I shook my head and lifted a shoulder. “I’m not even sure what I was about to say.” Ducking my chin, I cleared my throat. “Have we received word from Pensdurth yet?”
“Not as of an hour ago,” he answered, and the knots in my stomach tightened. “When I returned to the Solar and you weren’t there, nor was the bone dagger, I thoughtyou’dgone to Pensdurth.”
I pulled my arms tighter around me. “I agreed not to.”
He took a slow, almost tentative step toward me. “Can you blame me for fearing that anyway?”
“No,” I admitted, exhaling slowly. “How did you know I was here?”
“I wanted to be where you were,” he stated simply, like he’d walked from one chamber to the next. “So, I willed myself there.”
“Damn,” I murmured. “I didn’t even realize we could do that.”
A faint grin appeared. No dimple. “I imagine there are many things we can do that we haven’t realized yet.”
“You’re probably right.” I thought about the fact that he’d shifted. “I still can’t believe you shifted before me.”
“Do you know why?”
I sighed as I tried to communicate the jumbled knowledge. “Primal gods can shift pretty much whenever they want after they Ascend, but with Ancients—which I guess we’re the closest to asDeminyenPrimals—it can take months, years, or even centuries. You shouldn’t have been able to shift so soon. It’s not like you have more eather just because you’re an Atlantian.”
“Like I said before, I’m just special.”
I laughed. “Hey, don’t take my line.”
His lips parted on a sharp inhale as he stared at me.
“What?”
“Your laugh,” he said, his gaze sweeping over my features. “Hearing it always does shit to my chest.”
“Good shit?” I whispered, feeling my chest start to do weird stuff.
“You know the answer to that.” His head cocked. “Can I ask you a favor?”
I nodded.
“Can you move away from the edge?”
My brows lifted. “Are you worried I’m going to accidentally run off it ag—” I stopped myself with a wince.
“You don’t have a reason to do that, right? So, I wasn’t thinking that,” he replied smoothly. “I just don’t like seeing you so close to a cliff’s edge.”
“I wouldn’t die if I fell.”
“But it wouldn’t feel good.”
“I don’t know.” I turned back to the edge. “I think I would just…land on my feet.”
“Let’s not test that out,” Casteel said, his scent wrapping around me, telling me he’d moved closer.
I hadn’t considered testing it out. But now that I’d said it, I kind of was. My heart rate kicked up. I could almost see myself doing it—choosing to leap. My stomach flipped, and I forced myself to take a step back.
Birds sang in lilting bursts as silence fell between Casteel and me. I could feel the heat of his body directly behind me now. That was how close he stood. I wanted to turn into it, but I couldn’t move.
Casteel hadn’t really touched me since Ironspire. He hadn’t woken me when he returned last night, and he had already been gone from bed this morning—and Casteel always needed convincing to leave a bed I was in. He wasn’t even touching me now, and it seemed he was always touching some part of me. This wasn’t normal.
The next breath I took was thinner, and the silence that stretched between us didn’t help. I searched for something to say. Luckily, I found it. “How did your talk with Malik go?”
