Page 111 of Crown of the Dunes

Now that bond was thrown open, and I could feel the mind-numbing pleasure bubbling up in Keera’s body and spilling over into mine. It was nearly frightening in its intensity, and Keera tensed, fighting the way her muscles twitched and spasmed outside of her control as the sensations peaked.

My own jaw clenched, a throbbing beginning at the base of my spine and crawling up my back. I leaned over her, wrapping my arm around her waist and plastering her to me.

“It’s okay,” I gritted out, speaking the words into her shoulder blade as I slammed into her even harder. “I’ve got you.”

Her cry was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard as it split the night air. Then it was drowned out by my own roar and the pounding of our synchronized heartbeats as my own release hit me with the force of an avalanche. I didn’t stop thrusting as I spilled inside her, pushing my release in as deep as I could. I wished I could bury myself within her completely and never leave.

Finally, Keera collapsed onto her stomach beneath me, and I followed her down, blanketing her body in mine. A sheen of sweat dampened her skin and made us tacky as it began to dry in the cooling evening air.

Carefully, I brushed the hair away from one side of her face. Tear tracks of pleasure painted her cheeks, and I kissed them away. Her mouth curled in a gentle smile, and she went boneless and pliant beneath me.

I kissed her cheek again, and traced her skin with my nose, unable to help myself. Despite the warmth of her skin against mine, a shiver ran up my spine as I watched her relax. The noise of revelry in the courtyard many stories below drifted in through the open archway.

The city celebrated her engagement to somebody else, and I had not had the strength to watch her share one dance with the man without tearing her away to claim her in every way I knew how.

I peeled myself away from her, the whispers of the desert in my mind returning in full force as I stopped touching her, their tone derisive and mocking. Among their chattering, I thought I heard words I had said to Keera at an oasis once as I held her in my arms.

The world will not survive the way I feel about you.

I waited in the stables, running a brush through Alza’s mane. There were no tangles in sight, but I did it anyway just for something to do with my hands. From her slack lower jaw and partially closed eyes, I could tell that Alza enjoyed the attention as well.

The stable door opened with a creak, and I stilled my brush. Alza’s eyes opened, and her ears flicked forward too, but I did not need to listen to the quiet footsteps to know that it was Keera who approached. I could tell simply from the way fibers of magic in the air around us shivered, even as I wished I couldn’t.

This would be easier if I couldn’t sense her presence and know where she was at almost all times. It made it impossible to put her from my mind, but I knew I must if I were to do what needed to be done.

We had never been able to figure out what the odd connection between us was, although I had theories I did not like to examine too closely. Everything in the desert was connected in a vibrating web of life and death—and both Keera and I were nexuses in that tangled net. Like two stones dropped on a taught canvas, we constantly collided, drawn together by the gravity of the other’s power.

Of course, the part that burrowed under my skin and ate me from the inside out was the way Kelvar and Alyx’s connection had been described—as if the magic of the desert had linked them together. I had briefly flipped through Kelvar’s journal, coming across sections where he referred to sensing his wife’s presence and emotions.

Nausea bubbling up in my gut, I snapped the journal closed and put it aside. I couldn’t bring myself to face the evidence that I followed in his footsteps. And his failures. I must undo what his love for Alyx had wrought. There was no alternative.

A shadow darkened the entrance to Alza’s stall, and I looked up. Keera stood there, not as the queen I had become accustomed to, but the rider who had accompanied me on a long journey to face a lava wyrm. She wore loose tan pants and a brown tunic and vest, bound by a cream-colored sash. The hood that lay draped around her shoulders looked almost black in the dim light of the stable at night, but a small swath of moonlight showed it to be a deep crimson.

Damn the color red.

“Ready?” I asked.

She nodded, heading to fetch Daiti from his stall. As she did, I loaded a small amount of packs onto Alza’s back. I did not expect this to be a long journey, but with the state of the desert these days, I could not guarantee that what I had been a few hours ride a few days ago would remain so.

Once Keera had done the same with her small bundles, we walked our mounts out of the stable and down through the city. As we passed through the arched opening in the stone wall, I held my breath, waiting for the lifting of weight that came with leaving the city behind for the open desert.

It didn’t come.

The chittering in my mind did not abate. I ground my teeth against it, so hard I thought Keera might be able to hear them creak. Even the occasional odd flickers at the edge of my vision that had started in the past few weeks remained.

It seemed Keera was my only peace, and she was about to be lost to me.

Burying my frustration deep in my gut, I jerked my head to the left, indicating we should ride parallel to the city walls until we reached the point at which they joined the mountains. As we rode, the peeked above the horizon, lighting the landscape a dusty gray that gradually warmed until everything in sight had a gilded quality.

I squinted out toward the sunrise, away from the mountains. Hopefully soon, I would be setting off in that direction every morning, carrying the Heart toward the temple at the edge of the sea. I patted Alza’s neck as it bobbed, taking comfort in the warmth of her flesh under my palm.

It would be a long journey for her and me both. She had never been to the ocean, but I had. Dread crawled up my spine at the memory of the horrors I had faced on that first long journey with Lord Alasdar. Alza snorted in response to the sudden tension in my limbs, and I shook myself.

There was no use worrying about the journey until I had the Heart anyway.

I tore my gaze away from the horizon to find Keera considering me.

“You’ve been quiet,” she said.