Page 32 of Artemysia

“Doesn’t anything make you want to scream with fury? Cry until you’re hoarse? Don’t you want out? To escape it all? I do!” He scoops up a rock near the fire and pitches it against the wall. It sparks silver as it shatters.

Difficult emotions well up in my throat, but of course, he’s right, and I don’t show it.

I push it aside to stay strong for others.

My face crumples into that pathetic expression I know it makes before I burst into tears.

“For me, it eats away at my heart, what I have to do every single day . Every mission. Every fight. But it keeps our city safe, our people alive. It keeps those I love alive. What else would you have me do? Sit around and wait to be killed? Like my mother?”

No longer able to contain myself, I grimace as tears well up and stream down my cheeks.

I don’t care if I look broken, because I am neither strong nor whole in this moment.

How we escaped the most Syf I have ever encountered, I have no idea—except if Riev hadn’t destroyed more than half the band like he did, giving us a fighting chance, we would all have died.

No one would have known.

Our bodies would’ve decomposed in the forest. My father would never know what happened to me. Syf would continue to attack without an end in sight.

“Who’s going to make it all better? There’s just me.” My voice is unnaturally high, punctuated by gasping sobs. “If I break down and cry like I am now, how is anything fixed? That’s what I’m scared of. That everything I do is for nothing, and nothing will ever get better.”

The tidal wave of feelings overwhelms me. Feelings I’ve never shared with anyone, and they spill forth like a winter flood, gaining momentum.

I’m wiping away snot, but I am also shouting back at him now.

“When I’m old— if I live to be a crinkled old woman—will I still sleep with a dagger and sword next to me in case of a Syf attack?

Will this just go on forever? The killing on both sides?

I can’t stand to think of it. So I tell myself I’m taking the right steps to change things.

But you’re right. I don’t know if it’s helping.

In the end, maybe all we do is meaningless. I try anyway. In case it’s not .”

I hiccup and my shoulders convulse. I’ve never cried like this in front of someone.

Riev reels back as if slapped. “Curse the gods. I’m such an asshole. Elphie, you don’t ever show fear or defeat. I didn’t know you ever felt like this.”

He moves to grasp my hand, but I step back out of reach, flattening against the wall of the cave. Ivy’s fire flickers and cracks next to us.

The crestfallen look on his face hurts me as much as my own fears.

His brows lower, but his eyes drill through me. “Listen to me. You and I are but souls trapped in a cage. I scream into the dark while you make wishes on the moons above.”

“You’re—you’re saying I’m an idealistic moron,” I blubber. “Some of the colonels would agree—”

He doesn’t let me finish. “But then…you make those damned wishes come true.” He pauses to take a jagged breath.

“So don’t you dare start screaming in the dark with me.

Keep wishing. Keep being yourself. Keep being the hope and beauty in the world, Elphie.

Everything you do is for others. Individuals matter to you.

You see the good in each and every person. ”

His celestial eyes latch onto mine. He’s as utterly defeated as any man could be. “But please, see me for who I am. The dirt, the ugly. I’m sorry.”

He truly believes what he says, and it breaks me apart.

“You’re not ugly.” I sniff pathetically. “You say you’re handsome all the time.”

“The truth is…” His tone softens. “You could’ve died, and I wanted you to leave me there and ride to safety.

It terrified me when you got back on my elk and came for me.

It terrified me more than anything else that’s happened to me in my life—the thought of you dying on my account.

I’m not worth someone else’s life; I’m not worth your life.

” His eyes darken, endless inky pools in the smoky gray.

When he looks at me like this, I feel as if I may ignite in flames.

All-consuming. Intense. Vulnerable.

A pulse of silence lingers between us.

My heart pounds from grief, anger, my confession of fear, my roiling emotions.

He feels the same. I can see it in his rapidly rising chest, his pinched brows over his unblinking eyes.

“You’re no less worthy than anyone else,” I whisper through the salty tears trickling over my lips.

His chest heaves unevenly, and with a sudden move, he grips my chin roughly in his broad palm. For some reason, this simple motion spears a wash of heat from where he touches my jaw, down my neck to my breasts, ending in a coiling warmth in my lower belly.

I’m lured in by his fingertips, and when I shut my eyes, the shadows of the orange flames beside us flicker on the backs of my eyelids.

He kisses the tears off my cheeks one by one, and suddenly his mouth slams into mine.

He kisses me, not in the gentle way his lips ghosted against my face to steal my tears away, but in a greedy reaping of dark desires.

I reciprocate, my tongue flicking his as my hands drape around his neck. I curve into him, my breasts aching as I feel the heat of his torso—his own chest straining under my touch.

When I murmur into his mouth, “Touch me, Riev,” he doesn’t hesitate.

He relieves my ache as his thumbs flick over my taut nipples, pinching and rolling them through my cotton shirt, sending sparks through my core, ending between my thighs. A soft moan escapes my lips as I soak in the strong juniper scent of him, mixed with blood and sweat.

“Give me more,” I demand.

He unzips the front of my pants and slips past my underwear, past the light dusting of hair, and uses a palm to cup the slickness building there. Gently grazing a finger between my legs, he inhales sharply. “How are you so damn wet already? Is it the fighting? The arguing?”

I choke down a laugh as he captures my mouth against his in a frenzied kiss.

His lips taste like blood. Salty and desperate.

He must be in pain from the cut on his head, but he doesn’t show it.

I love how real our kiss tastes: of battle, of heartbreak, of tears and pain, but also of hope and passion.

My hands work to unbuckle his belt and untie his pants, my lustful needs unfolding as quickly as my body flushes hot with thrilling heat when I feel the steely length of his erection in my hands.

He’s silky, hard, and—

My fingers run over two smooth, low ridges ringing his shaft partway down and another larger, bulged ridge near the base. I pull away from his mouth and work his pants down his hips to see what I’m touching.

I glance up at him, questioning. Partially questioning myself, too, as to why merely looking at extra bands of width and texture would turn me on even more.

“I don’t know if it’s because I’m only maybe half…human.” His mouth is downturned with uncertainty, and it’s entirely endearing. “The ridges are where I widen when I’m about to come. It’s okay if you don’t want to touch me—” He swallows down his hoarse vo ice and looks away, his cheeks reddening.

Even more girth? Good gods. A flare of heat spreads in my belly.

“You’re beautiful,” I breathe. He’s larger than anyone I’ve ever touched, and the enthralling thought of those bulges stretching me from the inside ratchets up the desperate ache between my legs.

His dark lashes drop thickly as he watches me spring him out the rest of the way over his underwear. He groans as I stroke his velvety length, closing his eyes in what seems like the torment of lust.

I want to taste him. I need this right now. Desire spikes between my thighs as I graze my breasts down the front of his torso.

His eyes widen when I lower to my knees and ease onto the hard rock. He shakes his head. “You don’t have to. I want you . Let me…I want to taste…you.” He barely gets the words out.

“You’re not the only one who wants something right now.

” I silence his protest when my lips wrap around the thick head of his cock, and I suck him down, feeling the ridges burgeoning as I run over them with my mouth.

I widen my jaw to accommodate the size of him as he hits the back of my throat.

My stomach tumbles at the thought of him inside me, elsewhere—more than a little concerned at how it would all fit.

But right now, he’s at my mercy, and I love how he trembles in my hands.

He throws his head back in a breathless gasp.