I reached the window, threw it open. The white sky was empty. No Isanara. I turned and paced to the other side of the room. I stumbled on the hearthrug. Cursed under my breath.
Witches created talismans. We inscribed them, consecrated them, and then finally charged them with power. What they did from there—protect, hide, weaken—depending on the runes andspells used. Without any one of the steps, they were just useless objects. But that fae woman wasn’t a witch. None of that torture had anything to do with a talisman. So what was Maura doing? Had the Dark God lied to me about the talisman to keep me in Balar Shan?
Why?
The word echoed around in my head. I was at the window again. Turn. Pace. There was the fireplace. Already? Damn, this room was too fucking small.
I was vaguely aware of Garrick, standing just inside the closed door of the bedroom, watching me silently.
Garrick, who’d nursed me back to health after the Devotion Gate. Garrick, who’d betrayed me. He’d reminded me why I could never trust again. The ice block in my chest that I’d built to protect myself was spreading throughout my body, threatening my ability to function. If I couldn’t feel anything, then it was easier to accept what I’d just done. I was not good, despite all of my resistance to witch ways. A good person would not have let that woman die.
I just wanted to escape, even if only for a moment.
The thought wasn’t even formed enough to second-guess. All I had left were instincts, and those drove me straight into his arms.
Garrick caught me against him, absorbing the force of my body colliding with his easily. He was so wide, so strong, and so thick that even I was able to lose myself in him. It was one of a million things that made him disastrously perfect.
His mouth found mine, or I found his… I did not need to know. With his tongue curling around mine, his spicy taste flooding my senses, I could just exist. My mind was blissfully filled with sensation instead of thought.
I wore none of the thick layers that usually guarded me from Velora. No leather or wool. Only the thin linen shift and thecrushed velvet gown, and the friction of them against my skin was so sweet. My nipples hardened as the buttons of Garrick’s surcoat brushed against them through the thin fabric.
Garrick responded to my moan, dragging his tongue from the corner of my mouth down over my throat, his hands on my breasts making no secret of his destination. It couldn’t be comfortable, bending like that to reach my breasts, the height discrepancy between us so vast. But his sound of appreciation vibrated against my tender skin, sending tremor after tremor straight between my legs.
His tongue drew circles on my skin just above the neckline of the gown. I arched, desperate for the flimsy fabric to be gone. I was so transfixed that I did not even notice the hand he’d slid between my legs until he cupped me through my gown. I could suddenly feel every fold in the soft fabric of my shift, and every place where his fingertips teased my entrance through the barriers of fabric.
I tugged on his shoulder. The bed was only a few steps behind us. I knew the dimensions by heart thanks to my pacing. I wanted more than Garrick’s fingers. I needed his cock buried inside me. I needed the fabric gone. Only my cunt clutching around him and the heat of his breath on my shoulder as he buried his face in my neck would be enough.
Already the heat was building between us. It wasn’t enough to melt the block of ice in my chest. This was physical heat. Sweat drenched us both, making our exposed skin slick and salty. Even the thin layers I wore were nearly unbearable. I had to get out of my clothes, or I was going to burn alive.
Garrick used his teeth to tug down the neckline of my gown, his insistent mouth seeking my breast. I arched again to give him access. He nudged my breast from my gown, closed his lips around my nipple, and the world shifted into brilliant golds and oranges, warm and luxurious as flame.
An actual flame.
I wasn’t fantasizing about being consumed by the flames of desire. The room was on fire. We were going to burn alive for real.
“What—Koryn, stop!” Garrick grabbed for my arm, realizing the danger less than a second after his mouth left my body.
But there was no need. My power answered my call without hesitation, the ice in my veins melting to form water that flowed from my fingers, over the burning hearthrug, extinguishing the wingback chair nearest the fireplace that had caught flame. I was tired, mentally and physically exhausted from the torture I’d witnessed. My power was tied to my coven; it should have been affected by that extreme expenditure in the bowels of the castle. But the frost and ice inside of me seemed to take on a life of its own, to almost scoff. I had not survived so much to be felled by an errant spark from an improperly tended hearth.
The flames hissed out, leaving behind clouds of smoke and steam. Garrick opened the window. My skin pebbled in response to the rush of cold air. My left breast was still exposed.
As the air around us cleared, the extent of the damage became visible. The hearthrug was mostly ash. So much for Garrick’s bed. The chair that might have been his second choice wasn’t much better.
Third choice, my mind amended. If he could choose, Garrick would be in the bed with me. Maybe that was where he belonged.
Trying to keep space between us was a mistake. My body craved his, and fighting against that pull was a waste of energy. I could sate this physical need without giving in to the emotional torrent. I would use it to stave off that emotional torrent.
Garrick crouched beside the hearth, using one of the fire irons to poke around in the heap of wet logs and at the throat of the chimney itself.
“The chimney needs to be swept. The buildup must have ignited and caused the sparks that caught on the rug,” he said. He laid the poker neatly against the brick edge of the fireplace as he stood. “This room has been unoccupied for almost twenty years. We will probably find that the chimney is not the only thing in disrepair.”
The immediate danger had passed, then. No more than a stupid accident and a distraction. Another distraction, my mind amended.
I sat down on the edge of the bed, the posts rising up on either side of me. “Come here.”
Garrick’s jaw ticked. For a moment, his expression was unreadable. That mask he wore for everyone else was so familiar that taking it off was a choice, not the default. As he watched, I slid my hand down to cup my breast. Putting out the fire had not extinguished the need within me. My body still ached for release and the oblivion it would bring.
Indecision played across his face. He wanted to talk, to build upon the dangerous closeness of those moments where he’d held my hand and shared his strength and calm. But that was not what I wanted. I wanted to forget.
