Page 88 of Dark Shaman: The Lost Treasure
"How did you guess?"
"I'm perceptive like that." He kissed her, deep and searching, as if he could pour all his hope and determination into her through that connection. "My goddess," he whispered as his handsmoved over her body with the reverence of a worshipper at an altar, each touch designed to drive thought from her mind and replace it with sensation.
She arched beneath him as he traced the curve of her hip, the dip of her waist, the sensitive skin where her neck met her shoulder. He knew her body so well by now, had mapped every responsive zone with the dedication of a cartographer charting new territory. When his lips followed the path his hands had taken, she gasped, fingers tangling in his hair.
"You're so breathtakingly beautiful," he murmured against her skin. "So strong. You deserve so much more than this."
"I have you," she said, the words escaping before she could stop them. "For now, that's enough."
He lifted his head to look at her, his gaze intense in the darkness. "Is it?"
Rather than answer, she pulled him down for another kiss. Some facts were too dangerous to speak aloud, even in the supposed privacy of her chambers. The fact that he'd awakened something in her she'd thought long dead. The fact that she was falling in love with him despite every rational argument against it. The fact that when he inevitably left—through death or escape or simple loss of interest—it would destroy something fundamental inside her.
His body joined with hers in that perfect synchronization they'd found from the very beginning, and coherent thought scattered like startled butterflies. This was what she needed—this connection that transcended words and fears and her reality. In these moments, she could pretend they were somewhere else.Not in an underground harem on a private island, but in a home of their own choosing, free to love without consequence or fear.
He moved within her with passionate tenderness, each thrust a promise he couldn't keep, each kiss a vow that would inevitably be broken. She met him stroke for stroke, trying to tell him with her body what she couldn't say with words.
When release came, she cried out his name and felt him shudder above her. For a moment, they existed outside of time, outside of the prison that held them, outside of everything but this perfect moment.
Reality returned slowly, seeping back like water through cracks in a dam. His weight pressed her into the mattress. The humid air clung to their sweat-dampened skin, heavier than usual, carrying the green scent of growing things and something else—a mineral tang that seemed out of place.
"You are right. It is more humid than normal," Elias said. "Maybe the dehumidifier stopped working."
"It's monsoon season," she said, though it had also been monsoon season yesterday and the day before, and it hadn't been this humid in her room. The air felt thick, almost oppressive. "The rains have been particularly heavy this year."
He rolled to the side, keeping one arm draped across her stomach. "I noticed. The garden has been challenging to maintain with all the water. I've had to work on the drainage to save my herbs from rotting."
"Perhaps that's affecting things down here as well. All that water has to go somewhere."
"Into the water table, ideally. Though with volcanic rock..." He trailed off, and she could practically hear him thinking. "The geology here must be complex. Volcanic islands often have unusual underground water systems—aquifers trapped between rock layers, underground streams following old lava tubes."
"How do you know so much about geology?"
"I know a lot about many things." He tickled her ribs. "I'm like a sponge. I absorb information. I've traveled through many volcanic regions, like the Caucasus, parts of Turkey, and the Mediterranean islands."
Always an explanation. Always plausible. Never quite satisfying.
"The pyramid must have been a massive undertaking," he said, once again deflecting. "How was it built?"
She allowed the change of subject, too content in the afterglow to pursue his secrets. "I don't know the details. It was already here when we arrived. Navuh built it for us. The design is ingenious, really. Each level is smaller than the one below. Natural light wells hidden in the structure bring sunlight down to the first level during the day."
"But not to the lower levels."
"No. Those of us on the second level have windows to the interior garden, but that's artificial light. The servants below us have no windows at all. Just endless artificial day and night, regulated by timers and routines."
"I know. I lived among them for eighteen months, and I still work down there during the day."
"Humans are remarkably adaptable," she said. "I suppose we're all proof of that. We adapt to our cages, make them comfortable,pretend the bars are there for our protection rather than our confinement."
"Some cages are harder to see than others," he said quietly.
Before she could ask what he meant, another tremor rolled through the structure. This one was gentler, more of a shiver than a shake, an aftershock, but something about it felt off.
"That didn't feel like an earthquake," Elias said, sitting up.
She sat up beside him, listening intently. The tremor faded, but in its wake came something else—a sound so low it was more felt than heard, like the earth itself groaning.
"The structure is settling, perhaps," she said.
