Page 88 of The Shadowed Oracle (The Bonded Worlds #1)

Chapter Forty-Six

By the time Ingrid returned to her room, her exhaustion had turned to restlessness, sitting up in her bed and rolling her father’s viseer stone in her hands.

She peered into it every few minutes, hoping to see that glint of power still in there.

It was the only thing she had remaining of her father, and she dreaded the thought of his stored magic vanishing before she’d even known it was in there.

There are rumors of Oracle’s using stones like backup reserves, Tyla had told her .

To use it when they are in need.

It was only speculation. Something Tyla was hesitant to tell her about in the first place.

But the way the stone awoke, after she’d been calling out to those that came before her, it was impossible to ignore.

She and her friends would likely be dead if it hadn’t helped—if her raw, untrained power wasn’t guided and supplemented by it.

She took one last glance into the amber gem, squinting with one eye before returning the necklace beneath her blouse, then leaning over to blow out the light by her bed.

She slunk down, just about to slide under the duvet when a knock came at the door. Still mostly dressed, she stood up, threw her long black coat over her shoulders. “Come in.”

The hinges of the old cabin creaked open slowly.

Dean appeared from behind, emerging from the shadows of the dark hallway below the ship.

He was dressed in his own clothes again, out of the well-worn merchant’s attire.

The bloody loincloth he’d been forced to wear in the arena, he joked, was thrown into the sea just minutes before.

When he was returning to his room after washing, he saw the light was still on in Ingrid’s cabin and wanted to check in on her.

As always, Ingrid returned a curt, “I’m fine.”

Dean laughed at the predictability. “And I’m good too, just in case you were wondering.”

“I wasn’t,” she lied.

Since Dean abruptly left Callinora’s room after the restraints were set up on the princess’s bed, she’d been wondering how to approach him.

Ingrid had taken two or maybe three steps to track him down before convincing herself he was better off.

She’d been so attuned to the chaotic emotions circulating on the ship that she didn’t trust herself to be good company for anyone.

It was why she’d returned to her room and closed herself off as best she could.

“Any hangover?” Dean asked. “Karis had difficulties, sometimes. After using his magic.”

“Ahh, hangovers. I remember those. Awful, but I’d take them over whatever this is any day.”

Dean gave her a knowing smile. “I thought so.”

“You do know everything.”

“No.” He hung his head. “I’m realizing more and more, assuming I know anything gets me in trouble.” He looked to his knife, hinting at the scuffle with Veston. “I was just angry. Scared.”

“I felt the same,” Ingrid said. “Maradenn, I think I resent them for having to rely on them. Maybe it’s just some weird Oracle thing. But the thought of them, of that place, it sets me on edge.”

Dean stepped closer to the bed, urging her to go on.

“It’s strange,” Ingrid said, again reaching for her necklace.

“When I held that magic in my hands, I felt invincible. I felt weightless. I felt… nothing, but in the best possible way. As soon as the action stopped, though, all kinds of little images and spikes of emotion hit. Not to mention the little aches popping up.” She gently touched her jaw, checking in on the bruises that had formed after her tussle with Arryn.

“It’s healing already,” she added. “But you must have worse, I’m sure.”

Dean reached for his sleeve, pulling it up to reveal a cut the length of a Wrane’s nail. “I think this is the worst of it. Should be gone by tomorrow.”

“Let me see.” Ingrid patted the bed, beckoning him to sit so she could take a look. He did, the thin cushion of the mattress now sagging a bit with the weight of him.

Ingrid made herself comfortable, lifting her hand inches above his skin and trailing her finger along the cut. It was deep, but clotted, and there was the faint scent of blood, though it was nearly masked by the stronger whiff of Dean’s Earth-made soap. Cedarwood and sweet bourbon.

It reminded Ingrid of the cheap whiskey he’d order at her bar.

“I never asked you,” Ingrid said, still assessing his wound from every angle. “Why did you always order the shitty stuff from my bar?”

“What?”

“When you came into my bar, why’d you always order?—”

“Oh, right.” Dean bent his uninjured arm to face her.

“That brand.” He shook his head, a complicated smile forming.

