The Crescent Heir
The ritual demanded complete cleansing—body, mind, and soul.
Their soft caresses worked methodically across his skin, and Deimon felt his mind drift into that space between consciousness and meditation. The ritual demanded purity, but tradition also allowed for... other cleansings. He spent the better part of the cold evening entangled with the maidens, their bodies warm against the winter chill seeping through the mansion walls. It was part ceremony, part indulgence, part necessity. The wolf needed to be satisfied, its hunger sated, before tomorrow's transition. His problems dissolved in steam and flesh and whispered moans, floating away like the incense smoke that filled the chamber as he