Page 22 of The Unencumbered Warrior
Her breath caught, just enough for him to hear it.
“I know you will.”
He stepped closer and kissed her, slow and sure, like it had been lingering between them since their arrival home and needed to be satisfied. She leaned into him, her hand tightening around his as he deepened the kiss and pressing just enough against him to feel his strength.
She thought to ask him to stay, but that wouldn’t be right. She needed to know he would make this place his home permanently and not find him gone one morning when she woke.
She ended the kiss reluctantly, though when his lips begged for more, she returned his kisses until she finally stepped away from him, fearing she would submit to her own desires.
“Goodnight, Raff.”
She didn’t want him to leave. He had felt it in the way she returned his kisses and how she pressed against him, but not too close or else she would have felt the strength of his desire for her. And he didn’t want to leave. He felt as she did and soon, very soon, more would need to be said and decided.
He waited until she slipped inside, and the latch fell into place, then he turned to go. But as he walked down the path alone, a weight settled in his chest. He’d heard the rumors. He’d seen the fear. And deep down, where even the fire hadn’t reached, a thought stirred with quiet dread.
What if the witch hadn’t come for the village?
What if she’d come for him?
The night pressed in around him, like a heavy fog. His boots found the familiar path back to his cottage, but his mind wandered far from the ground beneath him. Ingrid’s kiss still lingered on his lips, warm and grounding, as did her obvious desire for him. But it did little to silence the quiet storm building in his chest.
Why now?
The question circled him like the wind whispering through the trees, persistent and full of warning. He had started to believe, just a little, that maybe things could be different here. That with Ingrid—clever, kind, fierce when she needed to be—he might have a chance at something he hadn’t dared want in a long time.
A life. A quiet one, perhaps. One built with her.
He imagined what it might look like, kissing her whenever he wanted to, which would be often, protecting her, sleeping cuddled together while snow fell outside, waking beside her eachmorning. It was a life he hadn’t given much thought to but now it was the only life that mattered to him. He’d felt something touch him deep inside every time she reached for his hand, as if her touch held a promise he didn’t deserve but longed for all the same.
And now… this.
The rumors. The fear. The talk of a witch.
What if it had followed him? Not just the tale, but the truth behind it, the shadow tied to the wish he made long ago, when he was too foolish to know what he was truly asking for.
He paused at the bend on the path where the trees grew thicker, old oaks hunched like watching beasts. The wind stirred through their branches, brushing his cheek like a whisper.
What if the witch hadn’t come for the village? What if she’d come for him?
His chest tightened. If the magic had returned, if it had found him again—he’d face it. He had no choice. But the thought of Ingrid caught in it, suffering for a past she had no part in, that he could not bear.
He wouldn’t lose her. Not to this. Not to anything.
He stepped around the bend in the path, his cottage coming into view through the trees, a slant of moonlight silvering its thatched roof and casting long shadows across the area. The firewood was still stacked neatly by the door. All seemed still, untouched.
Then he stopped.
Someone stood near the edge of the clearing, half-shrouded in darkness where the trees thickened. Tall. Cloaked. Unmoving. No torch, no lantern. Just the glint of moonlight on what might have been a braid of white hair, or the curve of a hood.
His breath caught.
He knew that silhouette.
A year might have passed, but the image was burned into him like an old scar—the figure who had stepped from the forest that night, when he and the others had laughed and made their foolish wishes around the fire. The one who had granted their wishes and disappeared as fast as she had arrived, leaving damage in her wake.
Now, here she was again. Or was she? Was it his guilt or misgivings for what he had done that made him think it was her?
He took a slow, deliberate step forward, eyes locked on the figure.
