Page 219 of Blood Curse

The relief was so sharp I nearly laughed. I could say his name again. I could shout it. I could fill the room with every command the Crown once used and his body would remain his.

I didn’t test it.

I turned carefully in his arms instead.

The movement brought his face close to mine. Sleep had softened the hard lines around his mouth. His silver hair spread across the pillow, dry now, and a clean bandage showed above the open neck of his shirt. Colour had returned to his skin.

His eyes opened when I touched two fingers to his chest.

“Hungry,” he said, his voice rough with sleep.

“Very.”

His gaze dropped to my mouth. Heat followed it, but my stomach interrupted with another furious noise.

“Food first,” he said.

The corner of his mouth moved. I kissed it before it could become a comment.

He took my face in one hand and turned the kiss deeper. His tongue stroked mine, slow and warm, while the hand on my thigh tightened. Desire rolled through me without another presence riding inside it. My body answered him because I wanted it to.

I slid closer until my knee brushed the hard length of his cock through the thin cloth of his sleep trousers.

His breath caught. So did mine when his fingers moved higher under the robe.

The pull at his wound stopped us. His mouth tightened, and I felt the tension go through his chest.

I pressed my palm beside the bandage. “Food. Bath. Healing. Then I plan to make this room earn its reputation.”

His pale eyes flared. “I look forward to being medically cleared.”

He kissed my forehead and let me go before either of us turned wanting into another injury.

Breakfast waited on a low table by the door: eggs, toast, bacon, a pot of tea and a sealed bottle of blood. Someone had left a note under the cup. Eat was written across it in Mara’s blunt hand.

The door stuck when I pulled it closed again. I put my shoulder into it, and the latch caught with a solid click.

The house didn’t help.

I grinned at the wood.

We ate in bed. I emptied half the plate before I tasted any of it. Butter, salt and hot tea settled inside me, human hunger answered by human food. Stellan drank from a glass beside me. The scent of blood reached me and remained only a scent.

He watched my face over the rim.

“Bacon,” I said, holding up a strip. “That is where my loyalties lie this morning.”

His shoulders loosened. He didn’t apologise for checking, and I didn’t ask him to. We were both learning what safety felt like when it wasn’t enforced.

“Say something that is true now,” he said.

I looked down at the wrecked plate. “I’m hungry for bacon. My scalp hurts. I want you, and I’m furious that your chest needs time to close. I can hear people outside without wanting to command them. I feel like myself.”

His fingers closed around my wrist, resting over the pulse there. “You are.”

“Your turn.”

He glanced towards the stubborn door. “The title is gone. Harrowmere is a house. My heart is healing. I feel like myself as well.”