Page 57 of Echoes of Fire

Heat flared in my chest, his unsaid promise an all-consuming weight. I couldn’t have defied that pull if I tried—and stars above, I didn’t want to try. My fingers lightly traced the ridges along his forearm as I nodded, my pulse loud enough in my ears to drown out everything else.

“Always.”

Rath held me carefully, my ribs pressing against the solid weight of his chest as his wings arched slightly. For a creaturedesigned to bring a battlefield to its knees, he carried me like I might shatter if he held on too hard.

He stepped backward until his claws grazed the edge of the raised sleeping slab in the center of the room, its surface draped in silks.

Rath laid me down, one hand bracing the line of my spine while the other adjusted my shoulders into place until the silks cradled my weight. His wings spread fully for balance before he joined me, the rumble in his chest steady as the earth itself.

“You are …” His voice hitched, his golden eyes awash with something both worshipful and predatory as his claws curled around one of my thighs. “You are fire itself,shyrarva, and you do not know.”

“You keep calling me fire,” I murmured, my hands sliding up his shoulders until they curled around his neck, fingers grazing the seam where muscle and scale met. “What does that make you?”

“Fuel,” he answered, his fangs catching on the word like a vow. “Heat without direction will devour everything it touches. But with purpose?” His tongue flicked along his fangs, his tail brushing over my calf in slow, deliberate arcs. “It sustains, binds, creates.”

His mouth captured mine before the quiver in my breath could answer him, his kiss measured and slow at first, then hungrier when I pressed up into him. His claws skimmed just under the hem of my shirt, tracing the faint lines of muscle where the burn scars were beginning to fade.

He broke away just long enough for his fingers to tug delicately at the fabric. “Off,” he commanded, his gaze nearly black. His claws rested against the edge of my skin. “Let me see everything.”

My clothes joined the folds of silk beneath me, but his lips didn’t follow immediately.

Instead, his fingers skimmed over my exposed skin, tracing over burns, scars, and the star tattoos he’d come to know better than I did. His tail looped farther across my legs, pinning me gently in place as his claws caught at the line of my ribs. “They’ll know,” he murmured, lips finding the hollow just beneath my collarbone. “Every mark etched here is proof of a strength they can never question. Never challenge.”

I would have laughed if his thumb hadn’t caught on the corner of my hip bone, stopping the sound with a sharp inhale. “You think scars impress them more than schematics?”

“I know,” he said simply, his lips skimming lower, tongue brushing just shy of the lines between silk and skin. Every nerve in my body sang under his touch.

“Rath, I—” The words stumbled into the space between us, more reflexive gasp than command as his mouth found the edge of mine again.

Fingertips against my hip flexed, claws hidden away for just the barest press of intention—Rath’s reverence was fire made flesh, devouring without destruction. And when his tail dragged higher, the heat at its core left no confusion: He wasn’t asking if I understood.

He was showing me.

Claiming me.

Loving me.

I arched into him, the heat from my own need melding with the furnace of his scales as his claws dipped in places that made me shiver. His hips pressed flush with mine as his tail curled tighter—a possessive pressure rather than restraint, his voice lurching into a quiet growl.

Mine.

The word echoed silently as he consumed me, entirely his own.

Shyrarva.

His breath drew short against my ear, claws flexing protectively across my ribs, but his thrusts slowed with effort. His rhythm stuttered before settling—he intended it to, his movements deliberate and languid. No hurry here, not when it was just us.

Just this undeniable pull.

“Rath,” I gasped, my hands clawing at him as he brought me to the edge, forcing me to hover there.

He shuddered, his lips at my neck as his pace faltered. “Burn for me,shyrarva.”

He didn’t have to ask. The sensation he wrung from me was already fire itself, but his command set something loose that raged and devoured until there was nothing left.

He joined me in an all-consuming wave, his chest pressed flush to mine, his wings folded tightly over both of us. His breaths came deep and hard, the satisfaction in them unmistakable. When he finally spoke, his voice was a low rumble.

“Never forget who you are,” he murmured, his fangs glinting even as his grip softened.

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