‘I …’ She didn’t know what to say. So, the truth was what came out. ‘In another life … I might have chosenyou.’
He squeezed her hands and leaned in close, so that his lips were a sigh away from hers. ‘And would you choose me still if he was standing right beside us?’
Her silence was answer enough.
‘In another life,’ he said, his hands cradling her face, ‘I would have proved to you just how well you and I could fit together, Ezer. How deeply I could love you, day and night … until the only Laroux brother on your mind wasme.’
‘Don’t say that,’ she whispered.
And suddenly she was cold without him, as he backed a step away.
‘It is the truth. And I am man enough to admit that I cannot have you. Not … forever. Not the way he could.’
Her heart squeezed, full of guilt, but she did not regret it in full.
Because if the door hadn’t pushed her to kiss him … a part of her would always wonder what it would have been like. Even after he was gone.
So she took his hand and squeezed it. ‘You deserve to live, Kinlear,’ she said. ‘And you’ve plenty of life left. You have an Acolyte to kill. And you promised me a dance when this is all said and done.’
‘I could give you more than a dance,’ he said. ‘I’d give you anything you wanted, Raphon Rider. I’d give you my soul if you asked.’
His smile was playful. Devilish, as his thumb caressed her cheek, and it was almost her undoing. She didn’t know if it was from the intoxicating, dark power pulsing off the door …
Or her own feelings.
Her heart was a traitorous, wretched thing.
She could have stayed in this cave forever with him, if not to explore what they could have had together … then certainly to freeze time and keep him from facing his inevitable end.
But that tiny whisper in the back of her mind – her own conscience – told her that her choice was already made.
And it wasn’t him.
‘Would you help me open the door?’ Kinlear asked.
She nodded. ‘Of course.’
And together, they turned to it. But they could find no way to open it, no matter how they ran their hands across it, no matter how many places they tried to find a fold in the stones, a gap, a hidden handle.
‘Ezer.’
It surprised her, the whisper. She hadn’t known if her mother’s spirit was still with her.
‘Blood.’
Something seemed to shift inside of her, and she knew what her mother meant. She reached for the small blade on her hip. It glittered beautifully as she unsheathed it and held it to the purple torchlight.
‘What are you doing?’ Kinlear asked.
The power of the door threatened to pull her under again as he stepped closer, his hand on the small of her back.
‘I think we should try blood,’ she said, and stepped ever so slightly away. She could still feel heat where his fingers had just been. ‘It’s what called Six to me at first. If it worked with one of his raphons, perhaps it will work with this door too.’
She looked at Six, who stood paces away.
The raphon twitched her tail once.
Her breathing went from steady to slightly hitched as she held out her right hand and poised the tip of her blade above it.
