Page 36 of A Kiss of Embers
Preferably, he’d like to keep the family jewels intact.
His eyebrows drew together when the next tree was too far away to jump to. To leap the distance meant to put his and Seraphina’s lives at risk. But if he did nothing, they could risk getting shot.
At least he took heart in the fact that only one of them would take the bolt, and the other would live. But if he took it and left her to fend for herself, both of them could die. Or worse, the clan leader’s son would take her back to his village as his bride.
“Don’t do it, Bastien,” Seraphina warned when she spotted the large gap. “Don’t you dare.”
“Hold on tight.”
And then he jumped.
His heart soared when he realized he was going to make it. Not on the same branch level as the one he’d leaped from but one lower. It was good enough.
But then something sharp stung his leg, and the unexpected intense pain caused him to lose his focus. His stomach slammed into a branch, his body doing a disorienting flip. The impact flung Seraphina from his arms, and he found himself falling after her.
The ground approached at an alarming rate, fast enough to crack their necks or break a few bones. He reacted on instinct as he tucked Seraphina beneath his arm, and just as his feet hit the ground, they rolled into the fall together. Though instead of returning to his feet like a graceful feline, they rolled across the ground several times until they came to an abrupt halt in a mass of tangled limbs and disgruntled moans.
He gasped and sat up suddenly as he knelt over her, assessing her for damage. Her body remained limp from the poison, though it must have been wearing off because she moved an arm to brush hair out of her face.
“Please be all right,” he breathed as he ran his hands along her head, her neck, her arms, and her legs. “Please, please, please.” But nothing seemed to be broken, though she’d sustained several scratches from the fall.
A branch cracked behind him, and he leaped to his feet, only to hiss when placing weight on his leg momentarily burned. Blood ran down his leg and seeped into the fabric of his trousers. But otherwise, he remained mostly unharmed as he faced his foe where he stood beneath the shade of a tree, barely visible in the dark atmosphere.
The crossbow, now strapped to his back, was empty, and in his hands lay two small knives.
Bastien drew his obsidian sword from his clothing sheath and held it at the ready.
However, the man glanced from his sword to Seraphina lying on the ground to his knives before he huffed and turned back around, jogging out of sight.
He wasted no time as he sheathed his sword once more and slung Seraphina over his shoulders, much to her grunting protest. But he didn’t have time to be careful with her. Not when the other man knew where they were and might come back with more soldiers.
Ignoring the pain flaring in his arm and leg, and yes, even his ear, he ran as fast as he possibly could while carrying Seraphina, making sure to cover his tracks whenever possible. Only when his body threatened to collapse from exhaustion did he finally set her down against the trunk of a tree within a small clearing far away from the Ember settlement.
“Why is it that we’re constantly finding ourselves in a tight spot?” he grumbled as he paced back and forth in front of her. He tore several strips of cloth from the bottom of his tunic and wrapped his leg and then his arm over his clothing, tying the knot off with his teeth. He attempted to staunch the bleeding from his ear next. It was a shallow cut, at least. “Youwere supposed to be my enemy. Not an ice wraith. Not some Ember lunatics.You. And now you are far closer to an ally than I’m comfortable with.”
“You saved my life,” she murmured.
“They weren’t going to kill you,” he scoffed. “I probably only saved my own hide.”
She stood on shaky feet and approached slowly, the intensity in her eyes freezing him to the spot. “You. Saved. My. Life. And you had no reason to.”
Only then did he realize she wasn’t talking about her actual life but the life he’d saved her from. One she desperately hadn’t wanted. But it still didn’t change the fact that she would still have to choose three concubines eventually.
Seraphina took a step toward him. And then another. Intent lay within the depths of her eyes, and he couldn’t help but back up as she advanced.
“Oh ho ho.” Bastien held a cautioning finger between them. “Don’t you dare kiss me again. I don’t trust you not to breathe your dragon fire into my lungs.”
His back brushed the tree behind him, trapping him against Seraphina’s slow advancement. He swallowed as his gaze roamed over her. Black hair fell over her shoulders in a beautiful, knotted mess. Her wings draped down her back like a waterfall of gold and green leaves, the color barely visible in the darkness. And her eyes… They captivated him with their shape, their color, their intensity.
In all his life, he suddenly found something he wanted to paint more than anything. To capture her on paper. To immortalize the alluring way she stared him down.
She was an Ember Fae. The enemy. But he could no longer think of her ashisenemy. Because in the past several days, something had developed between them. A mutual trust, perhaps. Though, of course, he couldn’t disregard the way her proximity caused his heart to beat faster, his pulse to race, his breath to escape more rapidly.
Which was why he held still as his fists clenched in anxious anticipation, not knowing whether she would sear him alive or offer him a gentle heat.
Her fingers cupped his chin and turned his head to the side before she stood on her toes and placed a kiss to his cheek. The warmth from her lips lingered long after she pulled away as if it seeped into his skin and latched onto the deepest recesses of his soul.
A breath stuttered from his lungs as he lifted his hands and cradled her face. His thumbs rested on her cheeks, a hesitant touch. Despite the warning flashing through his mind, despite the impossibility of their situation, he liked the Ember Queen far more than he had any right to. And autumns, he wanted to kiss her.
