Page 75 of Kiss of Ice

Kam drifted in and out of consciousness, his dreams a chaotic febrile mess of images from the past. He dreamed of his father; a stern man who’d loved his son but could never quite show it. His mother; a distant memory of kindness and patience who’d sung to him as a baby. Natalia; the slayer who’d saved him and left him.

He dreamed of a distant forest; of faeries and dragons and witches and warlocks.

He dreamed of being Beast again.

Ren felt him shaking under her arms. Sweat was pouring from his body and he jabbered words out loud, caught in the grip of delirium. Most of them made no sense. All she could do was hold him.

She applied panacea cream to his wound every few hours and gradually the red sickle tracks began to fade.

Reducing his fever required more effort. She had to concentrate to keep her body chilled as she lay across him, holding his limbs tightly to stop him thrashing. She lost track of time, only realising the sun had set when the room darkened.

Jaina – or Amal or Leshi, she wasn’t sure who – left meals outside the door. The few breaks she took were spent gulping down cold food or relieving herself in the ablution room. Then she would return to Kam, arranging herself around his form and trying to calm him.

His fever broke in the early hours. She had been dozing and woke with a start to find him quiet and still. For a moment she panicked, fearing the worst. But his breathing was steady and when she felt his forehead, his temperature was normal.

She inspected his wound and saw the edges had finally knitted together. There was no sign of the sickle markings; the infection had cleared.

Dizzying relief swept through her. She hadn’t realised until that point how desperately worried she’d been. She pushed back a damp lock of hair from his forehead, careful not to wake him. The pallor had left his olive skin and he looked peaceful.

With a grateful sigh, she let the cold dissipate from her body for the first time in nearly eighteen hours. And suddenly, she could barely keep her eyes open.

The need to take care of Kam had kept tiredness at bay but now her limbs were as heavy as tree trunks and she ached with exhaustion.

She knew she ought to give Kam space to recover. She’d move to the chaise longue and let him rest on her bed, she told herself. She just needed a moment to gather her strength. Just a short moment.

Kam blinked awake slowly. Sunlight filled the room; it looked like the drapes hadn’t been drawn. He could hear birdsong outside the window and was momentarily confused about where he was. He tried to raise his head and could barely lift it off the pillow. Gods, he was as weak as a kitten.

He became aware of the body pressed against him. Ren was asleep, her arms and legs flung over him as if she was using him as a comforter. She mumbled in her sleep and curled closer, nuzzling her face into his shoulder. Her hair spilled over him like a silver curtain, its clean scent drifting to his nostrils. She was soft and curvy and he was shocked by howgoodit felt to have her lie on him.

But the thing he noticed most acutely was that they were both naked.

What the fuck?

He struggled to remember what had happened. He vaguely recalled travelling back from Coppertown but everything beyond that was a blur.

He’d been ill, he knew that much. The damned minotaurian and his rancid blade. He squinted at his bicep. The wound looked clean and healthy and he breathed a sigh of relief. But between arriving back at the palace and now, his mind was a blank.

The only thing that stood clear in his memory was the night at the inn. The bedroom. The mirror. Ren’s reflection.

Unbidden, his manhood hardened. It didn’t help that Ren had one of her legs hooked round his and he could feel her mound pressing against his hip.

He studied her face. Her silver lashes fluttered against her pale skin and her rosebud lips were slightly parted. She was very kissable. But he, he realised, was not.

He ran his free hand through his hair and found it matted with sweat. The sheets around him were damp. Gods, he must smell like a jotnar’s loin cloth.

Carefully, he slid his arm from under Ren and sat on the edge of the bed. He needed a moment to gather his strength. His legs were as wobbly as a new-born foal’s. He staggered to the ablution chamber and turned on the bath taps.

It took several minutes for the giant tub to fill but as soon as it had, he stepped down into the steaming water with a groan of bliss.

He looked for some plain soap but the only options seemed to be a variety of foaming bath salts. He gave up and selected one at random. Bubbles rose in a blast of floral scent. A little feminine for him but it beat a jotnar’s groin hands down.

He sank beneath the surface, staying under for as long as he could to let the water cleanse his hair. Then he sat up, rivulets streaming off his shoulders. He rested against the edge of the bath and waited for his strength to return.

“Are you feeling okay?”

He opened his eyes to find Ren watching him from the doorway, her nudity covered with a sheet.

“A little weak. But otherwise fine. Did I wake you?”

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