Page 69 of The Frost Witch (The Covenants of Velora #1)

We climbed in strained silence. The few times I caught Garrick looking my way, he turned away just as fast. Even Isanara’s reappearance was not enough to loosen the tension between us.

The quiet gave me time to plot.

I set up my bedroll while Garrick pulled out our food supplies and began to prepare the evening meal.

He’d augmented our stores before departing from the tavern on the other side of the Devotion Gate, but it had taken us longer than it should have to travel between the two gates, even with Garrick carrying me.

If the Memory Gate did not await us the next morning, we would have gotten to try our hands at hunting.

As I watched Garrick’s competent hands at work, I felt certain they’d have been up to the task. But I wanted them otherwise occupied.

Wingbeats overhead signaled Isanara’s return. She’d joined us around midday before taking off again. The tiniest barb of regret formed inside of me at what I was about to ask of her.

“The stained one has already reached the temple,” Isanara reported.

“We expected as much,” I replied, though I did relay the confirmation to Garrick. He nodded. Apparently, talking to me was too dangerous now, too.

“Have you eaten today?” I asked my familiar. She circled the campsite we’d set up at the edge of a valley, flaring her wings in and out in a series of movements she always seemed to repeat after extended periods of flying. The dragon equivalent of stretching, maybe.

Her head snapped up, yellow-green eyes finding me instantly. “ I gorged myself on a vein of iron,” she said. “I will tell you if I need your help finding nourishment.”

“ That was the agreement,” I agreed. “In order to get you to stop rooting around my pack like a toddler.”

She snapped her jaws in my direction.

I responded with a smile. “Not a fan of the comparison?”

“Are you being irritating intentionally?”

“I often wonder the same thing about you,” I shot back. But she’d caught me. “I thought if you were in a huff, maybe you would fly off for another few hours.”

Her neck swerved to the side, scales glimmering teal and then violet, then back to lavender in the dying evening light. “And why would you want me to do that?”

I looked pointedly past her curved horns to where Garrick knelt over the fire, turning the roasted potatoes.

Isanara blinked up at me. I knew that dragons could not smile. Her muscles did not quite work that way. But the swish of her tail from side to side said enough—Isanara was enjoying herself immensely.

When I did not speak, she planted herself on the ground and curled her tail around her hind legs. “I guess I will just settle in for the night, then.”

She was going to make me say it.

“Isanara.” My cheeks flushed, but I ignored them.

I had almost died at the Devotion Gate. There was every possibility I would not survive the remaining three gates.

I was not about to be bullied by a teenager.

“If you choose to stay, I will not be held responsible for whatever emotional scarring your precious adolescent mind might have to endure when Garrick and I ? —”

“Disgusting!” Isanara hissed, flapping her wings wide. Garrick rocked back on his heels, eyes darting between us.

My familiar launched into the sky in a blaze of iridescent scales, spikes cutting through several thinner branches that got in her way. Garrick blinked at me across the fire.

I shrugged. “Teenagers.”

Garrick served dinner an hour later. I lingered over every bite, humming suggestively as I savored the spices he’d used to season the potatoes and cured bacon he’d sliced into bits and sprinkled over the top.

The creamy cheese melted on my tongue, marrying all the flavors together.

I’d never learned to cook, but I was usually more than happy to eat.

Tonight, I ate every bite of food in my bowl. I did not want to hear a single word from Garrick the fucking Red questioning my strength for what was to come.

Night fell fully around us as we cleaned out our bowls and Garrick stacked enough firewood to last through the coldest hours. Now was the time of night when Garrick usually retired to his furs to brood, while I argued with Isanara from mine on the opposite side of the fire.

But Isanara was gone, and the only person I would be arguing with tonight was Garrick. It was an argument I intended to win.

I unstrapped my belt first, tossing it down alongside my furs. That should have been his first clue. Usually, I tucked it underneath the spare linen shift I used as a pillow.

Next was my knee-length leather vest. Just like every night, I loosened the trio of metal buckles that held it closed over my stomach and just below my breasts. Sleeping in layers was the only reasonable way to stay warm in the frigid cold of Velora nights. At least when you were sleeping alone.

As I shrugged off the vest, the cold night air rushed in, seeking the covered parts of me that had been nestled beneath its thick insulating layer.

