“Did you- You must have-” Caspian collected his racing thought. “Did you look for me?”
Her mouth opened, and a shuddering breath escaped. “I went there. I went to Icespire Pass. I saw- I saw the death there. So many… How could you have- How could anyone have survived that?”
Caspian’s hand came to cover his mouth. He thought of the weeks he’d spent unconscious, recovering in the fort’s hospital. After that, he’d been in and out of consciousness, not even able to speak his own name. It had been two months after the battle that he’d been able to send his first letter, penned by one of his healers.
“I wrote to you as soon as I could,” Caspian said. “When you didn’t answer, I came back for you, but the tower was empty,” he said. His tone was flat. “I rode all the way to Silverfell to find you, and no one knew where you’d gone.”
Keira sniffed. “I couldn’t stand to stay at the tower without you, to be around Ignatius after what he’d done. I was in too much pain to care about my studies. It all seemed meaningless. I just left everything and went south, like we talked about.” She sniffed again, more resolutely, still looking down at her hands. “And now Ignatius is gone. He wrote to me… when he got sick… But I ran too far-” That was all she could take. Her proud shoulders collapsed into sobs.
Caspian pulled her into his arms. His fingers curled through her thick black hair as she shattered against his chest. He could only imagine the pain she had suffered, to think he was actually lost forever. Finding her gone, he’d been heartbroken and confused. If the venom had been allowed to finish its work… He would have been devastated. Destroyed.
“I should have stayed. I would have been there with him. I- I wouldn’t have lost you.” Her frame trembled in his arms. “I was just so angry. I couldn’t-”
He hushed her, rubbing his hand over her back. “I’m here now. We found each other again. That’s all that matters.”
Keira clung to him so tightly he was unsure if she would ever let him go. Caspian lowered his head, kissing her hair, breathing in her scent, like summer sun and growing things.
His nose brushed lightly against her forehead, and Keira looked up at him. Her green eyes were still wet with tears. His heart skipped a beat as he absorbed her features. The warmth had returned to her cheeks, her lips once again rosy and full. With her in his arms, the rest of the world grew dim. Even the last three years faded like an unpleasant dream.
This wasn’t at all like his fantasies, his memories, which like her letter had been worn down by time. After conjuring her memory for so long, the subtle changes in her were undeniable. She was fully a woman now, her curves more pronounced, the lines of her cheekbones, her jaw, more defined than they had been. Caspian savoured her with every sense, the familiar and the new, because it rooted him deeper into the reality of this moment. She was here with him now, and it truly was the only thing that mattered.
Her dark lashes fluttered up at him, and his blood heated. Her hands ran up his chest, and he could see only her. Keira’s lips parted, and he was undone.
Kissing Keira was coming home. All at once it was achingly familiar. The feeling of her in his arms, her scent, the smoothness of her skin. Yet, it was not the same. It began slow and deep, searching. Her touch glided over his arms, his chest, his hair, as Caspian held her firm against him. He brushed his thumb over her cheek, coaxing her deeper into his kiss. A fire kindled within him as he felt the sweeping motions of her tonguepass his lips. Their explorations grew into something more… desperate and consuming, wild. Until the heat of it made him feel as though his heart might explode.
Her fingers twined in his hair, gripped his clothes, clawed his back. Caspian was holding onto her for dear life, part of him still afraid that this was some magnificent dream. If he let her go that she might drift away. But it was more than that too. The way the blood was rushing through him now, he wasn’t sure if he could.
He didn’t realize he was moving with her until his back collided with the wall of the cave. Keira’s body pressed into him more, her teeth drug against his bottom lip. An unbidden groan stirred in his throat. Caspian ran his fingers through her hair, down the curve of her spine to cup her backside. It was fuller than he remembered, and curse him if it wasn’t perfect enough to be the end of him.
Keira
Caspian was grabbing her ass. The sheer miraculous insanity of it crashed over her, feeding into the gale of passion which had overtaken them. Keira couldn’t help but explore his form, the contours of his arms, his shoulders, the definition of his spine. He had always been strong, but now he was built like some knight of legend.
She missed his shaggy locks of hair, but she ran her fingers through the cropped cut, gripping where she could. Her hand smoothed down to his jaw, trailing the strong line toward his lips which she teased with the tip of her tongue. His hands smoothed up her back in response, pulling her in closer, hungrier, demanding for more.
Keira placed her hand on his cheek, her fingers grazing the raised skin of the scar she’d forgotten now marked his features. As she felt along the length of it, Caspian went still, pulling away from their kiss. His skin was flushed, breaths uneven as he studied her. She saw the flicker of hesitation in his black eyes, of nervousness. Holding his gaze, Keira stroked the scar with her thumb carefully. He was completely still as she pressed a kiss against his cheek, and then another, following the mark down to his jaw and then to his neck. A sigh escaped him as his hand combed through her loose fallen hair.
Keira’s tongue trailed up the cord of his neck and he sucked in a breath.
Her teeth pressed into his skin, and his grip on her hair tightened. “Keira,” he pleaded.
Satisfaction rolled through her as she released her bite and drew her tongue over the mark slowly.
His dark eyes were fixed singularly on her lips as he pulled her in for another kiss. Keira shook her head, a tiny gesture that stopped him at once.
As she backed away, his fingertips trailed down her arms, releasing her reluctantly. He watched her, perplexed but waiting. She could see it in his eyes, how much he wanted this, yet if she said it was over now, he would find a way to stop. He was already resigning himself, waiting for her to say they’d gone too far.
Keira’s lips curled.
She was just getting started.
Her fingers undid the first clasp of her coat, and his brows raised. The second snapped, and his breath caught. It was delicious, watching him want her. It was enough to take her breath away. All at once, her coat was hanging open on her shoulders. Keira’s eyes never left his as she let it fall limply to the floor, leaving her in nothing but the band which supported her breasts and her fitted leather pants.. He was still looking at her as if perhaps she didn’t understand what she was doing, as if perhaps she had made some mistake. A chill set over her exposed skin, but she could barely feel it over the heat raging beneath.
Caspian drew in a great breath as his eyes drank her in. A headiness came over them that made her toes curl in her boots.
Two steps was all it took before she was back in his arms. Caspian’s hands found her waist, spreading against her bare skin and pulling her into him hungrily. There wasn’t a moment wasted before his lips were on hers. He devoured her, and Keira met his urgent touch in kind. It was as if each of them was tryingto absorb enough of the other to fill the void of three years, the heartache and the loneliness. Enough to erase them away, to make it seem as if they had never happened at all.
Caspian parted from her lips with a hot sigh. His eyes moved over her body before fixing on her neck. It was arched, exposed. He buried himself in it, lost in her hair as he bit. Heat flushed through her, pooling between her legs as she felt the pressure of his teeth scoring her skin. His fingers dug into her back as he continued to feast on her. Keira gripped his hair, his arm, throwing her head back in magnificent pleasure.
