Page 383 of Alchemised
It used to be like this. Feeling it again, she could remember it, the way he used to touch her, hold her, consume her.
He kissed her neck until her head dropped back and she was gasping. Her hands trailed along the curve of his jaw, down over his shoulders, as the physical memory of him awakened beneath her skin.
She brought his face back to hers. “I love you,” she said, kissing him. “I wish I’d told you a thousand times.”
She found the buttons on his shirt and began unfastening, pushing his clothes away, running her hands across his skin, fingers craving the warmth of his body.
“Tell me to stop, and I’ll stop,” he said, his voice ragged.
“Don’t stop,” she said, fingers trembling as they grazed the familiar patterns carved into his back. Her clothes were slipping off, and want pulled at her from within.
She was pushed back on the bed, her body under his as he kissed across her breasts, but then everything inverted; she was lying there, trying to hold still and stay quiet, frozen with fear of what might happen if she didn’t, the bed canopy above her, and the body over her, every sensation a wretched betrayal.
Her hands froze and her eyes went wide as her ribs clamped down around her lungs, suffocating her.
“Stop.” The word was ripped out of her, so painful that it took her lungs with it.
Kaine froze, jerking back, but she caught him, pulling him to her, not letting him go, burying her face against his shoulders, and breathing in and remembering that it was him. And he was hers, she could not let him go.
Her body shook, as she choked back a sob.
Kaine was not even breathing.
“It was just for a moment,” she said, her chest hitching. “It was just too much for a moment. It’ll be better now that I know I can say stop. It was good.” She wouldn’t let go. “It was good. It was just for a moment that I—It was good.”
But he pulled away until she finally let go. He sat up slowly, his face drawn, pupils contracted so that his eyes resembled cracked ice. He looked so fragile.
He was covered in scars. Her hand shook as she reached out and touched one that ran nearly the length of his torso. “What has he done to you?”
He looked away. “Anything he wants.”
She rested her head on his shoulder, entwining her arm with his as they sat there in the lengthening dark, amid the ruins of all they’d once been. They just needed more time.
HELENA HAD READ THROUGH ALL the works ever attributed to Cetus, organising them in order of likely legitimacy. She felt that she was beginning to grasp what Cetus’s fundamental ideas were regarding alchemy, but she was in desperate need of a more recent glimpse at his methods, and she knew exactly where she might find one.
When Kaine was gone, she left her room, moving slowly, avoiding the shadows, using the walls as a touchstone.
She knew which rooms Morrough might be watching from, and she was careful to avoid as many as possible.
Davies materialised as Helena reached the foyer, but Helena passed through the main wing, moving onwards.
She finally stopped, looking over. “Can Morrough see me here?”
Davies shook her head slowly.
Helena went over to the far door. The frame was warped to lock it in place. Without iron resonance, a person would never get through. Helena’s resonance hummed in her fingers as she placed her hands on the frame and pushed the iron back as if it were a curtain. She gripped the knob; it was a simple lock mechanism.
She glanced back at Davies, who had a look of terror on her face, the only emotion she seemed to still express.
“I’m sorry,” Helena said. “I need to see it.”
“No …” Davies said; her voice came out warped, hollow and gasping. She didn’t know if it was Kaine or the remaining shadow of the woman protesting.
Helena shook her head. “I have to know how it was done.”
Davies did not follow but hovered near the door, stricken, uttering her ghastly pleading Nos as Helena turned on the light and went towards the array.
The lights flickered unsteadily overhead. Looking at that too-small cage, knowing who had lived inside it for months, Helena felt sick. Her heart was beginning to pound. She forced her eyes past, focusing.
