“Finished,” I murmur, for lack of a better thing to say. I begin to pull back, but find my wrist clasped within his hand before I’ve ever seen him move. My eyes flicker up to meet his.
“Thank you,” Penn says haltingly. I know he is not only speaking of the washcloth.
“You’re welcome.”
I swallow hard. I have not been this close to him in more than a month. Since the battle, he has hardly crossed my path. If anything, he seems to be going out of his way to avoid my presence. Even so, there is no forgetting the last time we found ourselves alone together. The last time he touched me. The heated exchange we shared the night of Fyremas is scored in my mind too deep to expunge with any amount of avoidance.
Don’t you understand?his voice whispers in my memory.You have undone me completely…
When I close my eyes, I can almost remember the taste of his mouth devouring mine. The feel of his callused hands, seeking out my most sensitive skin. The channel of need burning down our bond, an exquisite torment of lust neither of us was strong enough to deny.
I might convince myself I’d imagined it, if not for the strange new tension that charges the air between us now, with his hand on my skin and our faces a hairsbreadth apart. No, it was real enough. That stolen moment of passion on the lookout point above the city as fireworks exploded in the sky happened—whether he wants to own it or not.
My teeth dig sharply into my bottom lip as the memories flood me. Penn’s eyes drop to my mouth, tracking the movement and seeming to get stuck there. I am blocking him as best I can, trying to keep my unruly emotions tucked behind my mental shields before they spill over into him, but the way he is looking at me has me questioning my own success in that endeavor.
While I am getting better at muting my emotions, I have not yet mastered it. Not like Penn. Except on the rarest of occasions—or when he is expelling so much maegic he can no longer afford to hold up those impenetrable bastions—he seldom gives me anything to go on. His true feelings remain an utter mystery. Whatever he feels for me, whatever he wants from me…he does not share. Not willingly, anyway.
A part of me longs to ask if my suspicions are true. If he laments letting his rigid sense of self-possession lapse long enough to expose his true desires. If he regrets how close we came to crossing an irrevocable line that night. But I find, when I try to ask, the words will not come out.
“I’ll go take the rice off the stove,” I say instead, voice thready. “You must be hungry. Mabon said you haven’t been eating.”
Penn grunts noncommittally as he releases me. The moment broken, I practically bolt back to the kitchen and turn my focus toward the meal.
Not a quarter of an hour later, I return to the parlor with food piled on a tray. Fresh bread, sliced cheese, a steaming bowl of long-grained rice, and a few of the apples I’ve been hoarding for a special occasion. Trade is finally starting up again, but for several weeks after the attack, no fresh produce moved in or out of the city. It will be some time before things are fully back to normal.
I freeze at the threshold.
Penn is fast asleep on the sofa, slumped over in what cannot be an entirely comfortable position, with his boots still tightly laced and his torso twisted against the cushions. The exhaustion on his face is so evident, I cannot bring myself to disturb him. I wonder how long it has been since he rested through the night. My own sleepless evenings have left me brittle and weary, but my burdens are nothing next to his.
Backing out of the room, I set the untouched feast on the counter with a soft thud. On the lightest tiptoes, I creep back into the parlor, drape a worn wool blanket over Penn’s slumped form, and douse the gas lanterns. We will talk more in the morning, I resolve, as I get myself a helping of food and eat it in the darkened kitchen before retreating into my bedchamber to read until I fall into a fitful slumber.
Tomorrow.
Tomorrow, we will discuss our relationship and everything we’ve spent the past two months avoiding. Tomorrow, all will finally be resolved. I am certain of it.
But in the morning when I wake, the sofa is empty, the wool blanket neatly folded. Pendefyre is long gone—not merely from my apartments but from the city itself, no more than a hint of flame on a distant wind somewhere far beyond the crater’s rim.
And growing fainter by the moment.
Chapter
three
It is not yet dawn, but already I am on my way to the infirmary. My boots are a steady rap in the eerie quiet, carrying me down darkened streets.
“You’re about early,” a voice says as its owner falls into step beside me. His gait betrays no limp despite the slim shin brace I know he still wears beneath his stiff leather boots—the final trace of a recently healed fracture. His copper hair is a dull flame in the dim light of dawn.
“So are you,” I return, brows lifting. “Kicked out of bed by one of your many suitors?”
“You’ve got it all wrong, Ace. They beg me to stay.Beg. On their knees, tears in their eyes.” Farley grins at me. “I thought I’d get an early start before reporting for duty at the barracks.”
“Duty?”
“Didn’t you hear? I finally got approval to rejoin active rotations. You’re looking at a fully reinstated member of the Ember Guild.” His chest puffs in self-importance. “I’ll be leading my own unit.”
“That’s a big step.”
“Not really. I have a wealth of experience in ordering men around.”