“A handful of days,” Rentir said tightly, uncaring that he was exaggerating.
Melam ran a hand over his chin. “A handful of days, and yet you were willing to attack a male twice your size to protect her. You’re an enterprising guard.”
Rentir sneered at him, annoyed by the conversation and by the male’s mere presence. “You must excuse me. My female needs to eat.”
When he turned back to the door, Melam called, “Yourfemale?”
Rentir didn’t correct himself.
The door slid open, and a plume of humidity spilled out into the hall along with the room’s soundscape of tinkling music and soft animal calls. He stepped inside and hugged the section of wall shielded from the falling water to keep Cordelia’s food from getting soaked. It was dark in the room, but his vision was quick to adjust. He could see nearly as well in the dark as he could in the light, only without the saturation of color.
He set the tray down on a low table nestled along the back wall, hemmed in by thick cushions used in lieu of chairs. He scanned the room from his dry vantage point, squinting as he tried to make out her form through the endless, pouring rain.
A flash of artificial lightning lit up the room. Cordelia was floating on her back in the middle of the expansive bath with her eyes closed and a smile on her face. He’d seen her for only an instant, perhaps less than a second, and it was enough to make him painfully hard and desperate with longing.
Her body was similar to his own and yet so unlike it. Softer, stranger, with different swells and curves. He wanted to touch them all,tastethem all. He shuddered, tearing his gaze away as thunder rolled through the room.
He should shut the rain off and turn the lights back on. Cordelia couldn’t see well in the dark. Instead, he took one helpless step toward the bath, and another. His skin began to glow in the darkness, a beacon of luminous purple, but she didn’t react.
The hybrids had often bathed together in youth, not in grand baths like this one, but in tiled rooms filled with open shower stalls. They had shared soap and scrubbed each other’s backs. There was no modesty between them, not like the shyness Cordelia had shown.
He should turn back. Leave her in peace. Let her preserve her modesty, for whatever reason she valued it. He began to pant. His joints locked up as he warred with himself.
Her pale skin seemed to glow in the vast darkness of the room, as though she was emitting a soft white light, so dim compared to the bioluminescence of his skin. Another flash of lightning lit her in stark relief, and as the thunder subsided, he realized he could hear her voice just beneath the patter of the rain. She was humming to herself as she drifted over the surface, a soft smile on her face.
His shaking hands pulled the hem of his shirt from his pants, then dragged it over his head. It hit the ground with a wet sound as he reached for his bottoms, stepping out from the protection of the awning. Water sluiced over his bared skin as he dragged the fabric down his legs and wrestled them free along with his boots and socks.
A splash drew his attention back to the bath. Cordelia was standing in the middle of the water, concealed up to her waist. Her breasts hung like teardrops under the weight of gravity,bared to him as she wrung the water from her hair and dropped it over her shoulder. He only knew what they were because he’d asked Haerune, curious about the difference in her silhouette. His brother had answered the question with great discomfort. Their chests were similar in form, but without the extra swell beneath the skin.
Breasts, to feed young. Given their function, his fascination with them made him feel… untoward. Guiltily, he dragged his gaze back to her face.
There was a small divot in her abdomen, one he lacked. It did not look like an injury, but he could not guess at its purpose. Her cheeks were still an alarming shade of red, but her eyes were brighter, and the darker half-circles beneath them were less prominent.
She still had not noticed him. Could she see anything at all?
A preemptive whine for forgiveness escaped him as he took his first step into the gradual slope of the bath, water licking over his ankles. She did not seem to hear him over the droning rain; her face was serene as she tipped her face back and let the water course over it. He hadn’t made such a sound since he was a child quarreling with his brothers, but she called forward all manner of feelings he’d long thought lost to him.
He waded in deeper, the water reflecting his glow at him in rippling waves of violet light. She didn’t notice him until he was close enough to touch her. Her eyes went wide in that wild way, flashing the weird whites around her iris, and she ducked down into the water.
“What the hell are you doing?” she called over the rain, wrapping her arms around her chest.
“Bathing?” he offered up numbly.
Pursuing you mindlessly, because I feel like I’m going to die when you stray too far. I need to see you, need to smell you, need to touch you.
The purple glow of him painted her pale skin, and something possessive surged within him at the sight.
“So, use one of the fifty showers!”
He blinked at her. “What?”
“Are you insane?”
“Yes,” he said brokenly, sinking to his knees before her. “I don’t know what’s happening to me. I need to—I need to touch you.”
Her eyes darted between his, her expression skeptical, but she didn’t say no. Hope surged within him.
“Please.” He begged, scooting closer to her, close enough to scent her in the humid air. His cock jerked beneath the water. “Cordelia, please. Help me.”
