Page 18 of Tales of a Deadly Devotion (Tales of a Monstrous Heart, #2)

How his fingers tangled with my own, still marked by the darkness he’d summoned. That crescent moon at the knuckle that I dragged my fingers over.

I won’t leave you alone to that darkness, Kat.

He hadn’t. I wasn’t alone. It was me who’d left him, sleeping in that bed as I’d wandered into that nightmare and nearly got him torn apart. How ravenously and how he’d screamed out from the agony of it.

‘In that darkness … I forgot my own name.’ My voice broke with those words. Remembering the brush of death’s breath, how close I’d allowed it to come. ‘But I remembered yours, Emrys.’

Even in the depths of my pain I remembered his name.

That he was there. Waiting. That he would call me back.

‘You asked me to stay,’ I whispered, knowing I’d made my choice in the pit. His hands captured my face, thumbs wiping away my tears. Breath unsteady with restraint, but I tightened my grip on his forearms. Holding him to me.

Knowing it haunted him as it haunted me.

So much had changed but I didn’t want this to change.

Not this fragile tangle of threads between us.

He touched me as if he couldn’t resist, his fingers brushing along my jaw, the arch of my ear and then the curve of my throat.

As if the flutter of my pulse against his fingers was the most important thing in the world.

‘I didn’t know what I’d do if you didn’t come back.’ His voice was like gravel, breaking ever so slightly as his fingers trembled against my flesh. ‘I thought I knew fear. Then you were so cold in my arms, Kat.’

‘I’m here.’ I pushed myself up, rising onto my tiptoes to brush those words so gently across his lips, done with the distance and all the things unsaid.

I may have been broken. Too many sharp pieces pressed together inside of me but there were spaces between the cracks. Spaces I wanted this strange forsaken thing between us to fill.

‘I’m wrong, Kat.’ His fingers slipped into my hair, moving gently through the strands. Hesitant but not pushing me away.

‘Kysillians burn, Emrys.’ My fingers curled into his shirt. The Kysillian curse: to be consumed by our own fire. That was the story of my blood. The price of my magic. A fate I should have followed. ‘If we’re nothing but our stories, then that is mine.’

‘No, it isn’t.’ There was a firmness to his denial. So sharp and sure I couldn’t help but smile.

‘Then this darkness isn’t yours.’ I brushed those words hesitantly against his jaw, breaking the stoic spell over him as he pulled me the rest of the miniscule distance to him.

So his lips could claim my own. Soft and devout, as if we’d been allowed time to court.

As if there was nothing beyond us. This thing burning more wildly between us than the flames in my blood.

And for that moment, there was nothing but the warmth of him, the tentative brush of his magic and the swelling of emotion in my chest as I dug my fingers into his strong back. Wanting him closer. Wanting him to never retreat again. To have all of him. Darkness or no.

An icy blast of wind came through the window, causing a shiver to move through me. He pulled back the barest inch. Breath uneven.

‘You’re cold,’ he observed, worry creasing his brow. ‘Let’s get you a tonic before Gideon reprimands me again.’

‘I’m fine,’ I countered, but his hand slipped easily into my own as he guided me through the study and to his desk. Ignoring my small protest as he began to look through his things. ‘Gideon came back?’

‘I didn’t give him much choice.’ His smile was grim as he found the vial he was looking for.

‘William’s pleased,’ I noted, resting myself on the edge of the desk as Emrys uncorked the healing tonic and held it out to me. Thankfully this one smelt like burnt sugar.

‘That doesn’t say much. William thinks Thean is pleasant company,’ he observed dryly, making a small breathless laugh escape my lips. The sound seemed to startle him for a moment, as if it was the last thing he’d expected to hear.

‘Rebels seem to be the least of our worries,’ I pointed out, my smile small and self-mocking but it captured his complete attention none the less as I quickly drank the tonic. Wanting it out of the way so maybe he’d kiss me again.

‘I couldn’t agree more, Miss Woodrow,’ came a sharp male voice I didn’t recognise, my magic rising in alarm at a presence it didn’t know.

The surge of it painfully stealing my breath and making me choke on the remains of the tonic in my throat.

The vial slipped from my fingers to shatter on the floor as Emrys went rigid at my side.

The shadows in the room darkened, muting the morning sunlight.

A thin man stood in the study doorway, wearing Council-issued hunting leathers. The insignia of the boar on his collar as he grinned, showing crooked gold front teeth. His fingers curled into the collar of William’s shirt, the boy white as a sheet in his clutches.

‘Blackthorn. A tricky man to get hold of these days,’ he drawled with cruel amusement, but he didn’t need to say anything. I knew by that smug glint in his hateful eyes – my time avoiding the Council was finally up.