Two hearts made bare, in burning truth, are sealed.
The torches roar to life, flames flaring in unison. Light swells, its brilliance holding for a breathless moment before collapsing back into shadowy silence.
Heat stings my fingers, and I drop the parchment. It flutters back into the trunk, edges glowing faintly. My pulse is an uneven gallop in my chest. My breaths come too fast, too shallow. Sweat slides down my temple, and I swipe it away with a shaking hand. My whole body buzzes with heat and magick and the echo of his voice twined together with mine.
Declan cuts gently through the hush. “I wouldn’t call that weird.”
I look at him. My knees feel weak, the floor unsteady beneath me.
“No?” I breathe. He isn’t afraid. He isn’t dismissive. He isn’t running. He’s here, fully present, grounded, watching me like I’m not someone to control or fix, but someone to be in awe of. To follow. To believe in. “Then what would you call it?”
Declan’s gaze drags slowly across my face, catching on the shape of my mouth. “Powerful.”
My skin tingles with awareness. Heat coils low and hot, sending a pulse between my legs that makes my thighs clench.
“I don’t know where this is going.” I search his eyes.“What it will lead to.” The words are bigger than the spell. I’m not just speaking of magick, and we both know it.
“Amanda…” His fingers brush my temple, sliding through my hair with the softest touch before tucking it behind my ear. “I was ready to follow you into quicksand.”
I want to kiss him so badly it hurts. So badly it lives hot beneath my skin like a spark waiting to catch.
His gaze is searing, starving. He looks at me like he could devour me with nothing but his eyes, like if I lean in he’ll be on me—hands in my hair, mouth on my throat, burning me from the inside out.
And I’d let him.
Gladly.
Desperately.
I want his hands fisted in my dress, his tongue in my mouth. I want to taste the tension, swallow the groan I know he’s holding back. I want to grind against every hard inch of him until there’s nothing left between us but heat and skin and breathless want.
I can taste the kiss before it happens. I can feel it ghosting over my lips, making everything inside me clench and ache and beg.
I sway forward.
Just a little.
Just enough—
“I’m only saying”—Tarek’s voice comes from somewhere outside the room—“if I had a sword like that, I wouldn’t name itMarshmallow.”
Declan and I jolt apart like we’ve been struck by lightning.
A second voice responds, deeper and exasperated, unmistakably Dav. “I have not named my swordMarshmallow, Tarek. It’sMarrowshard. It is symbolic.”
“Huh, well,” Tarek says, footsteps drawing nearer. “It still sounds like something you’d toast over a fire.”
Declan drops his head on my shoulder and lets out a strangled groan.
My body feels fluttery, lips tingling, stomach flipping, heart swelling, and I slap a hand over my mouth to muffle the laugh that bubbles out.
In the distance, the drums start to pound, sounding the alarm for the nightly performances.
With a sigh, Declan straightens and drags both hands through his hair. “We need to move.”
I turn back to the trunk one last time and close the lid. The copper wheel spins once and locks with a soft, satisfied hiss.
“I still have to coat you in that bronzer the juggler gave us.”
