Page 144 of His Darkest Desire

Too soon, he looked away, withdrawing his touch, and shoved himself onto his feet. “I’ve something to show you,” he said as he strode to the wardrobe and opened it. “Don your clothing.”

Kinsley propped herself up on an elbow, watching him. There was something off, something she couldn’t place. Even the room itself wasn’t quite right. The fire that normally burned within the hearth was extinguished, and the crystals were dim.

He was acting strangely. He was acting…distant. This wasn’t the passionate lover she’d known. She could still feel echoes of every caress, every kiss, every thrust of his cock from the night before. She could still feel him branded upon her very soul.

Drawing back the covers, she slipped out of bed and rose, walking toward him. The chill of the room made her skin prickle.

“Vex, what is it?” she asked as she stopped next to him.

“You will know soon enough, Kinsley.”

She cast him a cheeky smile as she reached into the wardrobe and pulled out a dark blue gown. “A surprise?”

Though his eyes followed her hands, he didn’t look at her directly. It added to that niggling feeling of wrongness. He normally gazed upon her naked body at every opportunity, and he always had his hands on her as though he couldn’t resist touching her.

When he said nothing more, Kinsley stepped into the gown and drew it up her body, slipping her arms through the short sleeves before tying the belt at her back. “Will the wisps be joining us?”

Vex ran his gaze over her, and something sparked in it, something familiar and heated. But that ember faded too quickly. In a low rasp, he said, “Lovely as ever.”

Kinsley stepped closer to Vex and placed her hands upon his chest. “I could…take this off and we could get back into bed?”

He covered her hands with his, squeezing gently as he stared down at them. “Come, Kinsley. It…it shan’t take long.”

Keeping hold of one of her hands, he led her toward the door. It opened at a flick of his fingers.

A knot of dread formed in Kinsley’s belly as she followed him. “Vex, what’s wrong?”

The closest thing to a response he offered was the tightening of his grip as they walked around the tree. He brought her down into the foyer, turned, and descended into the chamber she’d only entered once, when she’d attempted to cross the mist.

Vex’s ritual chamber.

The crystals on the rough stone walls offered little illumination. As before, most of the light came from the runes carved on the standing stones in the center of the chamber. The tree’s thick, gnarled roots surrounded the stone circle, black as pitch in the dim light, and only now did she realize how much it resembled a cage.

“What are we doing down here?” she asked.

Vex led her beneath the roots, between a pair of standing stones, and to the center of the circle. Her skin thrummed, and the small hairs on her arms and neck stood on end. She understood what that feeling was now.

Magic.

Vex turned to face her, though he did not relinquish his hold. “You feel it. That”—he gestured to the ground with his free hand—“is why I chose this place. It is a font of mana. The ley lines converging beneath our feet carry unfathomable magic.”

Kinsley glanced down. The ground, covered with soft moss, looked unremarkable, but the feel of it… She could almost envision the powerful currents running beneath the surface. Could almost envision the magic flowing into everything around her, nourishing, sustaining, enriching.

But she found no comfort in that.

“Here, magics are woven and unraveled.” Vex took hold of Kinsley’s wrists, calling her attention back up to him.

“Vex…” She searched his gaze, desperate to identify the source of his melancholy, to understand the resigned sorrow in his tone.

He guided her right hand to his chest. Beneath his tunic, his muscles were warm, firm, familiar, and the beat of his heart was strong and steady. “What we share, my moonlight…”

The green glow of the runestones brightened, deepening the shadows on Vex’s face. Disturbed by a gentle breeze, Kinsley’s skirt brushed her legs, and her hair tickled her face and shoulders.

Vex’s hand heated around her wrist. “What we share is beyond magic.”

The air changed. It wasn’t exactly thicker or heavier, but…fuller. It was charged with the same unseen energy coursing underfoot, and it swirled round and round the circle, bristling with more power after every circuit.

She’d experienced Vex’s illusions many times. This magic was wholly different.

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