Page 155 of The Ascended
"Different," I managed. "More... everything."
He nodded, as if my incoherent response made perfect sense. "You've been containing your power for so long, you've never fully experienced what you're capable of."
I raised a hand, feeling the starlight respond to my movement. The motes shifted, dancing around my fingers now. "What are they?"
"Pure celestial energy," Xül explained. "Not formed into a weapon, but simply manifested. More versatile than a sword, if you learn to control them."
"I thought the point was to lose control," I said, raising an eyebrow.
His lips quirked. "The point was to break through your self-imposed limitations. Now that you have, you can learn to work with your true potential, not against it."
I nodded, trying to absorb the lesson beneath the lingering ghost of his kiss. "So what now?"
"Now we practice." He gestured to the stars circling my head. "But I believe that’s enough for today," he said. "You've done well, and I don't want you to burn out. Besides, I’m needed in the Eternal City."
“Again?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady.
“Unfortunately.” He sighed, walking towards me. “But I’ll be back tonight,” he said as he reached up to brush a strand of hair behind my ear. “If you need me.”
"I should... I should go clean up," I said, gesturing vaguely to my sweat-dampened clothes.
Xül nodded. "We'll continue tomorrow." He turned to leave, then paused. "Oh, and Thais?"
"Yes?"
His eyes held mine, intense and unreadable. "What happened today—the power you accessed—that's just the beginning."
With that, he strode away, leaving me standing alone on the black sand.
I made my way back to my chambers, mind reeling. I shed my clothes and slipped into the hot spring tub inside my quarters. The steaming water welcomed me as I sank into it, hoping to wash away my confusion along with the sweat and sand.
But as I soaked, my thoughts kept returning to Xül. To his hands, his mouth, the weight of his body against mine. To the way he'd looked at me when the stars had formed their crown around my head.
I closed my eyes, letting the water envelop me, and unbidden, my mind conjured his image. His stare pinning me in place, gaze igniting a flush I couldn’t hide. The hard lines of his jaw, the curve of his mouth when he almost smiled.
My breathing quickened as I imagined those hands—hands that could command death itself—moving over my skin. Gentle, then not so gentle. I sank deeper into the water, the warmth surrounding me transforming in my mind to the wildfire of his touch.
I pictured him here, in this room, watching me with that predatory stillness. What would he do if he saw me like this? Would he turn away? Or would he finally surrender to whatever smoldered between us?
In my mind, he chose the latter. I imagined him approaching the bath. His hands on my shoulders, sliding down my arms, leaving trails of fire in their wake. His lips at my neck, my collarbone, lower.
My fingers drifted across my skin, tracing paths I imagined his would take. The water rippled around me as I moved, my breath coming faster now. I bit my lip to keep silent.
It had been weeks now since we'd begun this dance, thisflirtation that walked the edge of destruction. At first, it had been a game, a welcome distraction from grief. Something to occupy my mind when darker thoughts threatened to drag me under.
But today felt like a turning point. And that terrified me more than any trial could. Because I was starting to want things I couldn't have. Starting to feel things I shouldn't feel.
You can’t fall for him, Thais.
It was impossible, of course. Whatever attraction he felt toward me was physical, perhaps tinged with some kind of sick satisfaction or lust for the forbidden. Even more, he wasn’t mine, could never be.
I rose from the bath and dried myself, pulling on clean clothes. This was foolishness. Dangerous foolishness. I needed to focus on survival, on the goal, on everything I‘d learned and everything I had yet to.
Not on sultry eyes and wicked smiles. Not on the way my body and power both responded to his touch. Not on the dangerous spark that had ignited in my chest.
I braided my wet hair with sharp, angry movements. Tomorrow, I would be better. Tomorrow, I would remember my purpose.
Chapter 37
