Morgan and Rylo were left alone on the old couch, silence filling the house as the baby settled down with Aniel. Morgan thought Serieff would return, but as time passed, it became evident that he was staying in their room.
She tried to stand to bring their dishes to the earthenware sink in the corner, but her head spun as she lifted herself up.
“Let me,” Rylo said, taking her bowl, as well as Serieff and Aniel’s bowl. After tidying up the bowls, he removed the pot from above the embers of the fire and threw a few more logs to light. He placed a kettle over the flames and worked to gather teafrom a shelf. Only after he poured both of them a cup did he sit down.
Rylo gave her the cup and she didn’t hesitate to take it from him. He sipped from his own mug, a broad grin stretching across his face after his drink. Leaning his head back, Rylo said, “I thought I may not survive much longer without a cup of tea.”
Morgan let out a dry laugh, but still didn’t feel capable of much conversation. Of course Rylo would be desperate for a cup of tea after the day they had.
The furs were draped around Morgan and she untucked them, placing the blanket over Rylo’s lap too. She leaned close enough to feel the heat of his body warm her cool skin.
He rubbed his eyes and let out a groan. “How did he die?” Rylo asked.
Morgan closed her eyes, picturing Elio’s lifeless body on the tunnel floor. “It’s very hard for me to tell you the truth,” she said, her full teacup still in her hand. Her voice shook as she said, “I’m so tired. Can we do this later?”
She was a coward. She didn’t want to tell this man, who she’d grown to care for, or at least rely on, that she’d been the reason Elio was dead.
Rylo didn’t look at her, just shook his head. “I need to know. Elio was… He was my friend.”
“You say that like it’s a hard thing to admit,” Morgan replied.
Rylo closed his eyes again, exhaustion obvious in his body. “You would not understand. It’s my duty to be held at a higher standard than common folk.”
Morgan’s lips pursed. This tiny piece of information was more than Rylo had revealed about himself than any other interaction they’d had.
“I don’t understand why a king would deny himself friendship and relationships,” Morgan finally said. It was a risk, being thishonest with him, but she took it. She couldn’t help it as her desire to better understand Rylo took over.
She listened to Rylo exhale, but he remained silent for long enough to begin to unnerve her. At last, he said, “It is difficult to form friendships or relationships when you are held at a different expectation than others, but most of all, it’s because those who have been closest to me have been taken from me. Yes, I didn’t show my friendship with Elio openly for all the court to discuss, for there to be an attack on him because of his friendship with me. It’s the same reason I keep you away from the eyes of my folk.”
Rylo placed his empty teacup on the hard-packed dirt floor and took Morgan’s hand in his, making slow, steady circles across her knuckles.
Morgan felt even worse for being the person who took Elio from him. She wanted to hide and never tell him the truth, to keep how she used then discarded Elio a secret forever from Rylo.
“You’re important to me, and for more reasons than that you could restore my nation’s borders. You challenge me in a way that nobody else has challenged me, and it’s been remarkable to see you discover your powers. When you entered my mind, I was already afraid of what Goldoth was going to do to you. They’d just shown me something beyond what magic should be capable of doing. Then they admitted to me that they were sending guards to take you away from me.”
He paused and looked at her, stroking her hand as he studied her face. His skin glowed slightly, his essence slipping out and it felt like being warmed on a summer day.
“In that moment, I knew I would destroy Maglar and Mara if they so much as touched you.” He shook his head. “I did something that will cost my nation everything. I released my essence on the king and queen and took flight. Then you werethere in my mind, I could feel the fear in your speech as you warned me to escape. Morgan, I was about to break that cavern to rubble foryou.”
He shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe it himself that he was capable of such strong emotions.
Morgan did the only thing she could do. She placed her hands on Rylo’s cheeks, pulling his face to hers, and she kissed him, letting her arms reach around his hard, strong back as she worked his shirt up and up, revealing glistening sun-kissed skin over rigid muscles.
“You’re the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen,” Morgan murmured, regretting her foolish confession immediately, but he looked at her like she’d just given him a precious gift.
She shouldn’t be doing this. She should be confessing that she was the reason Elio was dead, not making out with Rylo on this old couch.
But she didn’t. Morgan couldn’t confess that she was the cause of Elio’s death. Not now, and maybe not ever.
She pressed her hand to the hard ridges of muscles along Rylo’s stomach and she felt him suck in a breath at her cool touch. His skin was scorching hot, like the midday sun. The glow of it cast a brilliance against her own pale skin.
He stared at her, watching her every move as she explored all the dips and curves of his chest, his stomach, his back.
Morgan whispered into his ear, “I want you to know that what I felt that night I drank the Bayberry wine has never gone away. If anything, this need for you has just gotten stronger.”
“I’ve wanted to explore you, to taste you and touch you since I first laid eyes on you,” Rylo said in a husky voice that had lost all its sweet, honeyed cadence.
Morgan shook her head. “That’s not true. You didn’t even bother to learn my name!”
