Page 55 of A Kiss of Embers
A breath shuddered from his lungs as she ran her fingers down his chest and to his abdomen, maintaining eye contact the entire time.
A soft yet silky tone clung to her voice. “I lied to you a week ago.” She held up a pouch dangling from her fingers by leather strings, and his jaw slackened when she pulled out his chupacabra mask and his favorite bow. “I didn’t really throw your weapons into the river.”
He stared back at her with parted lips as he strapped the mask onto his back and his bow over his shoulder. “Why not?”
“Never discard anything you can later use as leverage.”
“And now you’re using it as leverage to get me to like you again.”
A long sigh escaped her mouth. Long and weary and full of devastation. “Is it working?”
His mouth twitched from one side to the other as he studied her. “What else do you have as leverage?”
“An apology?”
“You?” He laughed. “Apologizing?”
She scowled and kicked his knee. The fact that he didn’t stop her spoke volumes of how this situation might play out. He caught her foot, throwing her off balance. She turned into the movement and ended up behind him, poking him in the side with her fingers. “An apology,” she repeated again. “I am sorry for hurting your friend.” Feeling another pair of eyes on her, she glanced up to find Ashryn staring unashamedly at them, likely hanging onto every word.
The other woman shrugged sheepishly. “I’m not here.”
Seraphina rolled her eyes. “Yes, you are.” But there was no other place to hold this conversation unless she could somehow lure Bastien into the narrow hallway. But she assumed he would no sooner leave his friend’s side than give her a few moments of his time.
“She had my sister,” she tried to explain, gazing back at him to try to make him understand. “I didn’t think. I just reacted. I’m so sorry, Bastien. Please forgive me. I never should have hurt her.”
“You almost killed her.” Fortunately, the cold edge melted from his eyes.
“And I deeply regret it.” She ran a hand down his arm from his bicep to his wrist. “I cannot change what I did. All I can ask for is forgiveness.”
He swallowed. “And is Pri…?”
With a shake of her head, she said, “She’s alive and well.”
The fight left his eyes, but a somberness remained. “We cannot continue this, Ser.” He gestured between them. “It’s forbidden for a half-breed like me to…” He glanced toward Ash, who suddenly found a book to occupy her attention. But she never turned a page.
“To what?” she urged.
He turned away from her and began pacing the floor while running his fingers through his hair. “For me to marry! To have children. I never told anyone this part. Not even Ash.” He winced when he met his friend’s eye across the room. Taking her by surprise, Bastien grabbed her arm and pulled her into the hallway, shutting the door behind him before he continued quietly. “The council forced me to take a blood oath to never have children. The alternative was sterilization. Why else do you think they allowed me to stay in Attleglade?”
Her mouth turned downward, and she swallowed a lump of emotion in her throat as her eyes misted over. If Bastien had truly been forced into a blood oath, then the moment a child was born, he would drop dead just from the magic of the oath. To be with him meant giving up so much. But after knowing him, she knew she wouldn’t be able to pull herself away now.
Clearing his throat, he glanced away to stare at the top of the staircase rather than at her. “And a second blood oath to keep me grounded within the territory.” He glanced at her but quickly looked away. “If I cross the border, I will fall over dead immediately. When those Ember lunatics captured us, I was only a few paces away from dropping dead.”
Her lips parted as she stared at him, followed by a discomforting squeeze to her chest. The Burning Cliffs werebarelywithin the Attleglade territory, which was why it had been abandoned over the years. She could have killed him.
Until now, she hadn’t realized how close she’d been to losing him.
He stepped closer, a sheen of determination in his eyes. “If you know what’s good for you,” he said, pointing a finger at her, “then you will leave. There can be nous. You will lose so much.”
But instead of retreating, she trailed a hand down his arm and slipped her fingers into his. “Or I will gain plenty. I never imagined wanting a Forest Fae so badly it hurts. You are weaved into the very fiber of my being. Into my body, my soul, my past, my present, and my future.” She lowered her voice and brushed the back of her fingers against his cheek. “I love you, Bastien, and I cannot let you go. No matter how much you will it.”
A sigh escaped him as he closed his eyes and held his hand over hers, where it rested against his cheek. “You are an Ember Fae. The blazing Ember Queen, at that. We will never work. You know this.”
“You refuse to even try?”
Although she attempted to disguise her hurt, it must have leaked through her voice because he opened his eyes and looked at her with a somber gaze. “I have my father to think about.”
“Yes, but perhaps someday, the bird might need to leave the nest.” She cradled his face in both hands. “Run away with me. We’ll find a way to make it work around the blood oaths. We’ll go somewhere else, to a place where our cultures cannot reach us. We can just be Bastien and Seraphina.”
