“Guldan also explained that my body was being changed by the magic that exists in Penumbra. That I would eventually develop magic of my own. Not as strong as what daemons possess, but strong enough to use it myself.”
Bokkan sighed. “You have only been in this realm for a few days. It should not be a problem as long as you leave in a couple of weeks.”
“I can feel it, Bo. I’m already changing, already different. I was able to outrun Talus today and fight him off as long as I did because of it. I’m stronger. Faster.” I looked down at my inner forearm. I’d scraped my skin against the bark of a tree earlier, and the scab had already fallen off. The skin was pink, as though it had been healing for days instead of hours. "And I'm healing far more quickly than I should.”
“The effects should wear off once you return home,” he finally said.
I shook my head and huffed out a laugh. “It won’t, and you know it.” I lowered my arms back into the water and brought my knees up to my chest, suddenly feeling exposed. “Do you want me to return home?”
The stoic expression on his face cracked then, revealing tortured anguish for a split second before his features returned to neutrality. “I want you to be happy and to be safe.”
“That’s not an answer to my question.”
He broke my gaze then, looking past me into his bedchamber. When it was clear he wasn’t going to answer, I shifted off the ledge, crossing the bathing pool. I climbed into his lap, settling with a knee on each side of his hips. My hands curled around the back of his neck beneath his hair. He stareddown at me, his lips parted to reveal the tips of his fangs. He didn’t touch me, didn’t reach for me as he usually did.
Fear squirmed inside me, fear that he would deny it. Would deny anything he felt for me.
Why did this feel so important?
“Do you want me to go home?” I whispered.
His hands clamped down on my hips, holding me tightly. Bokkan’s neck tensed in my hold, and his arms were rigid, as though he was preparing to push me away.
That fear inside me swelled, shifting into hurt. He was going to say yes.
With a hoarse groan, Bokkan moved, his arms wrapping tightly around me, crushing me against his chest. “I should let you go. It would be the honorable thing to do,” he said.
Then, he was kissing me, his mouth almost harsh against mine. He held me so tightly that it was as if he wanted to fuse me to his body.
I lost myself in his embrace. For the first time, he was laying himself bare for me, and it was overwhelming. I could sense his yearning and his desperation.
I tore my mouth away from his lips, resting my forehead against his. “What does that mean?”
His fingers moved against my hips. “What does what mean?”
“That you should be honorable and let me go?”
His head fell back, and his eyes closed as he heaved a sigh. “It means I should put your desires and your safety above what I want.”
“And what do you want?”
He lifted his head, looking back at me, and he no longer seemed monstrous to me at all. Even with his horns, fangs, and pitch-black eyes, he looked… soft.
No, he looked at me like I was his reason for existing.
“I want you.”
“For how long?”
He moved until his lips barely touched mine. “Until there is nothing left of me.”
I shouldn’t want to hear that.
Shouldn’t want him to care for me.
But those words opened something inside me, a part of me I’d shoved away and locked down. A side of me that had been hurt too many times to trust a man again.
Except Bokkan wasn’t a man.
