Page 130 of Autumn Queens & Shadows

“Can I look at you? You’re not letting me.”

Sitting down by the tree trunk, he put me on his lap and let me have my fill of him. “Ten fingers,” I counted, bringing his hands to my mouth so I could warm them up a little. “Two eyes, a silly nose, two ears and a mouth.” I smiled at him. “You’re all here.”

He slid his hands out of my hold and cupped my face so he could bring it down to his. Then he kissed me like it was the most normal thing ever, like we’d done it ten thousand times before, while I was absolutely going out of my mind.

He pulled back and then sighed, just keeping me there, pressing his lips to mine from time to time.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, running my hands over his to try and warm them up.

“I thought I wasn't going to get to you in time. You still can’t do magic?”

I shook my head. “It’s angry at me. My own magic is angry with me. I think I know what it is,” I said to him, “the heartbeat.”

“I think I do, too,” he said, touching a finger to my eyes. “They’ve changed colour.”

“They have?” I asked, a little panicked. I loved my eyes. “To what?”

“There is a ring of gold around the green. And something else.”

“What else?”

“They aren’t lying to me anymore.”

Chapter twenty-nine

Green Buttercups

Malik

We’d made it to the tunnel entrance by the fourth time I faded. She had her arm wrapped around my waist, still insisting I used her to stand up right. It was adorable until she really tried to do so. She’d snap in half if I did.

“Rora, sweetheart, you’re going to pull a muscle.”

“I’ve got you, lean on me.”

“Stop trying to seduce me, it isn’t the time nor the place.” It was in fact the best place and the perfect time to wrap her legs around my waist and fuck her against the walls until she needed to lean on me herself.

Huffing all annoyed and frustrated, she moved away, letting go of me.

Not far enough for me to grab her back to my side. “Come on now, Tiny, I need your body heat or the upper half of me will freeze, too,” I coaxed, bending down to kiss her cheek and then her mouth. I’d been contemplating on doing it for the past three miles we’d walked to here, but she’d been all so worried about me, it broke my heart.

“I knew we’d make it,” she said, still trying to make me lean onto her like I was wounded beyond saving. “You’ve got the tits. I’ve got the brains. It was fool proof.”

I chuckled. “Sweetheart, they’re not tits.”

“But they are so big,” she grumbled. “Why do they have to be so big? Why can’t mine be that big?”

They weren’t that big. “Because I like yours just how they are.”

“Small?”

“Perfect.”

She rolled her eyes up at me and glared under her thick black lashes. Despite the cool look she gave me, her pink cheeks betrayed her. “You’ve barely even seen them.”

“I’m sure you’ll show me.”

“If you show me yours again.”