Page 61 of An Empress of Earth & Darkness

She found his lips, and she didn’t care if they were swollen. She pressed a kiss to him, and he swallowed hard. Emara pulled back slightly, curiosity taking over. “How did you come to the decision to let him live?”

His large hand stroked past her face and into her hair once more. “My father might have been a cruel man with awful tendencies, but he is intelligent, and if there is one thing that I have taken from my lessons with him it is that you should always keep your friends close and your enemies closer. I might need him.”

She sat up in his lap and ran a hand down his swollen cheek. “I respect what you did, but I could have lost you.”

He looked up at her with hope roaming free in his glittering blue eyes. “You won’t ever lose me again. I promise.”

She kissed him again, bringing her lips to his in a thankful embrace and thanking any of the Gods or ancestors who had listened to her prayers. A well of emotion crashed around her, and she could feel that familiar sting in her eyes as she let out a sob against his mouth.

He pulled back, concern ablaze in his eyes. “What’s wrong?” he whispered so gently.

Her hands tightened around his arms, his tunic. “When you were just gone from the battle…I thought…I thought—”

He looked at her with guilt, knowing what she would have gone through today. A long finger curled under her chin as he commanded her to meet his gaze. “Emara, look at me when I say this.” His voice was deep and promise lingered there as she raised her tear-filled eyes to his. “I am never leaving your side again unless you order me to as your guard, as your partner, as anything more should you want it. I am not going anywhere.” She ran a quick hand over her eyes to wipe the tears that had escaped and took a sharp breath to steady her emotions. “The minute I had been sworn in as commander and the battle was done, I knew that I had moves to make right away. This”—he looked around—“it’s Viktir’s personal cave of secrecy and knowledge. Anything valuable to him will be in here. Anything that I shouldn’t know about, anything that he’s been hiding, should be in here. And now the key belongs to me. I had to find it before anything could be destroyed.”

“I understand,” Emara whispered, her heart feeling a little lighter.

He pushed back her hair, which had managed to stick to her tear-covered face. “I wanted to come to you right away and feel you against me. But I had to see what I could claim in here. What I could use. So please forgive me for just stepping out on you and the celebrations. I had to secure this office.”

Emara raised her eyebrow and smirked. “Spoken like a true commander of the Blacksteel legacy.”

He finally smiled, truly smiled, and even with a burst lip, it was magnificent. “Don’t look at me like that.” His hand travelled a little further up Emara’s dress as a deep breath huffed out of his chest. “I had no intention of christening my new desk until early next week, but if you keep looking at me like that, these papers that I have so carefully sifted through will be a mess once again.” One of his eyebrows rose as if he liked the sound of the challenge. He wanted her to challenge him. “I fear I would lose all my hard work.”

Emara let out a laugh that finally reached her belly. “It seems you are making such progress already, and I wouldn’t want to come between that.” She placed her hands over his shoulders and around his neck once more. “I would hate to be the cause of such destruction in your new office.”

A wicked, deviant flicker burned in his eyes. “I would love nothing more than for you to be the cause for such destruction.”

She laughed again just as his dimples appeared on either side of his mouth and the scar in between his brow smoothed out. He traced little circles up her leg.

She grabbed his hand that had begun travelling to a place of no return. “I will not be the cause of your new office being mistreated. You have new responsibilities, Commander.”

His full mouth pulled into a grin. “Oh angel, you know that when we go exploring, I never mistreat you.” His eyes roamed her face, and those wicked fingers ran all through her hair and over her dress. Emara’s skin almost went up in flames. His lashes lowered before he spoke again. “However, Empress, regardless of my unbelievable restraint to not explore every inch of you, I do have something for you.”

She rose as he did and his hands rested on her hips, guiding her to sit on the edge of his desk. She watched him in confusion as he limped over to a unit that housed a few things like liquor and glasses. He withdrew an engraved box coated in gold and black paint. As he brought it over, he removed a brass key from his pocket and opened it.

Lying there in a white silk wrapping was the Resurrection Stone.

Emara gasped as she looked at it for the first time since Gideon had stolen it from her. The dim candlelight flickered over the stone’s polished edges, and all the brilliant colours flared through it.

She had forgotten the feel of its supremacy, even as it lay untouched. And now that she had tapped into her power, she could feel hints of fire, earth, water, and spirit in the stone, the elements calling to her.

He pushed the box along the desk to where she sat. “This is yours, I believe.”

Emara looked at Torin, her mouth open. “The prime said I couldn’t protect it properly.”

“The prime doesn’t see in you what I do.” His angled face told her that his decision was final. “Fuck the prime.”

Her heart caught in her chest. “That’s not very commander-like.” She smiled.

And he smiled back. “I am not one to follow the chain of command, am I?”

Heat simmered her blood as he watched her.

He lifted his chin. “I want you to do what you wish. Keep it, destroy it, throw it in the Broken Sea.” He sat in his chair again and managed to push one of his legs in between hers. “I can keep it for you or I can hand it over. What do you want to do?”

The choice was a shock to her. He was mere hours into his commandership and he had already given her back the power that had been taken from her on one of the worst nights of her life. The Resurrection Stone was more powerful than anything she had ever known. Her mother or grandmother had hidden it in her possession; there must have been a reason for that.

But the stone was sought after. It was a relic that people would kill for, yet he trusted her with it. She didn’t even know what kind of magic it wielded. She didn’t know the depth of its power or how she could use it.

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