“Is there a temple nearby?” Sophie asked as Helene placed pins in purple velvet with measured care.
The clothier’s perfectly arched eyebrows lifted, her eyes widening. “A temple of the goddess?”
Sophie checked the habitual “what other kind is there”? Illvya, not Anglion. “Yes,” she said with an encouraging smile. She already knew the answer, having found a temple nearby on Cameron’s city map. But she wanted a simpler source if anyone asked how she had known where the temple was. It would be unwise to share how hard she and Cameron had been working to learn ways through the city. Besides, it would be interesting to know if Helene would help her.
Helene’s nose wrinkled as she slid another pin into the sleeve of the dress Sophie wore. “I believe there is a small one in the square near Isle de Angelique. By the hospital there. That would be the closest. But do you not wish to see the main temple near the palace? It is very beautiful. Much more elegant than any of the smaller temples.”
Elegance, apparently, was more important than what went on within the temple walls.
“Turn a little, please, my lady. Toward me,” Helene said before Sophie could reply.
Sophie obeyed the direction. “A small temple is all I need.” She wanted to understand more about how the goddess was worshipped in Illvya and ask about the history with water magic, as Madame Simsa had suggested, not to encounter whoever the Illvyan equivalent of Domina Skey might be. A small local temple was exactly what she needed. Now that her Illvyan was no longer a barrier, she could perhaps strike up a conversation with a devout or a prior. Find what she was seeking without drawing undue attention to herself.
“I just need directions.” She made a small circling gesture with her hand. It had taken some convincing to get Henri and Cameron to agree that there was no reason she shouldn’t go to the clothiers’ salon for this final fitting rather than have Helene come to her. She had no idea what might happen at the palace later that evening. This might be the only opportunity she ever had to get information from an Illvyan member of the goddess’ priesthood. Even though she had concerns about the envoys, if, in the end, Cameron wanted to return home, then she wouldn’t let him go alone. If she was to return to Anglion, then she wished to be as well-armed as possible. Including learning some temple history that she doubted anyone in Anglion would ever volunteer.
“Stay still, my lady. This will only take longer if you keep moving. And you need this dress tonight, do you not? Every minute longer it takes me is a minute less for my seamstresses to complete the changes.”
Helene’s voice held an edge of irritation. Which, given how unflappable she had seemed on the other occasions Sophie had encountered her, might just be a measure of how tight the deadline for the dress was.
“Yes. I’m sorry.” She froze back into position even though her arms were starting to ache. “But the directions?”
“You are not expected back at the Academe?” Helene asked. She paused again in her pin placement, brow wrinkling.
Had Helene been instructed to make sure Sophie didn’t go anywhere else in the city? Goddess, she hoped not. She thought she could convince her escorts to let her stop at a temple, pleading devotion to the goddess. That was an argument that was difficult to deny amongst mages. From what she’d learned so far of Illvyan religion, earth witches were the most open with their belief in the goddess and the source of their power, but blood mages worshipped, too.
She needed to understand how the goddess’ Illvyan adherents felt about their Anglion counterparts. Imogene had called the Anglion Temple corrupt, intent on retaining power over the people. Sophie didn’t want to believe it was true, but Domina Skey had not scrupled to use Sophie’s powers to heal Eloisa, even when it had drained Sophie near to breaking. Certainly her anger with Sophie and Cameron seemed to be due to the fact that Sophie could not be fully bonded to the goddess, which denied the temple whatever use of her power they might have had if the ritual had been completed as usual. It might have even led the Domina to try to kill Sophie. If anyone in Illvya could understand what threat Sophie might represent, it would be someone of the goddess’ priesthood here.
But preferably someone with no need to play politics. The relationship between religion and the crown seemed more distant here, but it was unlikely that the two were completely severed. Not if many of the mages still worshipped the goddess.
She resisted the urge to rub her forehead, where a headache was setting in. If she moved, all she would achieve would be a torso full of pinpricks.
“No,” she said, realizing that she hadn’t answered Helene’s question. “Not immediately.” She smiled encouragingly, hoping to soothe whatever was concerning Helene. “The address?” she prompted again when Helene placed another pin.
Helene’s shoulder lifted in a tiny motion that clearly meant something along the lines of “it’s on your head,” but then she rattled off a short set of directions.
