Page 97 of The City Of Fractured Memory

I do.

“Relax your shoulders.”

I try. He’s so distracting–

“And stop thinking so loudly. I can practically hear your panic.”

“My panic?” I hiss. “Maybe if you taught like a normal person–”

But he circles me, coming to stand directly in front of me until there’s barely an inch separating us. His eyes spark with something both amused and…distracted.

Glad I’m not the only one.

“What?” I demand.

“You’re frustrated,” he says.

“No, really? I wonder why.”

His eyes drink me in slowly, lingering for just a breath too long before returning his gaze to mine. “That’s not the frustration I meant.”

“Oh,” I manage, my magic sputtering inside me like a struck match.

Riven clears his throat, suddenly looking less composed than usual. “Right. Well. We should…continue.”

“Yes,” I say too quickly. “Continue.”

He extends his hand and I take it. The air hums again, charged, electric, dangerously easy to confuse with something else entirely…

“Try again,” he instructs softly.

I lift my hand from his, channeling my magic the way he’s been showing me, a slightly different technique than Amari and Stryx taught me in our brief time in Lunoreth.

This time, it answers immediately, smooth and powerful, rising to my call like a tide responding to the moon.

A flicker of pride warms Riven’s features.

“There,” he murmurs. “See? You’re getting it quicker now.”

I try to hide my smirk, my words coming out breathless. “Maybe your teaching isn’t entirely terrible.”

He leans in, his voice a velvet threat. “Careful. Any more compliments and I might think you enjoy this.”

I swallow. “I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to.”

Silence hangs between us, fragile, thrumming with want.

He’s the one to break it, snapping the moment clean in half as he turns away abruptly. “That’s enough, err…touching, for now,” he says, voice rougher than before. “We shouldn’t get distracted.”

I stare at his back, cheeks flaming, pulse wild.

Too late.

Riven doesn’t give me long to recover. As soon as he turns away, he summons a pulse of silvery blue light to his palm and motions me forward.

“Again,” he says. “You need to understand how your magic moves before you try to shape it.”