Page 136 of The Shadow Wand

I watch breathlessly as he sets down his glass and rises in one smooth motion, his fire encircling mine as he comes to me.

Lukas gently caresses the sides of my arms, and I draw in a shuddering breath, his touch intensifying the decadent heat, my lines straining toward his. He slides his palms up my arms and rests them lightly on my shoulders.

I can feel his warmth radiating all along my back, my breath hitching in response to it. And I love the smell of him. I close my eyes, lean back against his chest, and breathe him in, turning to nuzzle my cheek against his warm neck as his fire gives another heated flare.

Deep forest wood. Pine.

Lukas slides his hands between us, moving back a fraction as his pianist fingers make deft work of my laces, quickly unfastening them. Then he tugs up my elaborate Sealing tunic, and I raise my arms as he pulls it smoothly over my head and drops it on the floor, revealing the deep-green camisole underneath. I lower my arms as Lukas’s arms slide back around me, his hard body pressing against me, a hot rush of his fire breaking free.

I look at him again over my shoulder, my breathing erratic as I’m swept up in sudden anticipation and the entrancing feel of his flame searing through mine.

Lukas’s breath is warm against my ear, his deep voice an inviting whisper. “Take off the skirt. Please.”

My own fire quickens in response, our magic newly charged.

I turn and sit on the bed, amused by how unsteady I am from nerves and desire and the hot draw of his magic.

Reaching behind me, I clumsily unfasten my skirt, push it down, and wriggle out of it.

Dressed now in only my thin, silken green camisole, pantalets, and deep-green silk stockings, I meet Lukas’s molten gaze, my cloth-wrapped Wand still pressed to my thigh in one of my stockings. I slide the Wand out and place it on the side table beside me, then lie back on the bed, basking in the feel of Lukas’s fire sparking against mine as I stretch, the linen quilt bumpy against the bare stripes of skin above my stockings. I close my eyes and delight in the taste of cherries still on my tongue, the feel of the trees caressing my lines.

Lukas’s fire draws down for a moment, and I open my eyes just as he retrieves something from the leather bag by the chair. A small bottle. He pulls what looks like a tiny sliver of root out of the bottle and hands it to me.

“Here, Elloren.”

“Sanjire root?” I ask.

Lukas nods.

I hold out my palm, and he drops the dark pregnancy-preventing root into it. I place it in my mouth.

It’s bitter on my tongue, and I flush over the need for it. Over what’s about to transpire. I throw Lukas an arch look. “I thought you were supposed to ‘breed on me.’”

He shakes his head and sits back down, picking up his glass. “That is, perhaps, the least sensual phrase ever uttered in the entire history of Erthia.”

“Hmm,” I agree as I finger the embroidery of the quilt beneath me.

Lukas’s expression grows serious as his gaze slides over me, a pulse of his fire stroking my lines. “That fabric is thin.”

“It’s soft too,” I tease as I bite my lip softly.

“Hmm.” His fire gives another hot pulse in my direction, the heat growing more insistent.

“Your fire,” I say as his heat stirs up my own. “It’s starting to make me feel very relaxed.”

“Good,” he says. “Because I’m starting to want to take that camisole off of you.”

I swallow, the tension picking up in the room.

Flushed from our affinity draw, I sit up and swing my legs over the side of the bed. I pick up my glass and take a small sip of the wine, then swirl the liquid and consider it as its oak limbs twine through me, soothing every line.

“Where did you get the rune on your forearm?” Lukas lightly inquires, his focus intent.

“Sagellyn Gaffney placed it on me,” I explain. “When I visited Cyme. It turns out she’s a Light Mage. She placed a demon-sensing rune on me, as well.” I brazenly pull up my camisole to show him and can sense Lukas’s focus scattering for a moment as he stares at the rune on my naked abdomen, his gaze growing a bit liquid before he raises his eyes to meet mine.

“You were in Cyme?” he asks, seeming a bit breathless.

I nod as I glance down at my glass, the wine such a lovely crystalline scarlet color, the firelight dancing in it. “I had spirits for the first time there too,” I confide in him with a mischievous smile. “I drank too much tirag one night with Valasca Xanthrir.”

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