My sapphire blue wool gown, embroidered with purple and silver thread, provided some protection.

But it worked best sandwiched between linen and leather.

I unfastened the ties that cinched the fabric in on either hip and then dragged the garment over my head. At the same time, I kicked off my boots.

Something heavy hit the ground.

I licked my lips, but forced myself to continue in slow, deliberate movements. I tugged on the neckline of the dress until it popped loose over my shoulders, leaving my unbound hair drifting down over my collarbone, the corners curling around my breasts.

Breasts with nipples that instantly rose to attention beneath my shift.

“What are you doing?” Garrick’s voice was rough, like the stubble on his chin and the calluses on his hands.

“I am undressing for bed,” I said as I turned. I bent at the waist and made a fuss of adjusting my furs, giving ample time for Garrick to admire my backside.

Was it brazen and a little backhanded? Absolutely.

But I was not forcing him. Garrick the Red was a legendary bounty hunter and seasoned warrior. Although I could read his tells and expressions now, he was a male in control of his own body.

I was simply making his choices very clear.

“Witch,” he groaned. “This is not a good idea.”

I flipped my hair over my shoulder and nodded. “That is what you told me before.” But I wasn’t about to agree with him.

I reached for the neckline of my shift.

“You are more than welcome?—”

I pulled the bow apart, and the linen fell away to reveal my shoulders and the soft upper curves of my breasts.

“—to let the fire go to ashes?—”

I flicked my fingers, and the fire extinguished, plunging us into darkness.

“—and go to sleep.”

I pulled the shift over my head and tossed it onto the ground between us. The sound of the fabric hitting the snow should have been nearly imperceptible. But I felt the reverberations, and I knew Garrick did, too.

For a moment we stood frozen in absolute silence.

I reached my arms overhead and stretched, my breasts lifting with the motion. If Garrick possessed the keen eyesight that the half-fae blood in his veins promised, he could not help but see. Then I rolled my shoulders one final time before lying down on the furs.

It was cold. Of course it was cold. It was Velora at night, in the middle of a cursed, perpetual winter. But I was a frost witch. The cold had already killed me once. My second death would be at a different hand.

For several beats of silence, I thought his better judgment might win out. I even slid my hand down the center of my body, prepared to see to my own needs. It would be Garrick’s name I called out when I climaxed.

“I am the only one who will be touching you there tonight.”

My fingers fluttered around my belly button.

“Is that so?” I breathed, my voice shaking. I had not lost my confidence, but the pure eroticism of him speaking to me like that, his voice heavy with command, knocked loose something primal within me.

Every footstep he took across the campsite was a physical sensation within my body, thrumming with the anticipation of him coming closer. But he did not reach for me or take off his clothing or join me in the furs. He stood at the edge of my bedroll, fully clothed, staring down at my naked body.

Even in the dark, I could see the faint glow of his remarkable turquoise eyes.

“Get on your knees, Koryn.”

Gods help me, I did as he commanded.

My lower lip pouted out, but Garrick was there to catch it. He scraped his thumb over the sensitive skin, his callouses drawing out a tingle of pain. I slid my tongue forward, eager for everything he’d give me.

He caught my wrist, lifting it to his mouth.

I expected him to press a kiss to the palm or the fresh pink scar on the inside of my arm.

Instead, he dragged his tongue over the Lifebind inked on my skin.

My back bowed, my entire existence centering in on the feeling of his hot tongue against my cool skin.

He cursed under his breath in that foreign tongue he only used when he was at the edge of his control.

“You can say no at any time,” he said, his voice rough as the words scraped out. He was as affected as I was. I nodded. Of course I did.

“I need to hear you say it, Koryn. You need to say aloud that you will tell me to stop if that is what you want.”

There was such power in his voice, barely restrained. Every line of his body was corded with muscle, his voice lined with strength, but I understood what he meant. He might tell me what to do, but I held the power in this exchange.

“I can tell you to stop at any time,” I said. I would have said anything if it got him to keep touching me.

“If you ask it, I will stop.” He dragged his tongue over my Lifebind again. “Even if it fucking kills me.”

I licked my lips, remembering how it had driven him to distraction in the tavern. “Are you going to stand there with all your clothes on? It seems impossibly unfair.”