“Right. But you’re sloppy. You have no sense of aim, no precision. It’s a wonder you didn’t hurt anyone last night.”
I bit my lip guiltily. He was right. If Lana hadn’t cast a bubble around the others, I could have seriously harmed them.
Fine. Maybe I did need to work on it, but I didn’t need to do it with him. “I can practice on my own.”
“Sure you can,” he said. “But you’ll learn twice as fast with guidance.”
“I’ll be fine. I can train with Lana. She’s been learning from Septimus.”
“You don’t want to train withme,” he surmised.
“I don’t want to spend any amount of time with you.”
“Then what exactly are you doing here?” Not accusatory. His voice was gentle, questioning. The first time I had seen him at the governor’s house I had thought there was nothing soft about him. But when he looked at me now, the ice in his eyes melted.
And as usual, he’d won our imaginary game, because whywasI standing at the threshold of his bedroom?
I knew I needed answers to all my questions – why the ghoul had spared me and why he had been cursed, first and foremost – but they shriveled up and died as I gazed up at him. I was so fucking tired of thinking. Of constantly strategizing how best to survive. Of death and pain stealing every waking moment.
I settled for a pathetic, “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
I shook my head.
A soft smile curled the corners of his lips, and I forgot everything. “Are you sure?”
“Categorically.” I wet my lips and his eyes tracked the movement.
“Do you want to come inside?”
“No.”
“No?”
“If I come inside… I don’t think I’ll want to leave.” The admission was more vulnerable than I wanted it to be.
He straightened, eyes darkening. “What do you want, Lirah?”
I paused and he stepped over the threshold. The power emanating from him enveloped me, dark and crushing. Beautiful in its terror.
“What. Do. You. Want?”
What did I want? I wanted everything to return to normal. I wanted to wake up in the morning and know Umma was alright. I wanted my life to not be in danger every single week. I wanted to know that Lana and Moric would be safe. I wanted to expunge the feeling of hate and anger andgriefthat wrecked me every day. I wanted to forget the Trials, forget everything.
And the only person that could give me that – who could make me forget – was the elven standing before me. The one who had caused all this pain and misery in the first place.
I wanted to be selfish. To take somethingIwanted. Even if it was something I should not, it didn’t change the frustrating fact that I still wanted it.
I peered up at him and breathed, “You.”
“Don’t say that if you don’t mean it.”
I swallowed, placing a hand on his breastplate. “I want you.”
Desire and ravenous hunger pulsed through me. He trailed his hands along my arms, sketched the curves of my waist and Ishivered. His fingers traced my hips and then my feet were off the ground. I straddled his waist, my gaze level with his at this angle.
He did not break eye contact as he carried me across the threshold and into his bedroom, kicking the door shut behind him. He pressed me against the closed door as my feet sank back to the ground. His lips dipped to my neck, and I tilted it, giving him better access as he drew a line down my throat, his cool breath skating along my skin.