Sophie had no trouble following the rapid-fire Illvyan, though she had taken care during her time at the salon not to reveal her improved language skills, making sure she still spoke slowly—not such an act when Henri had obviously been telling the truth when he said her comprehension would improve faster than her speech—and tried to keep her previously bad accent in place. She intended to let that slip a little in time. People would expect her Illvyan to improve when she was surrounded by the language so she should be safe if she let the pretense go gradually.
By the time Helene had completed her pinning and tucking on both dresses and Sophie was safely back in her own clothing, she was beginning to worry that the appointment had taken too much time and that her escorts would refuse her request.
But they didn’t. They only nodded when Sophie said she wished to take an offering to the goddess, and when she repeated the address that Helene had given her, the carriage trundled off again. It didn’t take very long. Soon enough the horses pulled to a halt and the taller of the two mages accompanying her opened the door and helped her out.
Sophie found herself facing a fairly nondescript red brick building, snug between two very similar structures. It was nothing like the temples back home which ran to marble and bronze and vaulting size, but there was a quartered circle inlaid in brass on the dark wooden door so she had to assume she was indeed in the right place.
The blood mages escorted her to the door but didn’t follow her in when it swung inwards in response to one of them laying his hand on a brass plate beside the door, causing chimes similar to those in the Academe to sound from within.
Sophie entered slowly, expecting to be confronted by a brown-robed servant of the goddess. Instead she appeared to be alone. So who had opened the door?
She walked farther into the building and the door swung closed behind her, making her start. The room appeared to be some sort of entrance hall. Small. Painted white. Empty beyond the pair of lamps hung from the ceiling and another door marked with the quartered circle in front of her. But plain or not, it clearly sat above a ley line. The power hummed beneath her feet and made the floor glow. She stared at the door. In or out. There were no other options.
Out left her without answers.
In left her with . . . well, that remained to be seen.
As she pushed the far door open, a waft of spice and salt grass and sage came from the room beyond. The scent was as familiar as the smell of her mother’s perfume. For a moment it induced a wave of homesickness so fierce that she thought she might burst into tears. Or worse, sink to the floor. But the sensation eased after the first eye-stinging minute and she tried to clear her mind of any thought of home as she passed through the door into the temple itself.
It was bigger than the façade of the building had suggested, not overly wide but running deep. Though, as far as Sophie could see, no other worshippers occupied any of the wooden benches. The ceiling was high, not domed like the temples of Anglion, and constructed from white-painted wood and plaster rather than bronze, set with panes of stained glass forming four quartered circles high in the ceiling. Each centered around a small opening to allow the smoke from the earth fires to escape.
Multicolored beams of light speared down from the glass, illuminating each of the fires. Three were small offering fires, complete with bundles of salt grass piled high in baskets in front of them, the nearest not far from Sophie, marking the beginning of the aisle to the altar, the other two set off to either side about halfway down the room. At the far end, near the altar, a larger earth fire burned, the flames a familiar medley of blue and green and orange from the salt-soaked logs that fed it.
The fires were so exactly like the ones from the temples she had known in Anglion she was at the basket set before the closest of them and lifting one of the bundles before she knew what she was doing. She cradled the dried grass in her palm gently, inhaling deeply. Salt and sage and the incense spices in the oil added to the bundles. A smell woven deep through the memories of her life. She breathed it again, greedily.
She hadn’t realized how much she had missed it until now. The scent and the comfort of the rituals she had grown up with. Even if her relationship with the temple in Anglion had been strained since her Ais-Seann had gone wrong, that didn’t mean she didn’t still believe. She held the bundle closer to the flame, then realized she had no blade to complete the sacrifice. There was no sign of an offering knife.
“May I be of assistance, my lady?”
Sophie started as though she’d been slapped, jumping half a foot, then whirled to see who had spoken.
“I am sorry, I startled you.” The woman who spoke was dressed in temple brown but her robes were an unfamiliar style. More fitted. Shaped like a narrow-skirted dress with a long over vest of some kind rather than an actual robe. The collar sat high around the woman’s throat, a bronze quartered-circle brooch marking its center.
Her skin was nearly the same color as the dress, her hair a few shades darker still. She was older than Sophie but not old, and her eyes, a tawny kind of amber unlike any Sophie had seen before, held a friendly expression. The ley light around her also seemed to hold a faint amber tint. Or it could have been a trick of the light. The ley light was faint enough that Sophie could see that the domina was touching the ley line—though that might be difficult for a domina in a temple to avoid—but also that she didn’t seem to be actively using any power.
“No, I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you,” Sophie said, offering a smile and then a neat curtsy.
