Page 165 of The Demon Tide

Jules holds her intense gaze. “I love you too, Lucretia.”

She smiles crookedly, joy bursting into being. “Well, at least that’s out in the open now. Our sordid secret.”

Jules laughs and sits back, regarding her with open warmth.

“There’s a tradition to this festival,” she says, feeling giddy and lit up. “You’re supposed to kiss someone you love under the lavender moon. It brings good luck for the entire year and a blessing from Vo.”

He arches his brow. “Are you asking me to kiss you, Lucretia?” His eyes flick toward the vial of Sanjire root.

“Yes, Jules,” Lucretia breathlessly agrees. “And I’m asking you to kiss me whenever you want to from here on in.”

He gives her a narrow look of amusement. “You wouldn’t get anything done.”

Lucretia can’t suppress her besotted smile. “Well, then... I want you to kiss me as much as you wanttonight. We can go back to devoting our lives to trying to get ourselves arrested or killed tomorrow.”

His expression turns ardent. “I’ve held myself back for so long, so careful not to openly pine for you.”

“So have I.”

He smiles at her, then gets up, moves to his small rune stove, then places his worn, copper kettle on it.

“Would you like some tea?” he offers. He points back idly at the vial of herbs on the table, a spark of mischief lighting his eyes. “To go with the Sanjire root?”

Heat shoots up Lucretia’s spine, warm water from her affinity lines curling around it, speechless for a moment as Jules’s lips form a fuller smile.

“Yes, Jules,” she finally says, unable to suppress her own grin. “I’d love some tea.”

CHAPTER FIVE

LUPINE

Aislinn

Xishlon night, twenty-first hour

Aislinn can sense Jarod’s silent approach with every fiber of her Lupine self, his affection enveloping her like the caress of the forest, his warm summer scent prompting a tingling anticipation that quickens her breath.

She grips the Wyvernguard banister, waiting for him as she looks over the Vo River. Everything is bathed in the Xishlon moon’s luxuriant purple glow, its gentle thrall making it easy to set aside the incoming threat of Vogel for just this one night. Just this one pause before Elloren’s power is unbound, an alliance is forged, and they all deploy west.

Together.

Aislinn waits as Jarod strides nearer, the two of them so breathtakingly high up on this highest of the crisscrossing walkways that connect the two Wyvernguard island-mountains like a series of ladder rungs. A few small, purple-tinted clouds lazily drift below.

Aislinn considers that she’ll never grow fully used to the sheer beauty of the Wyvernguard’s expansive views of the Vo River.

She grips the railing harder as Jarod draws up beside her, also garbed in a Vu Trin uniform, blond hair tousled by the wind. His arm brushes hers lightly and she looks into those beautiful, amber eyes, a small smile on his lips.

“I have something for you,” he says, holding out a rectangular present wrapped in purple parchment and secured with violet twine, a small Xishlon rose slid through the binding.

Aislinn’s nostrils flare as she accepts the gift, her enhanced Lupine senses drawing in the purple rose’s intoxicating floral scent as well as that dry parchment smell that always thrills her archivist mind. She shyly forms a sharp claw on her index finger, easily snaps the twine, then morphs her claw back to a tapered fingernail and folds back the parchment.

A black tome marked with a lavender Xishlon moon is nestled inside, purple flowers painted on its spine and Noi lettering in silver foil embossed on the cover. Just below the book is a curious square of flat glass, framed by small Noi runes.

Aislinn’s pulse quickens as she realizes what this is. She places the glass over the book’s title and the Noi lettering instantly transforms into the Common Tongue.

Lavender Garden of My Heart.

Aislinn knows of this text—one of Noilaan’s classic collections of love poetry, read throughout Noilaan on Xishlon night.

---