Page 26 of A Kiss of Embers
The faintest glimmer of distress echoed from within the confines of her Ember stone, startling her upright. It faded like the sound of a dying note until it disappeared entirely.
Just when she thought she might have imagined it, the same note of distress played but even quieter than the one before it. She latched onto the note and pulled against the thread. It wasn’t Pri’s distress, though it originated from her Ember stone.
Seraphina gasped when she realized it was Bastien. She lurched forward, following the thread, until she knelt beside the base of a tree and began scooping the snow away with her hands. The bitter cold gnawed on her skin and threatened to drown her within the prison of its icy fingers, but she ignored her numb hands and continued to dig.
Until she brushed against frozen clothing.
“Bastien!” she cried as she brushed the remaining snow off him, only for her heart to sink to the bottom of a cliff when she noted his pale skin, his blue lips, his frosted hair.
“You can’t die on me now,” she snarled. “I already told you that if anything was going to kill you, it would be me.”
She grabbed his wrists and dragged him off the path and toward the small hill, barely visible through the blizzard, while glancing over her shoulder. The ice wraith could have suffered mortal wounds when seared with her fire or her dagger after fleeing, but it might still be alive. She couldn’t afford for the creature to find them again.
Without the sunlight to charge her ring, the man’s weight became too much of a burden. But the sight of his blue lips and frosted eyelashes gave her the strength she needed to drag him around the hill and into the small outcrop carved into the side by nature. The rocky ceiling sheltered them from the elements, but not entirely.
Bastien didn’t move, not even to blink, as she knelt beside him and smacked his face to try to get him to stir. His eyes moved faintly to let her know he was alive and conscious, but if he didn’t receive warmth soon, he would die.
“Hold still,” she whispered as she climbed on top of him and straddled his waist. She almost rolled her eyes at how silly the demand sounded, as he couldn’t move anyway if he tried.
Her insides trembled as she took either side of his face in her hands and met his eye. Her fingers shook when she knew he could see her, hear her, feel her. But if she didn’t act, he would not survive.
She lowered her head and allowed her body to thrum with her fiery magic. The man’s eyes danced as if panic rushed through his frozen veins, because she had no doubt he’d witnessed the aftermath of what she’d done to his friend.
She touched her lips gently to his, and instead of billowing her flames into his lungs, she allowed the warmth of her magic to slowly seep from her mouth to his, filling his lungs, fueling his body, giving him warmth.
However, she was not prepared for the warmth dancing in her own belly as she became painfully aware of every place their bodies touched, the strength of his jaw beneath her hands, the hardness of his belly where she sat, the frozen sweetness of his cold, soft lips.
Never in her life had she bestowed a kiss of embers upon a man, one that gave life instead of taking it away. Bastien was her first.
She broke away from him and next kissed his throat, allowing her magic to heat his frozen bones, his frozen blood, his frozen skin.
Carefully, she pulled on the leather strings of his shirt to loosen it enough to expose the smooth, hairless skin on his chest. Next, she kissed him over the heart, feeling with her lips the languid rhythm beating within. At her heating touch, it started to beat faster and with more purpose.
Instead of calming like she’d hoped, her hands trembled more. Not from the cold but from the entirely foreign sensation of kissing her enemy.
She removed her hands from his face and slipped her fingers into his, warming them with her touch. Magic coursed through her as it bounced and swirled within her, begging for more release. But she held it in and instead flared her wings on either side of her to trap the heat within.
Snow battered mercilessly against her wings, against her back, as she lay on top of Bastien, her body flush with his. Hand to hand. Arm to arm. Chest to chest. Leg to leg. His body was no longer as cold as ice as he slowly thawed from the inside out. But as he moved his lips the slightest bit, no sound escaped.
“Shh…” she whispered, placing their intertwined fingers against his lips. “The wraith might still be out there.”
And as the snow continued to spray her with icy pellets, she felt a tingling sensation ripple through her, suggesting her wings were changing colors to mimic her surroundings. For now, they were safe. From the elements. From the wraith. From certain death.
When her head grew heavy from keeping it aloft, she dared to lower it to rest against Bastien’s shoulder while keeping her gaze on his jawline, his chin, his throat, just to make sure he didn’t succumb to death.
His throat bobbed with a swallow, followed by the slow blink of his eyes.
Seraphina pressed her lips together as confusion clouded her mind. Bastien Dalena was her enemy. She despised him for what he represented, for all of the suffering of her people. But here she was, keeping him alive with her heat, with her magic, with her kiss.
And she didn’t hate it.
Bastien stared at the low, rocky ceiling with wide, disbelieving eyes. He swallowed once, twice, but the lump in his throat remained.
The Ember Queen lay on top of him, her breaths deep when sleep had claimed her hours ago. Her fire magic seeped into him, keeping him warm as the blizzard outside transitioned from a chaotic tempest to a peaceful snowfall to a cloudless sky.
His hand rested on her bare back below her shoulder blades where her wings jutted out. The paralysis poison in his blood had long since dispersed. Rational thought warned him to flee. But the confusing emotions jumbled within his chest kept him inside the small outcrop with his arm lightly wound around the fae woman.
A slow breath escaped his lungs as he studied her without her knowledge. Black hair fell away from her face, revealing her rounded ears—ears like a human’s, with a waterfall of piercings running down one of them. Although she was of fae blood, her ears did not resemble his at all. While hers were rounded, his were long and pointed, with a slight droop at the tip to mark him as a Forest Fae.
