The fire burned in my chest as the innate sadness joined it.
Silas nuzzled my ear, breath hot against my neck. “Her soul is split in two. When I made my deal, she had been long gone, so what was brought back was her but a mere fraction of what once was. She can no longer perceive me nor any of the other residents in the castle. She instead haunts me in the west wing as a hollow companion to me.”
“Just like her, we were all frozen in time and removed from the world. The fog created a barrier to keep us in and to keep those who wish us harm out. The only reprieve I’ve had is glimpses from your world,” he said, taking my hand and intertwining our fingers, his thumb brushing the ring binding me to him.
The ache in my chest grew. How long had I been denying myself or even Silas? Every moment I had spent left me with a dizzying spell of what I should or shouldn’t be. Mama and Miriam wanted me to be the elder daughter that sacrificed herself for her family. Ayla wanted me to the sacrificial goat to the slaughter and kill the man who had only shown me kindness, and Silas—Silas had let me be what I wanted to be outside of what I had been told I was.
What I had to be?
“That night, the engagement party,” I closed my eyes, seeing it play out once more and letting myself relive it even if for a bit. “You found me at a time when the world was falling in around me. I had thought youwere an angel ready to sweep me away from the darkness that harbors in my soul.”
“I am no angel,” Silas attested. “I am a thing of damnation, a demon, a bastard of the gods. I condemned her, and I’ll condemn you if you let me.”
“And if I let you”—I swallowed—“condemn me to the hell that you have walked alone for so long.”
Silas stared out at the roses, throat bobbing as he struggled against the tide to speak the words he was so desperate to say. Silas had been alone, drifting as I had been with the tides of the world, watching it slowly change without him.
Does he ache for the world badly, or does he ache for death more?
A petal fell, caressed by the glistening snow. “In a few weeks’ time—if that—I’ll be nothing more. Anyone tied to Castle Briar will disappear alongside me. The fog will lift, and perhaps the villagers will be able to leave this trapped space. I cannot be certain of their fate, but I can be certain of mine.” Silas grasped my cheek, and I leaned into his touch. “I can’t let you share my fate.”
Just like many times before, I stood there on the precipice. If I turned back, just who would I be? If I turned back, would I still be nothing more than a puppet to the people around me pulling the strings to enact their own wishes? If I turned back, would I still be the girl who’d follow them with a sad smile? Would I still wish for more and never get the chance to do so?
But if I letmyself have this one thing—to love and be loved by a man who had forsaken life, what would that mean for my future? Would the ache in my chest ease? If I chose to tie myself to a damned man, would I still live in ways that I had thought was never mine to choose?
I whispered, slow to announce every syllable that passed from my lips, “I love you.” The aching in my chest pressed into me as if there was nowhere else to go. I held myself there—among the bitter cold and the truth I had been running from since the beginning. “And it terrifies me endlessly. But when you say such words, I am frightened not for me but for you. When I first laid eyes on you, I knew that you’d consume and ruin me.”
Silas brushed a strand away from my face, and I shivered against him. His lips hovered over mine, heat blooming on chilled skin. “Have I, Little Dove?”
My breath hitched, and for the second time, I didn’t think.
I kissed him, soft and inviting lips greeting mine, hands woven through dark locks. Fire coursed through my chilled bones, building with each stray touch. Silas tossed me over his lap, and I straddled him, cupping his face while his hands traced up my back. I softly moaned against him, wanting to get lost in the fire and electricity.
I was selfish, a very selfish woman.
Silas broke the kiss, cupping my face as his eyes searched mine. “You make me feel alive, Valeria.Something I have not been—have not felt in such lost years. I am yours.”
“And you are mine.” I let my forehead rest against his, sharing in the softness among the dying roses as if it was to be our graves.
They could have very well become it.
Cool stone braced my back, strewed on the bench below the smiling face of a goddess, watching as Silas feverishly worships under her watchful, loving gaze. His lips caress my neck, heart beating in tandem to his touch. Beneath the thrones of the gods under the moonlit night, I was sinning for this man to take me wholly unto his own.
Silas stroked my leg, pushing the robe and the chemise high upon my chilled skin. Mouth working down my neck and kissing my breast gently, he flickered his smoldering stare as his hand shifted lower to my inner thigh.
A gasp escaped from my lips, and I held his gaze, brimming with desire. Hunger as delicious as the smirk slid across his face smooth as the stone beneath. I struggled to keep my thoughts in order as his fingers slipped underneath the fabric and climbed to the apex of my thigh.
Silas teased, his fingers never straying too close to my center as I writhed under him, begging. He hovered over me, lips upon my neck as his fingers splay me open, diving into the ocean tides. I moaned as he stroked softly and nestled my hands into silver strands, pulling him closer to me. Our mouthscollided, intense desire pulsating through my body—the fire spreading, licking at the frozen air.
I needed him as a dying man needed the gods, whole and absolute. Between us, rawness to lust became animalistic, threatening to claim us both. To consume our souls the higher we ascended to the blissful heavens.
Silas pulled away, and I didn’t hesitate to bare the soft flesh of my neck. He kissed the skin softly, careful to tug at the bandage. He skimmed tender flesh, and I awaited for the singular moment of bliss, where my body fell away to fly under the moonlight. I tipped my head back, moaning out his name.
He groaned, fingers sliding into me, moving agonizingly slow. I throbbed under him, limbs alive with electricity I was sure to combust. I arched my back, Silas swinging his legs over me, setting a knee between my thighs.
“Silas.”
I whispered his name as a prayer to a god. A God wholly worshipped my mortal, fragile body until I begged for more. Until I no longer knew my own name or where I was. The only name to tether me to this plane was his and only his as I was pulled over the crest, shattering under him bit by bit.
