Warm air teased my mouth. My lips parted and I drew it in, filling my throat with his taste and my lungs with the scent of him, until all I could feel and all I could sense was the energy of his presence. In me, around me.
"Open your eyes."
I obeyed, and stepped into an ocean of blue. It was beautiful, that ocean, beautiful, but turbulent, and oh so powerful. My body began to tremble, not just with expectation and desire, but also fear. I was reaching for something I didn't understand, and it was far more dangerous than even Azriel thought. My throat tightened, and the rhythm of my breathing momentarily faltered. His fingers came to rest on my chest, his touch warm, electric.
"There is nothing to fear, Risa." His voice swirled around me, soft and hypnotic. "There is no darkness here. There is just us, two beings connected by flesh, connected by air, and connected by the essence of all that we are."
The fear ebbed away, and once again there was only him. His energy, his being. Against my skin and in my mind. Burning bright, within and without, making me tremble, ache. Want.
"Imagine there is no flesh to separate us," he continued. "That there is only energy and desire. Call to them, Risa. Become them."
It was as if his words were some sort of trigger. Power surged, became a rush of fire that invaded every muscle, every cell, breaking them down and tearing them apart, until my flesh no longer existed and I was one with the air.
As was he.
He was bright and fierce, a being that glowed like the sun and who was as beautiful as the moon. He drew me toward him, wrapped himself around me, until the music of his being began to play through mine and mine through his. It was a dance, a caress, a tease. It was movement, heat, and desire. It was crazy and electric, a firestorm that ripped through every particle of my being. It was pleasure unlike anything I'd ever experienced or felt before, and it took me ever higher. Our beings continued to entwine, tighter and tighter, until there was no separation—no him, no me, just the music of the two of us combined. And oh, the song we made was beautiful, and powerful, and right. Still the dance went on, burning ever brighter, until it felt as if the threads of our beings would surely explode.
Then everything did explode, and I fell into a storm of electric, unimaginable bliss.
I'm not entirely sure when, exactly, I came back to flesh, but when I did it was to an awareness of utter exhaustion. My body trembled, sweat trickled down my spine, and my breath was quick, shallow pants, as if my body couldn't get air quickly enough. And yet I felt alive in a way that was indescribable.
"God," I murmured, when I finally could. "Is it always like that for you reapers?"
He brushed a thumb lightly across my lips and smiled. "No, not always."
There was a note that almost sounded like amazement in his voice. I opened my eyes and looked at him. He glowed with health and vitality, his skin golden and his blue eyes shining. "You recharged?"
"Yes." He hesitated. "I hadn't meant to, but the intensity of the moment got the better of me. Unfortunately, it is the reason you are now so weak."