“Now?” She reached for a Peacock tooth.
He ducked his head, resigned. “It’s not like Tatterhelm’s turned around and gone home.”
A tooth had never felt so heavy in Fie’s hand. She let it go. “He’s not at our door, either. It can wait.”
“No,” he sighed. “Please. Let’s get it over with.” Tavin closed his eyes, like he awaited a magistrate’s sentencing. One she would hand down.
She reached for him—then, for the first time, let her fingers brushhis jaw, turning his face to her. The words fell before she could catch them. “What do you want?”
He wore the thousand-sided look once more, but this time, in a thousand different ways, it said only one thing:
You.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said instead, voice cracking.
Thunder shook the sky.
She’d known, she’d known, she’d known all along. Every look, every touch, every stray unpracticed smile, it had all said as much and more. And her own head had been dancing round it, insisting no Hawk could want her, searching for angles and motives, spinning lie after lie to cocoon the fearful truth.
Heartbeat after heartbeat rattled in Fie’s ears, the seed of another fearful truth unfurling, working its way to the surface of her thoughts. It didn’t matter what they wanted. She knew that too well. She was a Crow chief, he was the prince’s Hawk; until this nightmare passed, they had to look after their own. The oath, the prince, they came first and naught else.
What do you want, Fie?
The first shoots pierced through: she wanted him more than fire or steel or games, hungered for him in a way she couldn’t fathom, couldn’t reconcile, couldn’t stop.
It didn’t matter.
She thought of the wolf in winter. She thought of hunger greater than fear.
And the terrible truth took root:
If it didn’t matter what they wanted, it wouldn’t matter if—just once—they got it.
When, not if.
Fie took Tavin’s face in her hands and kissed him.
At first he hardly stirred, and for a horrid moment she thought she’d made a mistake, that she’d misjudged it all, that he’d think her a fool—she pulled back—
Then a strange, slight shiver passed through him, and a breath later, she found that meant the last of his restraint had snapped.
He didn’t kiss her back so much as drown himself in her. His fingers wound themselves in her hair, mapped out the bones and planes of her back by touch, fitted her hips against his; his mouth sought hers like a cure, starving and fierce, only to wander down her throat until she could scarce breathe.
A light scrape pricked at her collarbone—and then her head flooded with heat, with need, with dizzying awe and fear and desire, all anchored to thoughts of—her?
Oh.She drew Tavin back to her mouth. “Mind your teeth.”
“Yes, chief,” he murmured, and set about doing just that.
She didn’t mean to slide her hands below his shirt, yet she found them there, roaming along scar and muscle and rib and finding her hunger only growing, a fire that sparked from skin striking skin and burned without mercy. Soon the shirts were an afterthought. One rasped question and granted permission later, the rest of their clothing followed suit, forgotten even faster in the crash of thunder and the fire driving them both.
Before, when she’d lain with Hangdog, it had been matters of urgency, a hasty exchange of services. Needs met and dismissed with one eye still at watch, one ear still pressed to the ground, ready to flee.
Now Fie didn’t know if she could tear herself away, caught in a way that felt like binds breaking, lost in a way that felt like being found. Tavin too moved with urgency, but it was a curious kind, a need to discover every place that made her shiver or gasp or bite her fist to keep from crying out. And then he found them again, and again, and again; Fieknew only the fire arching through her, through him, again and again, until it finally left them both trembling and tangled in the dark.
After, as she lay in his arms under their ragged cloaks and stolen furs, she told him: “You know this won’t be easy.”
In answer, he pulled her closer and kissed her one more time. Then he told her: “You make me believe I can do something better with my life than die.”
