Page 46 of Soulgazer

Half-facing the wall, I peel my shirt free from the clammy skin beneath, careful to shake my hair after so it hides the mark. Thetrousers prove more difficult. Still, I can’t help the prickles of awareness that skate down my back like fingertips.

Like the feel of his lips at my throat.

I won’t look back. It would only make him smug.

“You had something to tell me?”

“Aye.” There’s a smile in his voice. “But I’m afraid I can’t hear you very well, facing that wall.”

Bastard.

I tug a dry shift over my head, breathing easier once the soft linen falls into place. It’s far too thin for the morning light streaming in, but my fingers are too stiff to pull on anything more. I turn, arms crossed over my chest, jaw locked in case he starts to laugh.

But he’s not looking at me. Of course he’s not.

Instead, Faolan studies another tapestry on the opposite side of the room—smaller, and better made. It depicts the Crescent as though from the eye of an eagle hovering high above, the smallest of the six islands nearly kissing on the right as the others grow gradually larger curved to the left. It’s a sight I’m somewhat familiar with.

The expanse of his bare body is not.

“I—thought you were getting dressed.”

He glances over one shoulder roped in muscle and smiles. “I got distracted. Don’t just stand there like a lecher—toss me some trousers, would you?”

I gape at him as indignation and…something else wars within my blood. Terrifying and beautiful, captivating as the storm.

My voice is hoarse when I speak. “You agreed to a marriage in name only, remember?”

He cocks a brow, and my hands go rigid where they curl over the softness of my waist. But it’s not fear that arches my back when his steps draw near, or panic that tilts my chin high. Faolan won’thurt me—not for speaking my mind. If I’ve learned anything on the ship, it’s that.

In fact, that is the only thing I’m certain of at this moment.

Faolan tilts his head to one side. “Is that your way of telling me to fetch my own bloody trousers, Trouble?”

I swallow, and he tracks the movement with his gaze. “Aye.”

He grins. “Good girl.”

I stumble back as he roots for a fresh set from the mess of cloth and trinkets clustered round the legs of his desk. He steps into a pair without much ceremony, and it’s all I can do not to collapse onto the bed.

There’s no trick. No threat. His smile is bemused but not the least cruel.

“Faolan—”

“What do you know about your grandmother?”

My hand falls to the bedpost as he ties the trousers in place. “Why do you ask?”

“Because Gráinne is the reason we’re here.”

Warmth leaches from me as fast as it came. I search Faolan’s eyes for humor, only to find them serious for once—no spark of mischief igniting the midnight blue.

I should have cast you into the sea the moment you opened those eyes and I recognized you for what you were.

My nails bite into the wood. “You said you only met her once. That she is the one who sang about the Isle of Lost Souls—about me?”

He nods. “Aye, but I didn’t knowwhoshe was exactly at the time. Otherwise I’d have sailed straight for your father’s land to steal you away, wouldn’t I?”

The wood slips beneath my sweating palm. “Would you have?”