“I would not usually interrupt you at your devotions. But you seemed to be looking for this.” She held out her hand, palm up. On it lay a simple silver blade, the polished metal reflecting glints of the colors falling from the glass above.
Sophie reached for it. “Thank you.”
“We cleanse the offering knives several times a day,” the woman said as Sophie stretched to pass the knife through the flame.
That didn’t seem to require a response, so Sophie focused on the flame instead. She nicked her finger with the blade, dripped the blood on her bundle of salt grass, and with an unvoiced prayer that she and Cameron would survive all this, tossed it onto the fire. The flames flared blue and green from the salt grass and the oils anointing it and then subsided back to orange. She spent another minute staring into their depths, as though they might have some wisdom to offer. Finding none, she turned back to the woman who might be able to satisfy some of her questions.
“I have not seen you here before, my lady. Are you newly arrived in Lumia?”
“Do you know everyone who comes to the temple?” Sophie countered.
One side of the woman’s mouth lifted. Sophie got the feeling that her attempt to avoid answering the question had not gone unnoticed.
“Many of them.” The woman gestured at the empty room. “We are not so fashionable just now. The earth witches remember our great Lady but amongst those without power, well . . . .” She shrugged. “But I have not introduced myself. I am Domina Gerrard. I am in charge here.”
In charge but tending the offering tools herself? Now there was something Sophie couldn’t imagine Domina Skey doing. And this woman looked young for a Domina. But this was a smaller temple, so perhaps that was to be expected. “It is good to meet you, Domina,” Sophie said with another bobbed curtsy. “How many serve the temple here?”
“Only ten,” Domina Gerard said. “The priors and devouts rotate between the grand temple and the others here in Lumia. Domina Davide and I are here permanently. Perhaps we shall come to know you, Madame . . . ?”
“Mackenzie,” Sophie said and then fought the urge to curse. She hadn’t wanted to announce herself as Lady Scardale, but Mackenzie was hardly an Illvyan name. At least she didn’t think it was.
The Domina’s eyes widened slightly but Sophie had no idea whether that was because she thought the name unusual or because she knew who Sophie was. “You are welcome in the Lady’s house.”
Well, if she knew who Sophie was, she was not immediately disapproving.
“Thank you.” Sophie hesitated, unsure how to proceed.
“Would you like me to leave you to your devotions, or were you hoping to speak with someone?” Domina Gerrard said.
Well, one probably didn’t become a domina without being able to read people a little. “I had a question,” Sophie admitted. “Do you have time to speak with me now?”
A nod. “I have an hour or so before I need to prepare for our evening devotions.” Domina Gerrard glanced around the empty room. “As we are alone, we can speak here if you are comfortable. I doubt we’ll be interrupted. But we have other, more private rooms within if you prefer.”
The thought of retreating deeper into a strange building—a temple—was not appealing. Goddess only knew what wards might lie within. She had no doubt the blood mages were waiting for her at the outer door. She didn’t want to be farther from their aid should she need it. Not that she had any reason to think that Domina Gerrard meant her harm, but Domina Skey had taught her to be wary.
“I am happy to speak here. It’s a beautiful temple.” She gestured toward the ceiling. “The glasswork is lovely.”
Domina Gerrard smiled. “Thank you. It is not as spectacular as some, but I am fond of it.” She moved over to the nearest of the wooden benches and settled on it.
Sophie sat beside her, leaving a little space. She folded her hands in her lap. The small cut left by the offering blade still stung, a welcome reminder of where she was and who she was speaking to. And also a reminder not to let her guard down.
“Before we begin, perhaps it will simplify matters if I tell you that I know who you are, Lady Mackenzie. Or who I think you are. I will confess, your Illvyan is better than I expected.”
She could keep up her pretense but it seemed a lot of effort for little gain. “News travels fast, it seems,” Sophie said, sidestepping the issue of her language skills.
“Yes. His Imperial Majesty saw fit to inform Domina Francis when the Anglion delegation arrived. Which required that he also inform her of your presence here in the city. A fact he had neglected to mention until that point. Not all news travels fast when the emperor wishes otherwise. But we were told to watch for you.”
Sophie stiffened. “Watch for me?” The ley light around the domina hadn’t changed.
“In case you came to the temple. Domina Francis thought you may have questions. Or need assistance.”
“Domina Francis is domina of the temple near the palace?” Sophie hazarded. Illvya’s Domina Skey in other words. Who wanted to offer her . . . assistance? Interesting.
Domina Gerrard nodded. “Yes. She has been for quite some time now.”
