What if, with her gone, Kol managed to do something worse to her kingdom’s beautiful magic?
Andrian pressed his forehead to hers, his skin warm. “I have to believe that everything will be okay. Even if we weren’t in Leuxrith, we couldn’t risk a ceremony. Who knows what monsters Kol would manage to pull through when your power lowered the barriers between the planes?”
“What if he still tries?” Mariah’s question was meek and soft.
“He could, but he wouldn’t succeed,” Andrian growled. “You are the bridge between the mortals and the gods. Kol needs you and he knows it. He could never wield the power you have.”
“How do you know that?”
Andrian grimaced. “He wanted you,” he whispered. “Before I escaped, he said he wanted you. That you…took something from him. He wanted to know where you’d gone. He sounded mad, but I have to assume it was because of the Solstice.” He exhaled. “Which is another reason I didn’t want to find you.”
Icy, ravenous fear clawed up Mariah’s spine, just as burning rage lit in her belly. He was looking for her because he thought shestolefrom him? When he was the one who tookeverythingfrom her? “I cannot wait to kill him one day.”
Andrian smiled sadly, planting a kiss between her brows. “I can’t wait for that, either. But you’re worrying too much,nio,” he said against her skin. “Even if it’s dormant, the magic of the moon goddesses is in your veins. This night belongs to you, and you have been so patient in getting to celebrate it.”
A heated thrill shot through her, chasing away the darkness of her fear and rage. “Does that mean I’ve beengood?” She lifted an eyebrow.
Andrian huffed a laugh. “Yes,” he said. “But this lesson isn’t over quite yet.” He glanced toward the raging bonfire, the musicians swaying with their instruments, the joyous bodies writhing with the incandescent melodies.
With a strange feeling of lightness Mariah hadn’t felt in a long time, she let Andrian drag her into the throng of the dance, losing herself in the music and magic of the night.
Mariah’sbare feet were coated with fine-grained sand, the soft layers of her paneled dress cool as they brushed around her legs. The music slowed, melodies easing from exuberant celebration to sensual worship. Sweat dripped off Mariah like drops of silver-gold moonlight.
And her blood wasboiling.
Andrian’s arm around her waist tightened, firelight flickering in his crystalline eyes. Black hair fell messily across his forehead and the top buttons of his shirt were undone, the corner of his scarred Mark visible on his chest.
He was beautiful.
She needed him.
As if he read her thoughts, Andrian glanced around, a smirk tugging at his lips.
The dancing followed the slowing beats of the music. Just like in Onita, Leuxrithian children and families celebrated the Solstice at home. That was about where the similarities ended.
Heat flushed Mariah’s cheeks.
Leuxrithians, it seemed, were far more uninhibited than Onitans. Some pairings—or groups—peeled off into the shadows of the woods, clothing already unspooling behind them. Some didn’t even bother leaving the area around the fire. Matheo and Signe embraced on the other side of the flickering flames, their lips locked with a desperate hunger that wasn’t unfamiliar to Mariah.
She huffed a soft laugh, her gaze drifting to other couples joined in ways that pushed far more boundaries than passionate kissing.
“Luexrithians have never cared much for Onitan standards of decency.” Andrian’s voice rumbled through her. “The Solstice for them is a night of magic and physical adoration without shame. An embrace of freedom and a shunning of control.”
Mariah swallowed, fighting to dampen the raging heat winding through her body. “Probably too much to wish that we could make things more like this back home.”
“Oh? Do you like what you’re seeing, princess?”
Her chest burned, heart thudding beneath her ribs. She pulled him down so her lips could whisper against the shell of his ear.
“I would’ve hoped that after last night, that wouldn’t even be a question.”
He laughed, breath stirring her hair. “Last night taught me a lot about you,nio. Thank you so much for thelesson.” His grip tightened. “I think you may have just earned yours.”
Mariah’s heart lurched, breath catching in her throat. “And what are you planning to teach me?”
Andrian didn’t answer. He only pinned her with a dark, hungry stare, shadows curling down his arms.
He moved, tugging her away from the bonfire, away from the swaying bodies. Toward the dark ring of trees lining the beach, edges gilded in brilliant moonlight.
