Page 30 of The Unseen Hour (The Unseen Hour Duology #1)

O rion’s fingers tangled in my hair. His lips were full and soft against mine.

Instead of sating the desire in me, the kiss just fanned it into a flame. As the weeks had gone on, I’d found myself thinking more and more frequently of what it might be like to have Orion’s hands on me.

I reached out, wrapping one hand behind the back of his neck, pulling him closer. It still wasn’t enough.

Orion moved his attentions, kissing just below my jaw, then all the way down my neck. I gasped when he reached a particularly sensitive spot.

He pulled back, looking down at my hand. Then, he leaned and kissed each finger.

“I’ve been wanting to do that for weeks now,” he admitted.

“You’re not the only one.”

His kiss had awoken the increasingly familiar combination of heat and need between my thighs. It was the sort of longing a real lady would have ignored, if she’d had such a sensation to begin with.

I had no desire to do that.

The longer I spent with Ry, the more time I wanted to spend with him. We hadn’t had any discussions about what life would be like in Emrys if, and after, we’d accomplished what we’d set out to do .

Part of me had wondered if he was afraid to get his hopes up.

We’d certainly made no promises to one another, and I knew that the situation would be complicated for many reasons.

His long absence, my own reappearance, Bellamy—although I had to believe he’d moved on after months of my absence—plus the potential that we’d have a very upset deity after us for ruining his hour.

“You’re frowning,” Orion observed. “Now, I’ll admit to being out of practice, but surely I can’t be that bad of a kisser?”

“I’ve never been kissed,” I said.

“Really?”

I shrugged.

“Keeping up with some sort of tryst, or becoming infatuated with someone I wasn’t engaged to … it would only have put me at risk of gossip.”

“I got the idea that didn’t bother you.”

“It doesn’t, but I never met someone worth the trouble.”

He smirked.

“What about now?”

I put a finger to my chin, pretending to think.

“I suppose I’d to be open to it, if I found the right man.”

He threw a hand over his heart.

“You haven’t found him? I’m wounded. Tell me then, Starlight, what do you require from a suitor?”

“I want someone I can trust to carry my heart. Someone who has the same thirst to learn, and see, and explore. Someone who sees me. Not a Hipnosi, not a woman who needs to mind her place, but me.”

And I’m pretty sure you’re exactly that man.

Orion put a hand on each side of my face.

“I see you, Starlight. Since the moment you got here, it’s been difficult to look at anything else. Your determination, your resilience, and your light.”

“Ry. I never thought I’d find someone like you. Not here, of all places.”

Then again, I’d been upset over the lack of options in Rayus.

A sudden chill tore through me, and I clung to Orion. Fog circled us.

“Bloody ghosts!” Orion cursed. “I have to go.”

I was ready to march up to Charon myself and tell him off for ruining the moment.

“I know. I’ll be here,” I said instead.

I followed him out to the garden, grabbing a few of the purple potatoes while he walked away. He was lost in the trees in a matter of seconds.

Orion returned late the following night with news.

“He’s growing paranoid. He’s still tight-lipped on details, but he mentioned the other meddling deities.

Either Death has been pushier than anticipated, or more of them are involved.

Either way, he’s said he plans to ‘see for himself’ what state his Shades are in.

He’ll be in the Meadow for the next few days. ”

In light of that rather large obstacle, we took the opportunity to spend more time in the forest. We hadn’t gone far from the cottage since our slycat encounter, but it was always possible that’s where my father was, anyway.

I’d felt better about his odds among the Shades or hiding in the Meadow than deep in the woods, with predators. Though perhaps the chances were about even.

I shuddered, picturing Father facing an angry slycat and its claws. He was smart, though. An experienced hunter. Surely he would know how to elude predators? After all, if he was in the forest, he’d also remained a secret to both Orion and Charon.

The following afternoon, we wandered through the trees. Just as we’d mapped out the Shades, Orion had sectioned off areas around his home to begin our search of the woods.

The swirling lights were purple and orange in the trees. The day had been pleasant. My hand was firmly in Orion’s, feeling as if it had belonged there all along.

“I used to love being outdoors at home. Riding Pellix, or sneaking off to bother the gardener.”

“At the rate you’ve gone through them all in the evenings, I’d have thought you spent most of your time reading books,” Orion observed.

