Page 50 of Silvercloak

Blame the magic; it was something of an aphrodisiac.

“I’m already in this, Killor. Might as well have some fun with it.”

Hells,Saffron thought. She could die tomorrow. They both could.

That nihilistic fearlessness swelled and crested, and she ceded to it.

Their mouths met again, hot and wanting, pointed teeth and the hard gold of the piercing, a forked tongue flicking over hers, a palmful of claws digging into the narrow of her waist.

The nearest walls of the Jaded Saint folded into a pocket, a private nook, until there was a mere sliver of space through which the rest of the tavern could be seen. Their alcove was twined with ivy and hazy with spores, candlelight flickering, the bard’s music both distant and immediate, the twang of strings rippling across the surface of Saff’s skin.

Nissa’s kissing intensified into hungry bites, digging into Saff’s lower lip before tracing a path across her jawbone, her neck, her collarbone. Saff laced her hands through the silken sheets of Nissa’s hair, a rough moan escaping before she could snatch it back, that bright, burning power from the brand surging and curling inside her.

Reaching for her magic, Saff whispered, “Ans omnivolan.”

The pleasure spell pressedhardat all the tender places in Nissa’s body: the throat and the nipples and the inner thighs; the soft pulsingpeak and somewhere deep, deep inside; all of it met with a sudden intense pressure.

Nissa gasped, breath hooking sharply inward, eyes widening.

“Saints, are you hurt?” Saffron muttered, pulling away. She realized too late that the searing agony of the brand had churned her well into something ferocious, somethingmonstrous.Her magical well was overflowing, and the spell had been cast far too strongly.

But judging from the dilated pupils and the parted lips, Nissa had enjoyed the added potency.

“Ans omnivolan,” Saff murmured again, twice more, raw magic pressing over and over against Nissa’s most tender places.

After everything that had been done to Saffron in the last few hours, it felt good to take control.She and Nissa were perpetually caught in this ravenous push-pull, a grapple of reins, a tug-of-war, neither of them naturally submissive, both of them hungry for power. Nissa usually won this tussle, but Saff still tried to assert herself anyway.

Saff pressed her mouth to Nissa’s neck, feeling the frantic pulse against her lips, then pressed the tip of her wand between Nissa’s legs. “Ans vorticaloran.”

Swirling heat.

Another gasp loosed from Nissa’s throat, golden eyes fluttering closed for a moment, losing herself in the spell. The swirling heat still pulsing over her—Saffron wouldn’t let the enchantment drop until it peaked and cascaded—Nissa pressed her own wand between Saffron’s legs.

“Sen laceran,” Nissa purred, drawing a slit down the central seam of Saffron’s trousers—and slicing clean through her underwear.

With her other hand, Nissa traced a claw downward, a stark line drawn over Saffron’swant,both soft and hard, both painful andgood,and a tremor rippled through Saff, more power rushing into her well with alarming force.Slender fingers circled and pressed, and their mouths met once more, Nissa breathing raggedly from the swirling magical heat between her legs. Saffron’s pleasure towered and deepened, something vital inside herself coming back to life, a pool refilled, a humanity restored.

All at once, Saff was glad Nissa knew the truth about her immunity to magic, glad she could relinquish herself to the simple thrill of a hand between her legs, of knuckles pressed against her inner thigh, of a sharp claw probing the place where everything throbbed.

“Et ascevolo,” Nissa incanted, flicking the table upward with her wand until it pressed flat against the ceiling, tumblers shattering around them like rain. Then she sank to her knees on the shard-covered floor, kneeling in front of the bench and looping Saffron’s legs over her shoulders. Through the slit in Saff’s underwear, Nissa gave a single forked lick, every inch of Saffron shuddering and gasping.

Nissa clasped Saff’s hips, tugging her closer as she drew flickering circles with her tongue, soft and wet and reverent, and Saffron leaned her head back against the wall, surrendering herself to the pleasure, trying not to think about searing pokers and wrists shackled apart, trying not to think at all. Trying only tofeel.

The pleasure peaked with a shattering moan, and the table came clattering back to the ground, narrowly missing Nissa’s head.

Nissa maneuvered herself back onto the bench, her lips red and swollen, the kohl around her eyes smudged. “Hells,” she muttered. “Who knew being compromised could feel so good?”

Skin still on fire, Saffron repaired the tear in her trousers. “Ans annetan.”

Then she sighed deeply, pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes. Though the feeling of a replenished well was a welcome relief, she felt a kind of creeping sadness as reality edged back in. She would not be returning to Nissa’s bed tonight, falling asleep with exhausted limbs entwined, embers and coal crackling in a grate. She would be going to face the Bloodmoons, face fear and torture and death.

As the walls of the Jaded Saint folded outward and the clamor of the tavern rushed back to greet them, Nissa read the dread on Saffron’s face.

“Who do you need to find?” Nissa said carefully, arranging her disheveled robes. “Now that we’ve established I’m already in this, and it’s rather hot.”

Saff wanted to protest, wanted to insist Nissa shouldn’t get involved any further than she had to. But of all the choices sprawling out infront of her, all the potential prongs in the fork, none of them seemed good.

If she wanted to stay alive, she had to find Zares.