Maren lay where he'd placed her, still wrapped in his coat, her breathing shallow but steady. Her lips had lost some of their blue tinge, but she remained too pale, too cold.
He stripped off her wet cloak and boots, working efficiently despite the intimacy of the task. Her shadows stirred weakly, not quite defensive but aware of his touch. When he peeled off her shirt and pants due to them being soaked through from snow, they curled around his wrists questioningly.
"Just getting you warm," he said quietly, as if they could understand. "That's all."
He wrapped her in dry blankets and positioned her close to the fire, then set about making the cabin defensible. Checkingthe shutters, testing the door, creating wards from materials at hand. Basic protection, nothing sophisticated, but enough to buy warning if the mob tracked them here.
By the time he finished, Maren's eyes had opened.
She stared at the fire for a long moment before speaking. "Where are we?"
"Old hunting cabin. About three miles northeast of the lake." Tristan crouched beside her, checking her pupils. "How do you feel?"
"Cold. Confused." She pushed herself upright slowly, blankets falling to her waist. She had her undergarments on, but the firelight painted her skin in shades of gold and shadow. "What happened?"
"You ran from the mob. Made it to the lake before hypothermia set in." He handed her a canteen of water. "Drink. You need to rehydrate."
She obeyed, her hands shaking slightly as she raised the canteen. "I remember the grove. The doppelgänger attacking. Someone saw and thought I was summoning it." Her voice steadied as memory returned. "Then I ran. Got to the lake and everything went strange."
"Strange how?"
"I had a memory. Or a dream. I'm not sure which." She set down the canteen, her silver eyes focusing on him. "My mother was there. Not really there, but like an echo. She was standing at the lake's edge, and she kept saying 'where the water remembers, where shadows sleep beneath.' Over and over."
"That's what you were mumbling when I found you."
"It felt important. Like she was trying to tell me something." Maren pulled the blankets tighter. "But then everything got fuzzy and I couldn't hold onto it."
"We'll figure it out tomorrow." Tristan stood, needing distance. "You should rest."
"Tomorrow Bram gets his binding or his exile." She looked up at him, firelight making her eyes glow like molten silver. "Tomorrow we're out of time."
"I know."
"And tonight we're alone in a cabin with a mob hunting me and a doppelgänger that wants me dead." A smile ghosted across her lips, brittle and sharp. "Seems like terrible timing to want you as badly as I do right now."
The words caught him off guard. He couldn’t tell if she was fully coherent yet or in a sleep deprivation stage.
"Maren—"
"I know. Duty. Professionalism. Bad idea." She stood slowly, letting the blankets fall away. Firelight painted shadows across skin he'd already touched once, already tasted, already memorized.
“You’re still out of sorts. You need to rest.”
“I’m done resting,” she insisted. “I know what I want and I’m tired of being treated as if I could break at any moment. I’m done fighting this. I almost died multiple times now. Life is too short.” She stepped closer. "Tell me you don't want this and I'll stop."
He couldn't. The lie wouldn't come.
She crossed to him, barefoot on cold wood, wearing nothing but thin fabric that hid almost nothing. Her shadows moved with her, reaching toward him like they'd already made their choice.
"Tell me," she repeated, close enough now that he could feel her heat.
"I can't."
"Then don't."
She kissed him first this time, rising on her toes to close the gap. Her mouth was warm despite the cold she'd endured, tasting of snow and desperation and need that matched his own.
Tristan's control, already frayed from days of wanting what he shouldn't have, shattered completely.