“And are she and the emperor . . . close?”
“She makes her views on things known.” Domina Gerrard smiled. “Sometimes His Imperial Majesty listens.”
Some of the tension in her spine drained away. That didn’t sound like the same kind of disturbing influence that Domina Skey had gained over Eloisa. Not that that necessarily meant Domina Francis was to be trusted, but it was not a point against her, at least.
“From what I have seen of the emperor, that would seem to be all that one can hope for,” Sophie said.
Domina Gerrard’s smile widened. “Yes. I had not had the honor very often. Which suits me. But you did not come here to talk about the emperor.” She cocked her head. “Unless you did?”
“No. Not the emperor.”
“Then ask. I cannot promise to answer everything, but I will answer what I can.”
Answer and perhaps obtain some answers of her own? Answers to questions on the mind of Domina Francis perhaps. But Sophie hadn’t expected not to have to pay some sort of price, and she doubted she could tell Domina Gerrard anything about the Anglion temple that Aristides de Lucien did not already know.
“I wanted to ask why the temple here accepts water magic. At home, we are taught the sanctii are anathema to the goddess. But here that is not so.”
“You didn’t want to start with a simpler question? Let me warm up a little?” Domina Gerrard said, shaking her head gently. “But no, I expect not. Let me start with a question of my own, then. What were you taught about why the goddess forbids water magic?”
Not enough. She tried to recall what exactly she had been told. Her lessons had included so little about Illvya or water magic. But there had been only a basic outlining of the history. Other than that, the temples services and teaching reinforced the message that water magic was evil. The tale of why it was had been couched in a lot of flowery temple-ese from what she could remember.
“To paraphrase a little,” she began, “mostly that, a long time ago, water mages tried to suborn the temple. That the goddess blessed those who stood against them to protect her. And, when they were successful, the water mages were driven from our shores. And the kings and queens of Anglion since have kept us free by ensuring they do not return.”
One of the Domina’s eyebrows lifted. Something in her eyes told Sophie that this recounting was both unexpected and perhaps a little amusing.
“Well, that is part of the tale, I suppose,” Domina Gerrard said.
“What’s the other part?”
“Ah. That part is a little more prosaic and a little less mystical.” Domina Gerrard’s fingers strayed to the quartered circle on her collar. “I am no particular scholar of temple history, it has never been a passion of mine, but I will tell you what we are taught. You would have to go to the main temple to look at the records themselves. I believe it was four, maybe five hundred years ago now, but our archivists are somewhat fanatical about maintaining such things.”
“So old,” Sophie murmured. She couldn’t imagine it. Yes, there were buildings in Anglion older than that—after all, the country had been settled for a thousand years or more, if what she had been taught was true—but books were rarer there than here in Illvya. And more tightly controlled. She had no idea how far back the temple records in Anglion might go but she did know that no one outside the temple would be likely to be allowed to look at them.
“Yes, they have ways of making paper last longer than it should. Don’t ever ask one how though. It will lead to a long and boring lecture about various chemicals and the proper manner of storage. But that is off our topic. So. History. Let us say five hundred years ago. Illvya was an empire, but only a small one. We controlled three, maybe four of the other countries on the continent. And Anglion was free, as it is now. But back then, the emperor at the time decided that the de Luciens needed more toys to play with. He began pushing to expand the empire. Which made many countries, including your own, unhappy. I don’t know if Anglion was within the emperor’s sights at the time. In fact, it’s difficult to imagine it was when it was well-defended and the sanctii couldn’t travel there over the sea. Trade between the two countries was more open than now, but neither country welcomed water mages from the other.
“At the same time, your king—his name escapes me just now—was . . . well, shall we say, not an exemplar of men. And he had the lack of sense to fall in love with two women. And while perhaps no one expects complete fidelity from a king, in this case, neither of the women he loved was his queen. One was his brother’s wife. The other, I am sorry to say, was a temple domina. A high-ranking one.
“Now the domina knew the king could never marry her. But she favored the brother’s wife, an earth witch, over the current queen, a water mage. The king’s brother was also a water mage. The king, however, was a blood mage. So a brother who could command a sanctii was, conceivably, a threat.”
Sophie wasn’t sure she liked where this story was going. “And was his brother a threat?”
“He wasn’t given a chance to be. The king and the domina formed a plan to perform an augmentier. I assume you know what that is?”
“A binding.”
“Yes. Such things are supposed to be voluntary. Somehow they convinced the brother’s wife to agree to a binding as well.”
