The smoldering look was already back in his eyes. “Considering how you’ll use me once we return home?”
“Yes,” I said simply.
His smile was as bright as the moonbeams piercing the tent. “Fast way back to the river? Then I need to hold you.”
I marveled at the many sides of this man I’d fallen in love with, but nodded, ready to be back in Emrys’s arms once again.
Chapter 60
Emrys
I woke up to slow, steady breathing that ghosted across my chest. Her arm was draped across me, fingers curled into the faint grooves of old scars as if her lingering touch could smooth them away. The curse was quiet under my skin, the beast half-asleep, lulled by her steady heartbeat.
I lay still, trying to memorize how this felt before the world inevitably found a way to take it from me. Nothing lasted forever, but, damn all the magic, I wanted her to be the exception.
There was joy in the way her hair tickled my shoulder when the breeze from the open flap caught it. There was peace in our magics wrapped up in each other, just like Isca was with me. Happiness in every single second that her heart beat next to mine,safe.A ridiculous grin had taken over my face, stretching my cheeks until they ached.
It was enough to change a man.
My body still hummed with the memory of hers. My magic felt replete, a sensation I hadn’t known in ages, as if it had been starved for too long and was only now relearning the simple act of existing without clawing for more. Her magic whispered against me in a subtle, cooling stream, teasing along my ribs where the curse had hollowed me out. Wherever her power touched mine, it quieted.
She’d lifted a single, delicate hand and stilled the tempest that had ended thousands of lives.
Dawn seeped in, casting a soft, golden glow across our tent. The river murmured all around us now, like what had happened between us lastnight had isolated us from the world, given us this one moment, this one place of perfect solitude. And in a way, that fanciful thought was true.
Isca stirred, moving closer before her lashes fluttered open. The private, drowsy curve of her smile was worth every battle I’d ever fought.
“What is that sound?” she asked, voice still thick with sleep.
Mindful of her warmth still pressed to mine, I eased the tent flap aside with a bit of magic. I had an inkling of what my passion had wrought—especially in those first, uncontrollable moments after she’d shown me how she felt. But what we now bore witness to surprised even me.
The river no longer ran in a single course. A new channel swept around the rise of untouched earth, and we sat at the heart of an island I hadn’t meant to create, but seeing it, I was glad for my lack of restraint.
Those first rumbles had torn the ground open, roots and soil splitting as I poured my magic into something that might spark life if changed instead of only breaking it. Fresh water now smoothed the new riverbanks, rivulets catching the day’s first light. It was ring of protection. A sanctuary for a memory.
We sat up together, and she kneeled beside me, her knee as close to mine as it could get. “You…split the river.” Her tone held no accusation, only wonder.
My lips quirked up despite myself. “You needed more than a flimsy tent between you and the world.”
Her gaze swept the water. Dragonflies flitted about in the warming air. A few frogs were hopping in the fresh loam, already surveying their expanded territory. I’d saved all but one tree from falling, and that was easy to fix. This new thing was born from disorder, just like us.
Despite everything, I dared to believe it could endure the world, just like we could if we faced it together.
Her gaze returned to me, softer than I deserved. “It’s beautiful.”
Only she would call my destruction beautiful.
I brought my hand up to rest on her neck, gently caressing the warm skin there with my thumb, my magic reaching out to nuzzle hers alongwith it. Beautiful was not the word I would’ve chosen for the raw magic I’d unleashed, but the way she said it and the way she was looking at me made me happy to accept it.
I wanted to stay here forever, hidden from the world’s demands. But duty lay behind and before us, and people waited for us only hours away.
Brushing her hair aside so my mouth could gain access to the spot just above her collarbone, I asked, “Will you be able to ride today?”
She reached out and flicked my shoulder in mock reproach, while her top half leaned into my kiss. “Yes!” she argued, all indignant fire, then hesitated. “Though I may need to ride sidesaddle for part of the way…”
I chuckled, knowing that I wasn’t to blame for our mostly sleepless night. She proved to be insatiable, but I’d have gone without a minute of sleep to repeat even one second of holding her like that.
Packing the tent and re-saddling the horses felt like bidding farewell to a place that would linger in my memory until my dying breath.
