I didn’t understand it. I only knew that it made me cling harder, my fingers digging into his clothes as if letting go would send me spiraling.
Thane swore softly, the sound vibrating against my temple. His arms came around me then, careful, loose, as if he were afraid of hurting me, his hands settling at my back without pulling me closer.
His body was hard beneath the layers of leather and cloth, and the awareness of it sent another wave of heat through me, my thighs pressing together instinctively.
Something solid pressed against my hip.
Thane sucked in a sharp breath and shifted slightly, trying to give me space without breaking the embrace entirely. The movement only made the sensation more obvious, more impossible to ignore.
“What’s happening?” I whispered, panic creeping back in around the edges.
His breath shuddered. “I don’t know,” he said, voice rough and honest. “I swear, I don’t.”
The door banged open then.
Thane stiffened, his arms tightening around me just enough to steady me as Malric appeared in the doorway with an armful of thick blankets, his expression thunderous.
“I told you to—” Malric began, then stopped short when he took in the sight of us.
Thane glared at him. He stood, took the blankets, then slammed the door shut in Malric’s face hard enough that the stone rattled.
Silence followed, broken only by the tower’s low hum and the sound of my breathing as it slowly began to even out again.
Thane wrapped one of the blankets around me, layering it over the one I already held, cocooning me in warmth and weight until my body finally stopped shaking. He settled against me,curling around me to lend me his warmth and strength, his presence still close enough that his scent lingered.
We sat like that for a long time, the world narrowed to stone and warmth and the strange, frightening pull that thrummed between us.
Whatever this was, whatever had begun here, it was bigger than fear.
And neither of us knew how to stop it.
Chapter Five
THANE
Iwaited until her breathing had been steady for long enough that I trusted it, then eased away from the bed with the careful movement that had become second nature after years of field camps and sleeping men who needed the rest more than I needed to stretch my legs.
Aveline didn’t stir.
She lay curled on her side, pale hair loose across the pillow, blankets layered thick around her shoulders. Sleep had taken her gradually—not the hard collapse of someone who had run out of resources, but a slower loosening, her body deciding by degrees that it could rest. Her scent had changed with it. Deepened. The honey note warmed and rounded. The silver blossom settled into something less sharp, and the effect on my ability to think clearly was significant enough that I was grateful for the excuse to put some distance between us.
I tucked the blankets higher around her shoulders before I could think better of it, then stepped back and didn’t examine the impulse.
The corridor was narrow and dark—the tower’s ambient light was dimmer out here than in the chamber. Malric stood against the opposite wall with his arms folded and his expressionarranged into something that communicated controlled displeasure. He had that skill—the ability to be furious in ways that were technically deniable.
I pulled the door closed, not quite latching it.
He looked at the door, then at me.
“She’s asleep,” I said before he could open with whatever he’d been preparing.
“I know. I could hear her breathing change through the bond.” He paused. “You were in there a long time.”
“She needed comfort.”
His jaw shifted. “She needed information.”
“She got information,” I said. “That’s why she needed someone to stay with her.”
