Page 44 of Claimed By Flame

“I don’t offer it often.”

“I noticed.”

She stepped closer.

Moonlight bathed the ruins in silver, casting long shadows that seemed to echo every buried feeling neither of them had the language to speak aloud.

“I knew something,” she admitted. “Not everything. But I suspected.”

He turned to face her fully, his expression unreadable.

“And still you let me burn in ignorance.”

Her jaw tensed. “You think I wanted to? And I only just had the confirmation recently. I was afraid, Cassian.”

Seraphine took another step, until the space between them was a breath.

“I didn’t know how to tell you,” she whispered. “Because I didn’t want it to change how I looked at you.”

“And has it?”

She met his eyes.

“No.”

That one word held the truth neither of them had dared admit. But she was done hiding that she was feeling something for him. Something more than she could control.

They stood there, caught between the ruins of what was and what might be.

Seraphine turned her gaze to the stone arch above them, the crumbled pillars etched with timeworn glyphs.

“Skyforged was the last place the blade was whole,” she said. “Before the Drakar shattered it. Before we turned on the ones like you.” She took a step around to face him. “And I thought,” she added, “maybe something broken can be made whole again here.”

He looked at her, like he wasn’t sure if she meant the blade or herself.

She wasn’t sure either.

Before she could overthink, she closed the space between them and pressed her hand against his chest, feeling the erratic thrum beneath.

Cassian didn’t flinch.

He stepped forward and kissed her like he had been waiting a lifetime. Like the world might tear them apart come dawn and he didn’t care.

It was messy. Urgent. Real.

Seraphine didn’t hesitate.

She dragged him down with her, pulling at his collar until his weight settled above her—solid and scorching and real. The ground beneath them was cool, packed with dust and moss and crushed petals from the ancient vines that crept along the broken foundation of Skyforged. Overhead, the stars spun above the ruin’s skeletal archways, each constellation a witness.

Cassian kissed her like a man who’d been dying quietly for years. His storm-gray eyes were wild when he pulled back to look at her, breath ragged, chest rising against hers.

“Are you sure?” he rasped, voice low, but tight with restraint. “Because once I start—I won’t stop.”

She reached up, threading her fingers into the silver-streaked black at his nape. “Then don’t.”

His mouth crashed into hers again, hungry and reverent. She felt the brush of his tongue, the sharp scrape of his teeth as he groaned into her mouth—and she gave him everything in return.

Seraphine’s hands moved over his body, tugging at the straps of his battle-worn leathers, pushing aside the layers until warm skin met her palms. His muscles flexed beneath her touch—he was all strength, the body of a weapon honed by years of war. She dragged her nails down his back, feeling the ridges of old scars and heat rising from just beneath his skin—the ember-blooded dragon beneath.

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