“Three people can be bound?”
“Not usually. I have heard that sometimes a water mage who shares a bond with a sanctii may also bond with a husband or wife, but such things are discouraged. When it is tried between people, the usual outcome seems to be that while two of the three are strengthened, the third is more often weakened. Not something most mages would wish to endure, however fleetingly.”
But royal witches were bound three ways, Sophie thought. To their husbands and to the temple. She clamped her jaw shut against the question that sprang to mind. She’d hear the story out first. Then decide what more was safe to ask. “And what happened after the binding was performed?”
Domina Gerrard shook her head. “Nothing good. The king managed to kill his wife and his brother. Claimed they were plotting against him. Plotting with Illvya to bring Illvyan mages to Anglion so they could summon sanctii and invade. He started hunting down water mages and their families with the help of other blood mages within the nobility. Many of whom had earth witch wives. Who were suborned into also being bound for the good of the country. Eventually the water mages were dead, along with whole chunks of families who showed talent for such things or fled to the empire. The king married his brother’s widow, and since then Anglion has forbidden water magic and bound its royal witches to strengthen their husbands.”
Even those without magic. Sophie wasn’t sure she could feel her fingers anymore, she was clenching her hands so tightly. The temple had felt warm a few minutes before, the flames from four fires and the sunny day outside making the air pleasant. But now she wanted to shiver.
How much of what the domina had told her could she believe? Probably not the entirety. Illvyans had their biases just as Anglions did. But something had happened. And as much as it would be pleasant to believe that the goddess had forbidden water magic to her followers, the more mundane explanation offered by the domina seemed far more realistic.
Somewhere outside the temple, she was vaguely aware of a bell tolling. Which meant time was passing. If she stayed much longer, the mages outside would come looking for her. She rose. “Thank you for your time, Domina Gerrard. And for the history lesson.” She bobbed a curtsy, the obeisance to the temple engrained in her. It was honor to the goddess, not the woman herself, she reminded herself as a small surge of rebellion flared within her at the movement. Though if the goddess allowed Anglion witches to be weakened to prop up their husbands, then perhaps that respect was unearned. But was it the goddess or those who purported to represent her? “I hope I can come and speak with you again.”
Her head throbbed suddenly, reminding her that only yesterday, she had let a demon teach her Illvyan. Things were moving far too quickly. She needed time to think. To untangle lie from truth.
And the most urgent truth she needed was what the Anglion delegation knew about what would happen to her if she returned to Kingswell.
“What are you reading?”
Sophie looked up as Cameron came into their room late on fourth day. He’d been to bathe after his last class as he often did. The sight of him in his shirt and trousers, hair damp as he rubbed at it with a towel, made her smile. She closed the book, putting it back on the table in front of her. “It’s that book on bindings that we found in the library.” They had little spare time left over from their studies, but they were still determined to fill in the gaps in their knowledge where they could.
Cameron came over and picked up the book. “On the Art of Augmentiers,” he said, reading the title. “Anything useful?”
“Hard going,” she said, eyeing the book. It was, as the majority of the books here were, in Illvyan. The reveilé had helped greatly with her understanding, but it still took concentration to understand the ideas being set out in the book. “But promising, I think. Maybe you can help me after dinner?”
He shook his head. “No studying tonight.”
“What?” she said, alarmed. “Has something happened? Did Henri say something to you?”
“No. Nothing’s wrong,” he said. “I just thought maybe we could take tonight for ourselves. It’s been nothing but study and . . . .”
Discussions about what they should say to the Anglions when they returned to the palace. They had spoken of little else in the moments they’d had alone. And the best approach they could come up with was to try and keep the relationship as cordial as possible, while trying to find out if further reassurances as to their safety should they return to Anglion could be obtained. There seemed to be little else they could do.
If that were so, maybe Cameron was right. Maybe they should take some time to just be. Or pretend to just be, at least. While they could.
“What did you have in mind?” she asked. Almost as soon as the words had left her mouth, the door chimes sounded. “Goddess, no. Now what?”
Cameron smiled. “I think that will be our dinner.”
“Dinner?” She blinked, startled. They’d eaten every meal in the dining room so far.
“I asked Willem and he arranged it,” Cameron said, crossing to the door.
Sure enough, when he opened it, one of the servant girls wheeled a wooden trolley into the room. Sophie couldn’t see what was on it because the various plates were hidden under neat china covers, but it smelled wonderful.
“Thank you,” she said to the girl as Cameron showed her out and then came back over to Sophie.
