Page 124 of Kissed By the Gods
I know what Ishoulddo—drive that uncertainty between us like a blade. It would make things easier, safer.
But this girl? She’s a fracture in all my defenses.
I swing my legs over the side of the bed to go to her. I will always go to her.
Her eyes widen, and she’s moving before I can even plant my feet. “Don’t you dare get up!” she cries out. “Elowen will have my head if you pull a stitch or fall on your face.”
But I’ve no desire for her to see me in a sick bed. Not when I’m awake and can do something about it. The stitches that crisscross jaggedly across my neck ache and stretch with the motion, but I don’t dissolve into a coughing fit, so there’s some progress.
She scowls at me. “I should have known you’d make a horrible patient.”
“I think you know what kind of patient I am firsthand,” I tell her, one eyebrow quirked. “Veilstrider.” I gesture to the patched-up gash over my throat that should’ve killed me. “Thank you.”
She winces as she lowers her eyes to the jagged scar. “I’m sorry I stitched it so poorly.” She smiles ruefully. “I’ve been working with Siofra to improve my field dressing so that I don’t curse anyone else with a scar quite so horrific again.”
I scoff. “An Altor that cares about a little scar isn’t a real Altor.”
“Little?” she questions. “I wouldn’t call it little.”
A wicked grin winks out before I can control myself. “No,” I drawl. “I don’t think you would.”
She blushes, a beautiful pink flush covering her chest and her cheeks. Thank Serephelle for Elowen and the gift of privacy.
My voice is still hoarse from the ash. The volcano on Solmire started blasting thick plumes of it before the Kher’zenn attacked.It was like they knew. Like they knew I was there alone; like they knew the volcano was going to erupt ash, creating the perfect camouflage for them. When Einarr and I were ambushed, it had seemed like the worst kind of luck.
Or the gods reaching down with a blade.
And then our fate changed again when Leina dropped from the sky. An avenging goddess on wings of fury, born for death and war. But the truth is, my fate didn’t changethen. It changed in the woods, when I first found her.
And gods, I’m so tired of fighting it.
She clears her throat, awkwardly. “I’m sorry about …” She waves her hand in the air a bit helplessly.
I quirk an eyebrow at her in question.
She blushes an even brighter red. “About the dreams,” she mumbles.
The sex dreams. The dreams that weren’t quite dreams. The implications have us both standing incredibly still, until I take a measured step toward her.
“Are you?” I ask, my already-hoarse voice going deeper.
“Mmm,” she answers. “I didn’t know of course, but even still.”
“I’m sure it won’t happen again,” I say, but my voice is a challenge. What the fuck am I doing?
“Of course, I-I-I. I wouldn’t—” she stammers, and then stops, unable to get a promise out. Because she still wants me. Because she can’t control it. Not yet.
She throws her shoulders back, raising her chin up at me, and narrows her eyes. There’s that fire.
“The Elder wants to take over my training for a while,” she says, her voice firmer as she changes the subject. “There’s not another veilstrider to work with me, and he believes he’s the best to help me understand my gift, given his experience and knowledge.”
I nod. I expected this.
Her lips part on a silent exhale. “The archons said you’ll still be my master, that I’ll still ride out with you in battles,” she continues. “But I’ll spend the winter training with the Elder while you’re in Selencia.”
The distance will likely be good for us.
Not because I want to leave her—gods, the last thing I want is to leave her, especially now that we know the danger surrounding her is greater than anything I’d prepared for. And I’d prepared for a lot—every worst-case scenario, every shadow at her back, I’d already counted. But this?
