I had only ever seen them in the crumbling botanical sketches of the foraging association.
I reached for my satchel that sat lazily by the entrance and retrieved my small silver foraging shears. My fingers trembled as I knelt in the damp moss and traced the base of a healthy adult mushroom. I carefully snipped the glowing cap, and a faint, sweet fragrance like ozone and honey filled my senses.
“Why are you awake, little flame?”
“Could not sleep,” I mumbled, my focus staying on the delicate stem in my hand.
Talon stepped beside me, his large shadow falling over the moss.
My eyes momentarily flicked up to notice he was half-dressed, his broad chest bare. The dark ink of his tattoos seemed to drink in the cobalt light of the river, glowing faintly.
He seemed at one with the cave surrounding him. Like he was carved from the very stone around us.
I dropped the glowing fragments into a clean vial, placing a cork into the opening to contain the magic. I gave the tube a small shake and gasped as small, glowing motes floated around the glass. “Beautiful.”
“Indeed,” Talon echoed, but he was not looking at the vial. His gaze was anchored to the curve of my neck.
I bit my lip to suppress a smile, but a sharp click startled me. A dozen wispy fragments tore free from the ink on Talon’s chest, weaving together with a hiss until they formed a small, levitating basket.
The shadows let out tiny, ethereal squeals as they swallowed the vial into their forms and solidified into an opaque structure.
“Where are they taking it?” I asked, watching the levitating basket.
“To Hera’s home,” Talon said. He watched the shadows depart toward the tunnel’s mouth. “All herbal medicine used to heal a mortal after the severance of a Lunthra bond comes from Umbral soil. Those mushrooms have healing tendencies that can knit a shattered spirit back together.”
I blinked, my throat tightening with a mix of relief and awe. “You are healing her.”
“I do not wish for her death to be the ghost that sits at our table, Kaelia,” he said, his blue eyes pinning me to the spot. “I told you I would help her. I am a man of my word.”
He looked down at my hands, then took them in his. He turned them over, his thumbs brushing over my palms, which were stained with dark earth and the glowing blue dust of the moss.
“I will run some warm water so you can clean up.”
I gave a nod and moved toward the private washroom tucked beside the sleeping quarters.
The space resembled a natural hollow, the dark stone smoothed only enough to serve its purpose. The air was perpetually damp, carrying the faint metallic tang of subterranean earth mixed with the lingering musk of Talon’s scent.
I stripped off my clothes, letting them fall in a weary heap, and stepped beneath the cascading water.
The intense heat sank into my skin, a blistering relief that did little to soften the ache stretched across my bones. I braced my hands against the slick obsidian wall, my forehead resting against the cool stone as the torrent poured over me. I let the water beat down, closing my eyes and trying to imagine it couldwash away the truth pulsing in my veins—and the blood that was surely still under my fingernails.
There was no turning back now. Even if I had not spoken the words aloud to my parents, the High Court would speak for me. They would not let a breach of the Archives and the assault of a Keeper go unpunished. By morning, the silver-clad criers in the streets of Isvale would be shouting my name, branding me a traitor and a thief of forbidden power.
With a heavy sigh that was lost beneath the fall of the water, I sank to the floor, pulling my knees to my chest. The deluge became a wall of white noise, muting my thoughts until they dulled to a low, insistent thrum.
My eyes closed, the heat, the isolation, and the sheer exhaustion coaxing me toward a fragile moment of peace.
Just as I thought I may become one with the water and filter down the drain, the current shifted, breaking against a shape. My eyes snapped open just as a pair of thick, inked thighs materialized in front of me, partially obscured by the spray.
“Kaelia? Why are you not answering me?”
I looked up, my throat constricting. Talon’s broad frame loomed above me. He was sheened with moisture, droplets clinging to the intricate, dark ink that mapped his skin. He wore nothing but a pair of black briefs that clung to him, radiating a masculine confidence that made my breath stumble in my chest.
Heat prickled my face. I ducked my gaze, trying to hide behind the fold of my legs.
“Talon,” I whispered, my voice betraying me with its crack. “This is all so wrong.”
Anger and grief tangled until tears blurred my sight. Without a word, he crouched down, his movement fluid despite his size. He slid behind me until his massive body caged mine, his thighs bracketing me against the slick stone. The heat of him wrapped around me like a furnace.