His control fractured.
He kissed her hard, one hand sliding into her hair, the other gripping her waist exactly where it had been in the water. Sabine kissed him back just as hard, her hands going into his coat, pulling him closer.
The mark on her palm flared hot.
Lucien backed her against the cold stone pillar. The contrast between freezing stone and his body made her gasp against his mouth. He took advantage, kissing deeper, his hand tightening in her hair.
Sabine bit his lower lip.
He made a rough sound and his mouth moved to her throat, kissing down to where her pulse hammered visibly.
The bond pulsed between them, making every touch feel sharper, hotter, more necessary than it should.
Sabine dragged him back to her mouth, refusing to let him retreat, her fingers working open the fastenings of his coat because she needed skin, needed heat, needed him closer than fabric allowed.
His hand slid from her waist to her hip, then higher, fingers pressing against her ribs where the bruises were worst.
She should have flinched.
Instead she arched into his touch, and Lucien groaned against her throat.
The river wind cut across the balcony, cold and sharp, but Sabine barely felt it because Lucien was burning hot against her and the mark was flaring with every place their bodies met.
Then he pulled back.
Not far. Just enough to stop.
His breathing was ragged. His hand was still in her hair. His forehead rested against hers.
“If I keep touching you here,” he said roughly, “I will forget where we are.”
Sabine’s fingers tightened in his shirt. “Maybe I want you to.”
“That is exactly why I have to remember.” He stepped back carefully, his hand sliding from her hair to her marked palm. “We are on a palace balcony. Anyone looking from the right window can see us. And the temple is already preparing to use the Blackwater retrieval against you.”
Sabine forced herself to breathe normally.
He was right.
She hated that he was right.
“The music,” she said. “Lysa helped me dry it near the fire. There was a message beneath the notes.”
Lucien went still. “What message.”
“Not the first. Not the last.”
His face drained of color.
“Isolde knew,” Sabine continued quietly. “She knew the rite had consumed women before her. She tried to leave warning for whoever came next.”
Lucien turned and gripped the balcony railing hard enough that his knuckles went white. “How many.”
“I do not know. But the Blackwater shrine is old. Older than the current version of the Trials. If the temple has been controlling what gets recovered and what gets recorded, there could be more hidden.”
“The circlet fragment went into Serast’s custody.”
“Yes. But I still have the music.” Sabine touched the false lining of her sleeve where she had tucked the dried strip temporarily. “And the message is clear enough. Isolde was part of a pattern.”
