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I read them out loud.

“What is given in silence, the Voice cannot take. The heart knows the singer before it knows the song. Where the beloved stands, Devotion finds no altar.”

“What does it mean?” she asks.

“I never understood these verses. I’ve had them since before I came here, and I’ve never guessed the message behind them.”

She reads them again.

“Well,” she says. “I think they make sense.”

“Tell me.”

“I met you when I was deaf. I couldn’t hear your song, so it couldn’t manipulate me. What is given in silence.” She points at the first line. “Then I lived with you. I got to know you, I got to care about you. Before I ever heard your voice. The heart knows the singer before it knows the song, right?” She touches the second line, then the third. “So, when I finally could hear you, there was nothing for the song to do. It would’ve made me worship you, but there was no room left for that, because I already had you in the place where the worship was supposed to go. Where the beloved stands, Devotion finds no altar.”

I look at her hand on the page, then at her beautiful face.

“You care about me?” I ask.

“Yes.” She blushes. “I care about you so much. I…” She stops, starts again, and doesn’t look away when she says it. “I love you, Mordred.”

My world tilts on its axis. I get up, swaying, find my feet, and pull her out of her chair and into my arms. She comes up on her toes and kisses the grille over my mouth. Then she groans against it, annoyed.

“Take this thing off.”

I laugh.

She lifts her head.

“I’ve never heard you laugh like this. Like you’re not hiding anything from me.”

“I’m not.”

I reach behind my head and open the clasps. She doesn’t wait for me. She pulls the mask off my face, drops it on the open books, and lunges at me. I catch her, my arms closing around her back. She kisses me, eager at first, then slower. Her hand is on my bare jaw, squeezing lightly.

I let myself get lost in her.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Aveline

The kiss lasts until I hear him breathe out through his nose and realize we both need air.

I push him back into the chair and climb onto him before he can catch on to what’s happening. My knees land on either side of his hips, my skirts bunch between us, and I take his face in both hands and kiss him the way I’ve wanted to since our first time in his bed. His lips are cool, dark, and soft. The ridge of the seam feels delicious on my tongue at the corner of his mouth. I follow it. I find the narrow front teeth and the smaller row behind them. I press my tongue against them on purpose until he makes a sound in his throat that travels right to my core.

That is new. I’ve felt him before. I’ve never heard him like this. Now I’m curious to know what others sounds he makes.

The chair creaks under us. His hands land on my hips and stay there, claws curled against the wool of my dress. I grind down on his lap and feel him thicken under the laces of his trousers. His breath comes short against my cheek.

“I love you,” he says, low in his chest. “I love you.”

“I love you,” I say it back.

“I love you, Aveline.”

“I love you, Mordred.” I rock against him and say it again into his mouth. “I love you. Put your hands on me. Here. Yes, like that.”

He cups my breasts through the dress and squeezes. I push into his palms and kiss him harder. His tongue is longer than a man’s and he uses all of it. I suck on it until he groans. I’m already wet. I can feel it when I move on him, the slick ache between my legs and the want to have him inside me right now.