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Weakness

Idris

I dris had long ago accepted his miserable lot in life. It’d started with the loss of his parents, like the first storms of autumn, harsh and destructive. He had grown colder with the hardships he faced as a boy on the streets of Fenrir, turning glacial when Grinnick died. For the past fifteen years as a Knight of the Order of the Valiant, Idris had been frozen. Numb. Resigned. Isolated in an endless winter.

Last night, Anya had cracked him open.

Now, his blood flowed like spring melt, swift and urgent. When once his most vulnerable emotions felt dormant, they were now awakened, emboldened, like bulbs pushing through hard ground. Possibility warmed him like precious sunshine.

In the span of one night, his seasons had changed. He’d thawed .

Lying with Anya in his arms—her soft body boneless with sleep—a new sort of fierceness now swept through Idris. His loyalty toward his Order still clung to him like frost—but a new devotion was taking shape. He squeezed Anya a little tighter, relishing her closeness and the delicate, dreadful optimism of her presence.

This complicated things. How could it not? Sleeping with her didn’t change the fact that he was duty-bound to a life of solitude; wanting to be with her didn’t diminish his loyalty to his brother’s memory; caring about her didn’t change the unpredictability of the Mirror’s vision. How could he, in good conscience, let this continue without being forthright about his limitations, his failures, and the danger of his mere presence? How could he explain that which he was not permitted to voice?

Anya made a squeaky, satisfied sound, nestling closer to his chest. Idly, he kissed her temple. It was early morning, and the chill of last night’s freeze permeated the walls of the cabin—but here in bed, they were warm. Impervious to the cold.

Anya slid her hand up Idris’s torso, from his abdominals to the base of his neck. She traced the hollow dip beneath his throat, then pressed her delicious curves against him, stretching up to kiss him in the same place, right on his tattoo. He tipped his face down, brushing his lips across hers softly, then pulling back far enough to stare into her pretty amber-brown eyes. The depth of them—flecked with gold, star-like around her pupils—seemed endless. A land he could wander for an eternity.

“You’re quiet,” Anya said, brushing her hand over the stubble on his cheek, up into his hair.

He leaned into the scratch of her fingernails. “I’m always quiet.”

“You weren’t last night,” she teased.

He chuckled into her hair.

“What’s on your mind?”

“You.”

She scraped her nails lightly down his neck, over his chest. Sensation pulsed in his groin.

“Good things, I hope?” she asked.

He growled long and low, then gripped her jaw. The scent of her—the sweet tang of her fresh arousal—told him she liked his commanding hold. “Not good, no.”

She pouted, but her pupils had expanded. “If not good things, then…?”

“Wicked things,” he murmured, biting her lower lip.

“I see.” She grinned against his mouth. “And here I was worried I’d disappointed you.”

Idris rolled on top of her. “Never.”