“We no longer need to worry about breakfast executions,” she said with a blissful smile. “No more getting up an hour before the bell, just in case we’ll miss the first ring. No more rushing through the hallways. No more fearing the mess hall doors. No more…” A soft snore replaced the rest of her sentence, and Thal giggled with a hiccup.
“Heehee, I’ve never seen her drunk.”
“You’re drunk yourself, Thal,” Lory pointed out as Thal swayed, sitting up.
Thal gave her a childlike glance. “No,you’redrunk.”
Lory stifled a chuckle, getting to her feet and pulling Tabi’s boots off her feet, which were dangling off the side of the bed, and lifting her feet back onto the mattress before draping the covers over her sleeping form.
When she turned around to tell Thal to go back to his room and sleep it off, Thal lay curled up at the foot end of her bed, folded hands tucked under his cheek, and black curls dangling onto his brow. An innocent smile lifted the corner of his mouth. “I love you, Ariel.” He murmured to himself, eyes already closed.
“Who’s Ariel?” Lory had heard that name before, but she couldn’t quite remember where.
Slow, deep breathing was all she got from Thal, the young man already deep in his dreams.
With a smile of her own, she tiptoed to the dresser, pulled a blanket from the drawer, and draped it over Thal’s huddled form. Then she picked up the full bottle and headed for the door.
“Khayrivven?”She didn’t expect him to hear her. After all, he was probably still meeting with leadership about the new schedules and assigned tutors, but it was worth a try.“Can you hear me?”
Not a single word echoed in her mind.
Maybe he could hear her but not respond the same way.
Bottle in hand, Lory made her way down the empty hallway, along the corridor, and down the stairs, eyes on the shadowy corners out of habit more than out of fear. In her veins, her fire magic always paid attention, listening like a creature of its own for danger. This was the one day she didn’t even know she’d been waiting for. A giddy sort of energy seemed to fill the air whenever students crossed the hallways, slipping from room to room, some of them with bottles, like her, others in pairs, looking for privacy as they celebrated their graduation from ashling rank, and for a moment, Lory hoped that things would be all right if she believed it hard enough.
“Khayrivven Falcrest, where are you?”She tried again, her mental voice shaking as she used his full name.
In all this time, since she’d come to Ashthorn Ward, Lory had only once been to Khayrivven’s room, and when she made her way through the pyramid, she was only half surprised when her feet carried her right back to the level where Anees’s room was located—past all the other doors lining the torch-lit limestone hallway.
Lory hadn’t given the blackened door at the end of the hallway much thought since she’d moved to Anees’s room, but she remembered very well who lived in the two-room suite behind it.
A gentle knock was all she allowed herself, anxious she would alert people to her presence in front of his door, but a glance over her shoulder confirmed she was alone. Since this was the part of the building dedicated to the accommodation of hands and phantoms, Lory at least didn’t need to fear encountering many other students up there.
In her head, Lory counted down from twenty, giving Khayrivven enough time to answer the door if he was there, but nothing seemed to move behind the wood. When she reached three, she suppressed the anxiety rising in her stomach—an anxiety, she told herself, had nothing to do with his absence but, in reality, had everything to do with it.
Two.
Lory took a casual step back from the door, calming her thundering heart. It was all right. They weren’t supposed to be seen together anyway. Visiting his room was reckless, foolish. And he’d certainly turn her away, even if it was purely to keep up the facade crafted for the rest of the world.
One.
Lory inhaled a steadying breath, savoring the hint of sage lingering in the air like a taunt.
She was about to turn around when Khayrivven’s voice sounded close to her ear. “I should scold you for showing up at my door like this, but all I really want to do is invite you inside and fuck you until you scream my name.”
The fight-or-flight tension building in Lory’s body instantly melted into scorching heat, her pulse picking up and her need pooling in her core.
“Just open the Guardians-damned door, Khayrivven,” she whispered with a glance past his shoulder, into the empty hallway, not trusting her voice.
Khayrivven reached past her, skimming her side with his fingers as he placed his palm on the doorknob, and Lory held so still, inhaling his scent was the only movement she allowed herself.
The lock clicked without a turn of his hand, and the door soundlessly swung open, revealing the view on the small living room and the foot of a wide, black-sheeted bed peeking through a gap in the wooden wall.
“Come in.” A shudder ran down her spine as he whispered beside her ear, his breath tickling the sensitive spot beneath it.
Lory didn’t need to think twice. Her feet started moving out of their own volition, already carrying her over the threshold and past the neat shelves along the stone wall enclosing the suite, small orbs of light flickering to life above her head with each new step, tinting the room in soft gold and orange.
“I thought it was too dangerous for us to be seen together,” she said to him as he closed the door and started unbuckling his weapons belt and harness, dropping both, including sabers, sword, and knives onto the worktable in the corner. An open book lay there like the last time she’d been in his room, but instead of a teacup, a small flask sat beside the tome.
