Irian was a statue carved from moonlight and marble.
I sucked in a deep, harsh breath. Irian was right—the time for stories was past. “Even as I learned to blindly love the human worldthat raised me, so too did I blindly learn to hate myself. I thought—I thought as long as I despised myself more than they did, I might one day earn their love. So I taught myself to hate the blood running green and black through my veins. To loathe the way I seemedmade, from rocks and trees and half-rotted memories. To detest the way the forest called to me, as if my hair were vines and my bones were roots and my heart was a green stone. But to hate those parts of myself, I also had to learn to hate the place that had spawned them. I had to learn to hate magic. To hate Tír na nÓg. To hate the Folk. To hateyou, even as I fell for you.”
“Colleen—”
“I am trying to unlearn all that hate, Irian. But it is rooted deep.”
Irian’s silence was unyielding. My pulse thrummed in my chest. When he finally spoke, his voice was so hoarse I barely recognized it.
“Once there was a boy. He was not so fortunate as the girl. He only ever knew one love. One great, terrible, consuming love. A love that snatched him up and ground him to dust and swallowed him whole. A love that would blot him out completely if he was not careful. A savage, scathing, sublime love that only came once in a lifetime and demanded everything of him. I—”
He broke off. Then he was reaching for me like I was salvation. He caught me by the waist and dragged me against him, sliding a hand under my chin to tilt my face toward his. The kiss he brushed over my lips was hard. Hot. Fragile.
He drew back an inch.
“Have you ever stood at the top of a tall cliff and, though terrified by the height, wildly wished to fall?” His silver eyes flicked between mine. “That is what loving you feels like. Everything hurts, and yet I want more of it. To climb a little higher, to press a little harder, to drive the blade a little deeper. Because being with you makes me feel so—”
I slid my palms up the front of his mantle, curved my handsaround his neck, tangled my fingers in the silky strands brushing his nape. “What?”
He leaned his forehead against mine and whispered the words against my mouth.
“You make me feel alive, colleen. Even as death looms. If loving you is a cliff, then I have already fallen over it.”
He pulled me close and I kissed him back, fierce with hope and hunger. I dragged my hands down his neck and over his arms, his hard, lean muscles contracting beneath my touch. He dropped his mouth to my throat, dragging scalding, shivering kisses against the side of my neck. I hissed as his tongue laved the sensitive spot beneath my ear.
“Apologies.” He drew away abruptly, although his words were frayed with want. “I am too forward. We need to talk; we need to—”
“Do you want to talk?” A laugh rasped in my throat, sharp as hyssop and bright as feverfew. “The last thing I want is to talk.”
“Good.” His eyes darkened to iron. “Where?”
“Bed?” My voice was breathless and my skin was hot.
“You may not have had your way with me last month,” he said with a grimace. “But you did my bedroom. My mattress is mulch and flowers. The whole tower has become something of an… arboretum.”
Mortification slapped warmth on my cheeks. But the front of his shirt bled heat against my palms, and his scalding fingertips were buried in my hair—he was too close for me to stay embarrassed for long.
Enough with the logistics. I wanted himnow.
“Then I supposeherewill have to do.”
I pushed him. He reeled back a step. His calf struck the stone staircase behind him. He sat on the third step, hard. Before he could rise, I straddled him, slinging my thighs around his hips and sliding into his lap. He inhaled, maintaining blistering eye contact. His pupils blew wide—desire eclipsing the moonlight of his gaze.
I arched myself over him, my dark hair falling around us like acurtain of night. His hands found my waist, his fingertips teasing circles of heat against my skin. I leaned down and kissed him—languorously, provocatively. I slid my tongue in his mouth and nipped my teeth over his lips. He made that glorious noise deep in his throat and rocked his hips up against mine. Even through our clothes, I felt the spectacular length of him.
Clothes.I undid the hasp of his cloak without looking, then unlaced the ties down the front of his undershirt, tearing away the fabric to expose the planes of his sculpted body. I skimmed my fingertips down his chest and stomach. His skin shivered and flexed beneath my touch. But when I reached for the waistband of his trousers, he growled and caught my hands in his.
Faster than I could blink, he slid his palms beneath the hem of my shirt and pulled it up over my head, sliding my arms out of my sleeves and mussing my hair. His eyes dragged hungrily over my naked torso. His hands followed a moment later, trailing up my waist and against the side of my breasts. I arched my back, pushing them into his palms. His breath hitched. He leaned forward to take one of my nipples into his mouth, sliding his tongue over the sensitive peak. I moaned into his ear.
The sound triggered something feral in him—he went hard all over. In one smooth, powerful motion he flipped me onto my back and ripped off my breeches. Even with his cloak spread out beneath me, the stone steps cut a chill against my spine. I didn’t care.
I watched, transfixed, as Irian unfastened his own trousers, dragging his belt off and tossing the black sword carelessly onto the floor. Moonlight spilled over the angles and curves of his flawless form. His hardness sprang free, kissing the planes of his stomach as he propped himself above me. A thrilling ache tangled in my core, and I reached for him. I brushed my hands up the velvet length of his erection and watched his eyes flash silver before darkening to metal. His hands tightened on my hips, then slid lower, caressing down the outside of my thighs to find my knees.
Slowly, deliberately, possessively, he pushed my legs open. Hesettled his weight between my thighs, nudging himself against my slick heat. A delicious yearning built in my belly, and I rocked my hips, savoring the feel of him pressed hard against me. But he still hesitated, his eyes roving over my face, my breasts, my stomach.
“What are you waiting for?”
“I am… savoring.” His smile simmered with anticipation and desire and unfocused melancholy. “We will never again be able to do this for the first time.”