He wasn’t wrong. I’d read everything on his shelf at least once, and some as many as three times.

I hopped over a log in our path. Taking a deep breath, I decided this was a good moment to bring up a particular book I still hadn’t mentioned.

R.’s words had comforted me and drawn me to the Ether.

But it was Orion’s words, and more importantly actions, that had caused me to fall for him once I was here.

I wanted to be free of this particular secret, which was starting to seem more silly and less serious the longer I held onto it.

“I do enjoy books, but I like being outdoors even more. The year before I ended up here, there was one particular text that I took with me. In the garden, in the sitting room. It was a constant companion. A diary of one of the doomed Holmes brothers.”

He stopped, eyes going wide.

I barreled on.

“I discovered it quite by accident, and I wasn’t the first Hipnosi to do so.

My father had written into the margins, between the lines, in every available space.

He was working for the royal family, on a mission to try to figure out the king’s disappearance.

He thought the answer lay in the Holmes writings.

That’s where he got his idea for Thipp’s root as a means to come down here, and where I did as well. ”

I kept walking, avoiding his eyes and waiting to see how he would respond.

“Once you told me about your father, I understood why you wanted to get here so badly. I’ve just never asked for more details about your methods.

I didn’t want to imagine you suffering. And now you say you figured the entire thing out based on a few scraps of writing?

If all you had to go on was the word of a few papers, that must have been difficult for you.

I’m graced with company as intelligent as she is intriguing. ”

I gaped at him.

“You’re not going to ask about the Holmes aspect of the whole thing?”

“We’ll get to that in a moment. After all, we have plenty of time to talk. I assume you’re not going anywhere?” He smiled, eyes glinting.

He helped me over another, larger log, and I sucked in a breath as he released me, still feeling the places his hands had been.

“Not for several months yet. And if I did, we’d be going together.”

There was no point denying it, because I had already made up my mind that I wanted to stay with Orion. I hadn’t worked out how that would play out in Emrys, when we were subject to certain restrictions again, but I was hopeful the two of us could figure out something.

If he wanted to, of course.

And the sooner we accomplished what I’d initially come down here for, the more time we would have to discuss that .

Orion held back a branch so I could walk along the path easier.

“How did you figure out a way to get down here in the first place, and come up with the antidote idea?”

“It wasn’t easy. There were times where part of me was tempted to give up.”

“Not that you’d ever give in to such temptations,” he said, an amused half-smile on his face.

I gave him my own wry grin in return.

“Of course not. Stubborn to a fault, that’s me.”

“I would have said determined .”

I threw back my head and laughed.

“I like your version, I must admit. Truthfully, if I’d been caught, it would have been devastating.

For my reputation—which I could have survived without.

But I wouldn’t have wanted to shame my family.

The Hipnosi daughter, running around town in her brother’s trousers and breaking into the library, what would people have made of such a thing? ”

Orion scowled.

“Hearing you say it aloud highlights how ludicrous it is. While I wish you’d had the opportunity to put your investigative talents toward something less morose than finding your way to the Ether, it undoubtedly required skill.

I ended up here by accident. You found a way here purposefully.

I gave up on any hope of sending myself back, or ending the Unseen Hour, until Death showed up with a plan, but you came prepared to work for both goals.

Even though we’ve been unsuccessful at locating your father, your resolve hasn’t wavered. ”

He helped me through a tangle of thick branches. Tree hoppers filled the area around us with song, and I could hear the chittering of the grey squirrels as they clambered up the trunks of trees.

I sighed .

“You’re not completely right about me. My resolve has wavered.

I miss my father, and he is the main reason I wanted to come.

The longer I’m here, though, and after talking to you and Death, the more aware I am that the stakes are much larger than even my love for my family.

Seeing the Shades day after day makes that fact impossible to ignore.

Everyone in that Meadow was someone’s … someone.

My main objective is the same, but with Death’s help I want to ensure no families suffer like ours again.

That’s part of why I wanted to talk to you about your brother’s journal. Your family has suffered, too.”

“I won't argue with you on that front. I’m torn on how I feel about the journal. Not that I mind you reading it,” he rushed to assure me, “but I don’t want to feel responsible for your being stuck here.”

“Technically, your brother is responsible.” Although I could understand he still felt, as an older sibling, that he was at fault.

“Actually, Starlight, that diary was mine.”