My throat tightens the longer I stare at his hurt. I shouldn’t. It will cross a line, a great, bold line shaded between us. But my body is already in motion as I lean down and gently brush a kiss across the scar.
A soft, pained sound squeezes past his throat. His eyes flick to mine. They are darkest caverns, deep fathoms.
There is an ache in me. It is like thirst or hunger—only through consumption will it be quenched. What do I wish? To press my mouth onto his skin and warm it with slow breaths. To move higher, toward his neck, and lower, toward his abdomen. As I begin untying the East Wind’s trousers, he bats at my hands with a strangled,“What are you doing?”
“I’ve already told you. You’re losing warmth to your wet clothes. Sharing body heat will help us survive the night.” Again, I reach for the ties. Again, he shoves my fingers aside.
I huff out my frustration. “Eurus.”
“Bird.”
“Either you remove your trousers, or I do it for you. Choose.”
In the firelight, his eyes appear glazed. When my tongue darts out to wet my lips, he tracks the motion.
“Turn around,” he whispers.
I do, though it feels akin to exposing my back to an apex predator as Eurus sheds his wet clothes. My pulse crests to a shrill hum in my ears. “Are you under the cloak?” I ask.
“Yes.”
All right. Well. That is good. Quite good, I think. “Um.” I clear my throat, reminding myself that I have lain with men before. Well, one man. Of course, this is notthat, exactly. This is for survival. “I’m going to s-slip under the cloak with you. I’ll wrap myself around your back.”
“Can you even reach all the way around?” He sounds as breathless as I do.
“No hurt in trying, right?” My laughter snags, splintering into fragments.
There is a long pause. When he speaks, it is with unusual brittleness. “What if I curled around your back instead? That might make things easier.” The click of his swallow sounds. Or maybe that is the snap of the fire, which is alive, as we are, and burns and burns and burns.
Slowly, I turn to face him. The black of his eyes and hair is in striking contrast to the pale of his complexion. After a moment, I nod my compliance. “Let’s try that.”
Lying curled on his side, wings folded across his back, the East Wind lifts the cloak in offering, watching me all the while. The sight of his calf ensnares me. It is carved from muscle, covered in sparse hair.
I do not allow myself to question my decision as I slide beneath the fabric and carefully seal myself along his front. The unexpectedcoolness of his skin causes me to flinch. I exhale and sink closer, my spine stamped against his chest, the muscle of his bicep cushioning my head. Our legs overlap. He doesn’t attempt to untangle them. I struggle to breathe with some semblance of normalcy.
“All right?” I whisper.
The East Wind clamps his other hand over my hip in a distinctly possessive gesture. “Yes,” he rumbles.
Incredibly, the space beneath the cloak warms to a point where I begin to sweat and Eurus’ shivering abates. I am both relieved and fraught with nerves.Rest, I think.It will do us both good.But I am awake, I am aware, I am so, so alive.
My breasts grow heavy, their points tingling against the fabric of my breastband. When I shift against him, the unmistakable shape of his arousal prods me in the lower back.
I stiffen, feeling Eurus’ slow breaths growing increasingly erratic. Our legs slot deeper, my feet curled into his large, warm calves.
A terse breath whistles out of me, for the hand on my hip has begun to move, an easy drift up to my shoulder, the callused pads of his fingers an abrasive drag against my skin. I bite back a moan as the East Wind presses closer. What of propriety, decorum? Eurus is a god. I am mortal. But he is alone, as I am. He has suffered, as I have. Regardless of what has come before, we now have only each other. It means something that he trusts me enough to allow my touch at all.
“Bird?” he whispers after a time.
His fingertips continue to glide up my ribs. I squeeze my legs together, as if that might stymie the dull pulsations developing in the secret place between. “Yes?”
“You know the torture I endured in the tower?”
I nod, wondering if it is possible to catch fire from touch alone.
“This is worse.”
It is fate. It must be. For who can claim the meeting of two hearts—one of immortal origin, the other of human brevity—would begin indiscordance and end harmoniously? We should not fit together. There are countless arguments to support that stance, not least of which is my collusion with the woman who intends to kill him.
