Page 197 of Feralheart

Eradin stood beside it, her body rigid with tension I could read from twenty feet away.

She’d seen me coming.

She didn’t move toward me, but she did not move away. She stood there, holding her ground, watching me close the distance between us.

Fifteen feet. Ten.

I slowed. Some part of me braced for the moment she’d lift her hand and tell me to go back where I belonged.

She didn’t.

Five feet.

Her exhale was barely audible.

I stopped at the fire’s edge, my pack heavy on my shoulder, my bedroll under my arm.

I didn’t ask permission or try to explain myself. We didn’t need justifications for why I was here instead of where the rest of the world thought I belonged. I knelt and started unrolling my bedding on the ground beside their fire, placing it between the commons tents and the elite camp. I’d face the direction any trouble would come from.

My shoulder screamed as I smoothed it flat. I kept going anyway, straightening edges that didn’t need straightening, pressing out creases that didn’t matter, aware that I was doing a very thorough job on a task that required no skill whatsoever.

My hands needed something to do besides reach for her.

I arranged my pack beside the bedroll.

She hadn’t said anything yet, but I could feel her watching.

I wanted to be here. With her. In this space that wasn’t about pretending or politics or anything except people trying to survive together.

Two tent flaps rustled.

Reece and Lyndie emerged, their faces shadowed but readable in the firelight. They stood outside their tents, watching the disaster unfold. Lyndie’s gaze found Eradin’s. A whole conversation happened in a glance I wasn’t meant to understand.

Eradin’s chin lifted a fraction, an acknowledgment that she knew exactly how bad an idea this was and was accepting it anyway.

Lyndie’s mouth curved with resignation mixed with respect.

They retreated back inside their tents. The flaps fell closed, giving Eradin and me privacy.

I sat on my bedroll, bracing my hands on my knees.

The fire crackled between us, shedding enough light to paint her face in orange and shadow.

Eradin stood across from me, her body held with the careful stillness I’d started recognizing as her version of armor. Her hair hung loose around her shoulders. The fire caught it, turning brown to gold in places where the light hit.

Her mouth was still slightly swollen from my kisses.

I made myself look away before I did something stupid like stride around the fire and kiss her again. My gaze dropped to my hands instead. The tremor had returned, barely visible but there.

She’d see it. She noticed everything.

Sounds from the elite camp’s carried on the cold air, distant enough it felt like a different world. Maybe it was.

I should explain. Tell her this wasn’t about strategy or using her for advantage. That I’d walked away from everything because I was tired of performing and what I felt for her was the first real thing I’d felt in thirty years.

But words felt inadequate for what was happening between us.

The fire sent sparks spiraling up into the dark. One fell, landing near my boot. I watched it glow for a moment before dying.