“It was what Karis bought me for my twenty-first birthday. I’m almost positive he just asked the cashier what a good present for a twenty-one-year-old was.

They told him booze, so he bought the first bottle he found. ”

“Sounds thoughtful.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Dean said. “But for Karis, it was spot on. He never drank, and he never understood things like birthday gifts. Never understood most human things. His head was too full of visions and epiphanies and meditations on life. Every outing we went on, every ball game or trip to the zoo, it was like being chaperoned by an alien. I’d have to explain everything. ”

“Well, technically,” Ingrid mused. “He was an alien.”

“But I never thought of it like that,” he said. “He was the fun one in my family, so I just thought every adult was either detached, or…” He dropped his head. “Crazy.”

Shifting closer, Ingrid slid her finger to meet the top of Dean’s shoulder, drawing a circle. “You think that’ll happen to me?”

“What? Going crazy?” Dean angled his chin to face her.

“I meant detached, like Karis. Losing touch with the human things.”

“I fucking hope note. I’m starting to get used to all your little quirks.”

“Even the bad ones?”

“Especially the bad ones.”

Ingrid’s fingers slipped from his shoulder, falling to the center of his back. Dean slumped into her touch, and Ingrid could feel the warmth of him through his shirt, the muscle rippling underneath.

“Which ones are your favorite?”

“I like your temper,” Dean returned immediately. “I like that you’re incapable of taking a compliment. I like…”

Ingrid waited for the next on his list, but it didn’t come. “Why’d you stop?” she asked.

“That was where you usually interrupt me,” Dean said. “I was waiting for the sassy, self-deprecating comeback.”

“Do you like those too?”

“Yes.”

Her heartbeat quickened. Mindlessly, suddenly, achingly, she slipped her hand lower, reaching underneath the material of his shirt and exhaling as her palm met his skin. She held it there, almost paralyzed as the reality of what she was doing sank in.

“I like your stubbornness,” Dean went on, as if nothing had changed, as if the barrier hadn’t even existed in the first place. “I like the way your nostrils flare when you’re mad. I like the way your right arm moves awkwardly when you run.”

“Hey!” She pinched him playfully. “I don’t run awkwardly.”

“Yes, you do.” He turned, astonished she didn’t know this about herself. “No one has ever mentioned that?”

“No. Which means you’re?—”

Dean didn’t let her finish. “Either I’m the only one with the balls to tell you.” He leaned in. “Or I’m the only one who watches you that closely.”

Ingrid’s voice caught, rapt by the feeling she’d been trying so hard to push away.

A terrifying, dizzying sensation, but undeniably needed.

The euphoria of getting out of the Isles alive, or simply because it had been so long, she needed the release of touch.

Needed it not just for her pleasure, or for the simple desire.

Akin to her magic aligning, she needed every facet of herself to awaken and be set free from the past. It felt as if her ability to go on in this new world depended on it.

She needed to let that part of herself—affection, lust, basic intimacy—breathe.

Let it live again after being buried with the trauma that had poisoned it long ago.

Dean hovered inches from her.

She emitted the smallest breath, inviting him.

And he feverishly lunged forward to meet her lips.

They held there, locked together. Ingrid’s hands explored the contours of his arms, his shoulders, his taut chest and sharp jaw.

Dean returned the strokes with such vigor that Ingrid went from the initiator to the passenger in seconds.

His hands framed her face as he slowly picked up the rhythm of their kissing.

She parted her lips for him, gliding her tongue softly over his, losing herself to the grip he had her in.

Her hands slid to his abdominals, down to his thighs, and then up to feel all of him.

He groaned and pushed her firmly on her back, undressing himself on his knees before her. Ingrid ripped her own clothes off as she watched him. Dean’s eyes were wild, seized by pure animal instinct and causing a nearly imperceptible grin to tug at his cheeks.

He moved to his stomach, drawing a line with his lips from her thighs back to her mouth, worshipping her wordlessly before looking into her red and golden eyes. Ingrid returned the gaze, unflinching. Watching as he aligned himself, barely remembering to breathe.

She burned, anticipating the connection, twitching in suspense.

Then the room went black.