Page 13 of Touch of Oblivion (Woven in Time #1)

His gaze dips, slow and deliberate, tracing the shape of me with no apology–lingering just long enough for the weight of it to settle warmly against my skin.

“Is it?” I counter, my words coming out much breathier than I intended .

He rises from the chair and crosses the distance between us in a single breath. Suddenly, he’s on his knees between my parted legs, making our faces level for the first time. One of his hands lifts before he moves it toward my face slowly, giving me plenty of time to deny his touch.

My mouth parts with a breath, but no words come.

His knuckles trail along the edge of my jaw, a caress that barely qualifies as touch, but feels like it was meant to leave a mark.

“You’ve been under my skin since the first moment I saw you,” he says so quietly, almost like he’s quietly speaking to himself. “I’m not used to feeling that.”

The words stir something deep in my chest. A fluttering sensation.

“Sounds uncomfortable,” I manage, forcing the words through a throat that’s suddenly too tight. “You should probably have that looked at.”

He huffs a soft laugh, and the sound, like everything else about him, is both rich and edged in heat.

I want to hear it again.

“Maybe you’re right,” he muses. “I’ve heard there’s no cure for it, though. Something about attraction being a terminal condition.”

I tilt my head, feigning thought. “Seems dramatic.”

“Guilty.”

His hand falls away from my skin, the loss of contact sharper than it should be–but he doesn’t retreat. The heat of him is everywhere still, curling around my spine and thrumming beneath my skin.

“It’s strange,” he murmurs, sounding less playful than before as his gaze rakes over my face time and again. “I’ve known plenty of desire. Chased it. Fed on it.”

His eyes drop to my mouth for the briefest moment before lifting again. He’s completely unashamed in his perusal and seems lit with something that feels like hunger and warning in one.

Somehow I feel like his prey, but I have no desire to flee.

“But you…” He shakes his head once, almost smiling, like he can’t quite believe his own admission. “You’re not simply a craving…you’re a disruption.”

I blink, breath catching, and for a moment, I swear my body leans toward him without meaning to.

“You throw off the careful rhythm of my life,” he says, voice lower now, the words curling between us like a confession. “That shouldn’t be possible.”

When I speak, my voice is quieter than intended. “You’re saying I’m…inconvenient?”

Riven smiles again, slow and sharp.

“Unquestionably. The most inconvenient thing I’ve encountered in a hundred years.”

I lift a brow, ignoring the heat pooling low in my stomach and the way my hands suddenly itch to feel his smooth skin in return .

“You have a strange way of complimenting people, Riven.”

“I’ve never had to try before, darling.”

There’s no arrogance in it, just truth. Somehow that makes it worse, because I believe him.

I’m not entirely sure I’m ready for what happens if he ever puts his all into trying.

He leans in closer again, narrowing the space between us until I can feel his breath fanning against my lips. His hands rise to rest on the bed on either side of me, trapping me securely in his presence.

“I should go,” he murmurs, the words quiet but heavy, dipped in something hushed and sinful. “I’m already breaking far too many rules by standing in the heart of the wraith’s territory.”

The edge of a smile tugs at my lips before I can stop it.

“Then why haven’t you?”

He doesn’t answer.

He only holds that fragile, sparking space between us.

I don’t breathe and neither of us looks away.

And though he gives no sign of what this is doing to him, there’s a stillness in his posture that feels like control, barely leashed.

Suddenly he stiffens.

His gaze cuts toward the door, or maybe the shadows just beyond it, every part of him pulled taut .

“I truly have to go, darling,” he says, and the velvet in his voice is gone, replaced by something clipped and reluctant.

And just like that, he vanishes.

No farewell or parting glance…just the room reclaiming its quiet space like he’d never been here at all.

Only a breath passes before the space he left behind breaks open again.

This time, the shadows don’t reveal a quiet vampire.

A deep, guttural sound accompanies the shadows that pour into the room like a storm cloud. Darkness sweeps across the floorboards, fast and hungry, slamming against the edges of the firelight and pulling all warmth from the air.

From the center of it, Azyric steps forward.

The wildness of his shadows gives him the look of something unchained, each tendril lashing around his arms and shoulders, flickering toward the ceiling and coiling back again as if they can’t decide whether to attack, or protect.

His gaze finds mine at once, and then he moves.

Two strides that are fast, precise, and without hesitation. His large hands find my shoulders, fingers wrapping around me tightly as if to anchor me, or maybe to steady something in himself instead .

“Who was in here?” he asks, voice low and rough, like it’s been scraped raw by the inside of his throat.

His grip tightens and I notice a barely contained fury simmering in his eyes–not aimed at me, but at whoever dared stand in his place only a moment ago.

“Riven,” I whisper softly, feeling like it’s a betrayal to admit.

It doesn’t startle him into action, but the energy changes around us.

The shadows still.

His hands don’t fall away, but they begin to loosen. His fingers relax slowly, like he’s forcing each tendon to obey. His jaw shifts, that tight line of control flickering as he drags his gaze across my face.

One of his hands lifts, thumb brushing the space at the base of my throat, where my pulse flutters beneath thin fabric. For once it doesn’t feel possessive or calculated.

It’s tender.

His expression, always so carefully composed, falters under the weight of something he didn’t mean to reveal.

And I see it...a line he didn’t know existed. One that led him here before he could stop to wonder why.

He steps back as if distance can fix what proximity betrayed, but the tension doesn’t drain from him. Not fully. His shadows hover near the walls now, quieter but still watching, like they, too, are reluctant to leave .

“Keep the door locked,” he says, and though his tone is even, it lands differently now. It’s less command and more of a warning.

Suddenly he vanishes, but a few tendrils of shadow remain.

I lift my hand as one crawls along the ground softly before slinking up my leg. Just before it can touch my hand, I hear a snarl from nearby. It startles me and suddenly the shadow is gone.

The fire pops softly in the hearth and the quiet of the room settles around me once more.

I lower myself onto the edge of the bed, fingers loose in my lap and breath shallow in my chest, the ghost of both of the kings’ hands still clinging to my skin.

When my eyes opened to this war-torn land, my identity was uncertain, this world unknown, and my skin untouched.

Now only two of those facts remain true.

Tonight, something changed, and I don’t think any of us can pretend otherwise.