Page 133 of Rift
His eyes closed, and his hold on her hips tightened. Baritone notes poured from his chest and shattered her ability to focus on anything other than doing whatever it took to keep him singing.
He snapped his head forward when she pressed her fingers lightly around his throat, letting the leather of his amulet slide between them.
“Leave it,” he said, his breath hot on her neck. She twisted to catch his heavy gaze, the question on her lips. She tightened her grip on his shoulder, nearly abandoning asking it in favor of the tension building in her stomach, but her eyes gave her away.
“I want you to want me, not need me because of some god of Fate’s meddling.”
Astra savored the heat in his stare before kissing him again, dragging her nails along his chest and sighing his name. He reached for her face, the edges of his vision blurring.
Lux squeezed her hips. His voice strained as he whispered something in another language against her neck. He buried his face in her curls.
“You first,” he whispered, holding her closer to him.
And away Astra went.
Golds and stars and pinks and flames consumed her, consumed both of them. She drowned in the color exploding within his ribcage, blinding her as she gripped onto the new skin she’d burned across his shoulder. She cried out, forgetting they weren’t alone in the sea or on a mountaintop somewhere. His bronze hand reached for her mouth, covering her lips as he followed her over the edge.
She clung to him, afraid that if she let go, the walls might ripple and the seams of time would fall apart in yet another dream. But when she finally worked up the courage to look at him through the sweat and heavy breathing, she knew.
He’d never leave her side again.
Not for Above or Below, Sun or Moon.
She brushed a curl from his forehead, running her finger down the knotted bridge of his nose, marveling at all the hills and valleys of him she’d never allowed herself to notice.
He unleashed the wicked smile she’d grown to quite like. She considered saying as much, but she’d been vulnerable enough with him. She drew the line at stroking his ego. He cocked his head to the side as if he read the string of thoughts in her mind.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he laughed, running his hand through her hair, tickling the bare skin of her back. “Just wondering what comes next.”
“Hour by hour, Commander. Hour by hour.”
Her knees ached as they slammed against white marble.
Her neck hung forward, the weight of her dazed head straining the muscle.
She squeezed her eyes, something in her chest screaming, as if a pillar of fire was spiraling from her heart. A metallic blade hit the floor, pinging against the cool marble as sparkling gold liquid pooled around her knees.
“Good man,” a deep voice said behind her. “Now finish it.”
Astra woke as another fire burst within her spine, screaming.
“As?”
She’d forgotten he was next to her. She was so used to waking up from her strange dreams alone, forced to slow her breathing and will the images away in silence. Lux’s arms encircled her and pulled her close, her ragged breathing settling as she grounded herself to this plane of existence.
“Who was that?” he whispered in the dark, gently stroking her bare skin as she pushed her hand against her drumming chest, the dull pain still lingering.
“You heard him?”
He hesitated. “I saw him.”
“It was just a nightmare,” Astra assured both of them. “Not everything has to mean something.”
He pressed a kiss into her forehead, not buying the line. She could feel it in the tension burrowing into his shoulders.
“We need to be careful with who we trust. Careful about who knows we’re…” Luxuros trailed off, realizing that there was no word for what they were to one another.
