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I undid the piece of leather holding my hair back in its long braid and shook out the strands. “By us, you mean me.”
“Of course. I get you to do all the hard work.” Draven grinned.
I forced a smile. “I’ve already tried.”
“You’ve what?”
I bit my lip. “I tried to destroy it. The grail.”
“How? When?”
“One night, after... after Gawain.” I hesitated. “You were sleeping. I snuck out. Went far away from the camp. I threw everything I had at it.” I looked at the grail, wanting to kick the cursed thing across the endless, empty room. “I was furious at myself for not trying before. But it was no use anyway. The thing wouldn’t burn.”
“Yet here we are on a quest to destroy it. What a delightful challenge that will be.”
“Yes, well,” I said tightly, “we’ll find a way.”
“At the very least,” Draven said, finishing his apple and tossing the core over his shoulder, “we’ll destroy your father.”
“Yes, we will,” I promised him. “But there’s a way to destroy the objects, too, and it’s here. Somewhere. I know it is. We’ll find it. We’re getting closer.”
“Do you believe that? Or do you feel it?”
I shifted uncomfortably. “What’s the difference?”
“There is a difference, Morgan. A difference in you. You’re...” He shook his head. “You’re hiding things.”
“I’m not. What things? I told you about the door. The grail... that was just a guess. I didn’t know for sure.”
“Didn’t you?” He was watching me closely. Finally he shook his head again. “Fine. It’s not that I’m upset. I’m not angry with you. If you want to keep things from me, that’s your right.”
“I don’t,” I protested. Was I lying even to myself now? “It’s a belief. A feeling. Can’t it be both?”
I looked at him over the light of the grail. A poor replacement for the warmth of a campfire.
But while our surroundings might have changed for the worse, Draven—he was the same as he’d always been. In the very best of ways.
I watched as he leaned back on his elbows, clad in traveling leathers that contoured to the clean, strong lines of his warrior’s physique and grinned.
“What?”
“You look more like a vagabond wanderer now than a prince,” I observed.
“These leathers were exceedingly costly, I’ll have you know,” he complained. “Are you saying they look badly tailored?”
I laughed. “I’m saying you look more like a man I’d meet on a dusty road than a prince of a royal court.”
He tugged at the opening of his tunic, and my heart hammered a little at the glimpse of bronzed skin it revealed.
“Dusty, no. Sweaty from walking all day and night, yes.”
The mention of sweat didn’t dispel my desire. If anything, it heightened it. I found myself suddenly imagining licking the sweat from Draven’s chest as he lay back on his elbows, looking down at me from those wicked, emerald green eyes.
As if reading my thoughts, he suddenly sat up and leaned forward, resting his body on his hands like a prowling cat.
“You were licking your lips,” he observed.
His glossy, raven hair was tousled and hung around his face. I looked at the slant of his jaw, the sleek, onyx horns and felt the familiar, raw pull of longing.
