Page 143 of To Scale the Emerald Mountain

ELLYA

Ithink Alec has left when I don’t see him, and disappointment weighs heavy.

Now that I’ve let him in, I can’t imagine not being near him. Experiencing torturous short minutes of life where Alec didn’t exist and the return of my full memories was enough to immediately break me out of my cycle of self-sabotage fueled by guilt.

A shadow moves behind the gauzy mauve partition to my sitting room, and I grin before moving towards its owner. I find Alec laying on his back in the pillow nook, arms up with his hands tucked behind his head. The position accentuates the broadness of his shoulders and his trim waist. My eyes drift to the dark hair on his stomach that disappears below his waistband. My mouth waters at the sight, and I imagine my fingers running through it.

“Quit giving me those heated looks, my clove, or you may find yourself in a position you have made clear you are not ready for,” he says softly.

I swallow before grabbing a cushion from a chair and throw it at Alec’s head. He catches it and laughs. “At least it was not a brick.”

He pats the plush pillows next to him, inviting me to join. I sit, pulling my knees to my chest and wrap my arms around them. We gaze at each other for a long time, simply taking in and appreciating being together, being close.

“What’s next?” I whisper.

Muffled sounds of the city beyond us lull through an open window while Alec starts tracing slow circles on my lower back.

“You learn how deeply your newfound powers run and how to wield them.”

I nod. “Where do we start scouting for the next gem?”

“You already have one, Ellya. Even if the others are found, their full potentials will not be reached.” His fingers stop their calming patterns.

“Maybe not their full potential, but still more power than most should have.”

Alec sits up and pulls me between his knees. I lay my head back against his chest and look up at him to smile blissfully.

“I love that sight.” He plants a kiss on my lips before sighing. “But, yes, you are right. I had assumed you would want to find the rest after getting a taste of amplified power. We will start in Brhadir; Crane Hills specifically. Then we will move on to the Mother Continent. We should probably stop in to visit your father while in Brhadir. He wanted to see you, but you were not at all receptive to the idea.”

I begrudgingly nod in supplication. The idea of my father seeing me in such an unstable state after all the years of inconsistency between us was more than I could bear. The notion still makes my throat constrict.

“What’s in Crane Hills, besides my father?”

Alec squeezes me tight. I’ve noticed in the last couple hours that he can’t seem to resist holding me, touching me in any way he can. I’m surprised at his restraint when things got heated in the kitchen.

“There is a man there I think we should speak with. I remember him vividly from my childhood. Mother kept her parents’workshop in one of the more prestigious artist blocks. There was a candle maker who had all manner of odd creatures in his shop. Creatures I had never seen or heard of before. I used to ask him where they came from. He would tell me ‘All answers worth knowing make themselves known.’ I had no idea what that meant.”

Alec shifts and tugs my arm, instructing me to face him, his eyes roving hungrily over my face. “He was an eccentric man, and I never put much thought into his odd non-answers. Not until you started having your very particular visions. I started making the connections between those creatures, your family’s kyniors, and the beast guarding the emerald, all created by Dhystros.”

I knit my brows with a mischievous smile as a thought comes to me. “You said a candle maker? In Crane Hills?”

Alec nods, studying me curiously. I grin wider, and he narrows his eyes. “What do you know?”

“Can I show you?”

Alec’s lips meet mine with a smile. “I would be honored,” he whispers, kissing me again.

I concentrate on the vision, even though I know it’s not required for him to find what he needs. The vision I had of the merchant loading candles onto a cart—that I thought completely unimportant—flickers through my mind.

Alec pulls away from my mouth, beaming. “You are fucking stunning.” His reaction tells me the man I Saw is the same he’s talking about. He lands a rough, claiming kiss with his compliment.

“Do you think that man has ties to Dhystros?”

“Perhaps.” Excitement shines bright in Alec’s dark eyes.

Studying the deep scars on his chest—long healed scars I noticed shortly after I returned to The Capital—something clicks intoplaces. The three long gashes match the talons of the creature left by Dhystros in the cave.

“That night in the library, you had the emerald already. That’s why you were suddenly so nervous when I began looking through the story about it,” I accuse.