"Move!" Imas roars, sweeping me off my feet.
He sprints for the narrow servant’s door hidden behind a tapestry. We hit the wood just as the world turns white.
BOOM.
The explosion is deafening. The floor heaves beneath us. Heat, searing and violent, chases us into the narrow corridor. The sound of crumbling stone and screaming men echoes behind us, a chaotic symphony of destruction.
Imas does not stop. He runs, carrying me through the labyrinth of back passages, up a hidden stairwell, his breathing harsh and ragged against my ear. I can feel the tremors in his arms, the way his muscles spasm with exhaustion. I can feel the grief hitting him like a battering ram—a deep, hollow ache in his chest that he immediately walls off, shoving it down into the dark where he keeps his demons.
We burst into the library—not the main archive where he burned the book, but the panic room concealed behind the false bookcase. It is a small, windowless space lined with iron-reinforced stone, stocked with dried rations and weapons.
Imas kicks the heavy door shut and throws the locking bolts—three bars of solid steel as thick as my arm.
We are trapped.
He sets me down. His legs give way, and he slides down the door, his head falling back against the wood. Blood is soaking through the shoulder of his tunic, dark and wet.
"Imas," I gasp, dropping to my knees beside him.
"I’m fine," he lies, his voice a wreck. "Just... winded."
I reach for him, my hands hovering over the wound. "Let me see."
He catches my wrist. His skin is freezing, slick with sweat and grime. He looks at me, violet eyes wild, the pupils blown wide with adrenaline and something darker, hungrier.
"We are dead," he says. It is not a complaint. It is a statement of fact. "Malek will breach this door. It might take an hour. It might take ten minutes. But he will come."
"Then we fight," I say, my voice trembling.
"With what?" He laughs, a bitter, broken sound. "I have a sword I can barely lift. You are exhausted. Asema is..." His voice cracks. He swallows hard, looking away. "Asema is gone."
The reality of it settles on us like a shroud. There is no escape. There is no clever trick of magic, no hidden exit. This is the end of the line.
I look at him. His face is streaked with dust and blood, his platinum hair matted. He looks ruined. He looks magnificent.
"Imas," I whisper.
He looks back at me. The despair in his eyes shifts, turning into something hot and desperate. He reaches out, his hand cupping my jaw, his thumb tracing the line of my lower lip.
"I wasted so much time," he murmurs. "Centuries of noise. Centuries of cruelty. And I only found the silence at the very end."
My heart hammers against my ribs. I lean into his touch. "We have now. We have this minute."
"This minute," he repeats.
His gaze lowers to my mouth. The energy changes. The smell of blood is still there, but beneath it, the sharp, musky scent of arousal blooms, fierce and undeniable. It is the body’s last rebellion against death—a desperate need to feel alive, to burn bright before the dark takes us.
He kisses me.
It is frantic. It is messy. Our teeth clash, lips bruising against lips. He tastes of iron and salt. I encircle his neck, pulling him closer, needing to feel the solidity of him, the heat of his skin.
He groans, a low vibration in his chest. He pulls me into his lap, his hands roaming over my body, rough and possessive. He tears the ceremonial robes, ripping the fabric away until I am bare to the waist.
"Beautiful," he whispers against my skin. "So beautiful."
He trails kisses down my throat, over the pulse point that is fluttering like a trapped bird. He moves lower, his mouth hot and wet against my breast. I gasp, arching into him, my fingers tangling in his hair.
"Imas," I moan. "Please."