“Hungry?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Not just yet. Come and sit with me.” The light was beginning to fade outside the windows and she reached toward the earth stone on the table, intending to light it. Then stopped and reached out her hand to Cameron instead. “You do it,” she said, nodding toward the stone.
“I’ll try,” he said, wrapping his fingers around hers. They had been experimenting a little with this, her trying to teach him some of the basic earth magic skills she knew and vice versa. Madame Simsa had taught them how to ward the bond, and it had seemed a logical step to progress from that to this. Just small things, things that could be useful. Nothing too noticeable. She felt the pull on the bond between them, felt the steadying weight of Cameron’s power meeting hers. Felt it flare stronger as he drew some of that power to him. The earth light began to shine and he grinned at her.
“There!”
“Success,” she agreed happily. Their previous experiments hadn’t always been successful. She leaned forward to kiss him quickly, felt the quick flare of desire through the bond. Then the echoes of it in her own blood. Which only intensified what she felt from Cameron.
Dinner could wait. She pulled back, glanced over at the bed, then drew on the bond, aiming the power at the quilts, sending them slithering to the floor in a satisfying heap.
“Sophie?” Cameron said.
“I think we should work up an appetite,” she said, standing. She tugged at his hand.
He rose quickly. “I think I like that idea.” He pulled her to him, bent to kiss her. She gave herself over to the kiss, wanting to stop thinking.
Cameron kissed her slowly, each touch of his lips on hers considered, as though he was intent on memorizing the shape of her mouth. The warmth of him flowed over her, through her, making her feel half-drunk with it. She started to tug at the buttons of his shirt, breathing in the scent of soap and clean skin. Of Cameron. She slid her hand across his chest as the shirt came apart, sliding it over his nipple. He groaned softly against her mouth, his kiss turning hungry as he lifted her, carrying her over to the bed to place her on her back against the mattress.
She waited to feel the comforting weight of him sinking down on top of her but instead she felt his hands at her skirts, pushing them up and then drawing off her underthings. She widened her legs, unable to stop the movement as his hands slid back up her thighs.
“Wider, love,” he said, and his hands pushed against her. Then his head came down and she felt the first stroke of his tongue against her, like a streak of quiet lightning. She arched up against him but his hands held her still, held her open to him so all she could do was lie back and let him do what he wanted. It wasn’t that difficult to submit, not when each new touch made her head spin and her heart pound as the pleasure built within her.
He added fingers to tongue, making her moan. So good. But she wanted more.
“I want you,” she gasped, hands tugging in his hair.
“You have me,” he said, lifting his head but not stilling the movement of those clever, clever fingers.
“More,” she said. “All of it. All of you.”
He laughed, and for a moment she thought he was going to draw things out, resist her urgings. But then he stood, shucking his clothes as she watched. She was too hungry for him, too focused on just him to worry about her own clothes. He was glorious in the last fading edge of light through the window and the paler golden glow of the earth light on the table behind him. The perfect statue of a man, muscles carved down his body in lines a sculptor couldn’t have bettered.
“Come back here,” she said, and his lips curved upward.
“Whatever milady wants,” he said, crawling onto the bed.
“Milady wants you,” she said as he lifted her farther up the bed, working at her dress with the fingers that had been torturing her not long before. She wriggled and lifted cooperatively, eager to have those hands back on her as soon as possible.
When she was naked, he smiled down at her. “That’s better.” He ran a hand over her right breast, fingers catching her nipple. She sucked in a breath. But she wanted him too much to let him delay. Her hand closed over his cock. Stroked it once, tightened as she heard the gratifying groan that escaped him.
“We were talking about what I want,” she said, stroking again. “I want this. You. Now.”
He didn’t argue. Merely swung himself over her, his mouth finding hers again as he slid home. She wrapped her legs around his hips, pulled him closer as he moved inside her, feeling each retreat and return of him like her heartbeat. Let him fill her. Fill the world and chase everything else away so there was only pleasure and Cameron and the rhythm between them, the pulse of heat that seemed to spiral through the bond and through her and back to him. Always back to him, even as the pleasure and the pressure built and she knew she was about to tumble over into that place where there was only sensation. Even then, as she fell, she held onto him, the one who could take her there, unwilling to let him go. Wanting him to follow her, which he did with a moan that might have been her name.
When she surfaced from the pleasure-washed fog of it, she was lying curled around him, holding him tight. “Only you,” she said fiercely. No matter what happened, the two of them would face it together.