Rain swayed toward Daric as he dipped his head. She’d been waiting for this moment forever.
Their lips hadn’t quite touched when an accusing voice sent them rearing back from one another. “Not only do I find invaders at my back entrance, but now they start kissing?”
A crone dressed in ragged robes brandished a staff at them. “I’ll teach you to come into my home uninvited!” She started chanting a spell that made the sphere at the top of her staff glow.
Just as Daric started to step in front of her, Rain blew the witch back with a stiff wind, pinning her to the wall of the cavern. The crone’s weapon clattered to the ground, and the greenery that Rain had already created grew again, crisscrossing the woman and stopping all movement. The witch gaped at them, falling silent.
Daric turned his head and arched a brow in Rain’s direction. “I’d like to come to your rescue occasionally. It would comfort me in my masculinity.”
Rain’s lips twitched. “Your masculinity is not in question, Daric.”
“But I do so enjoy a damsel in distress.” He was clearly teasing now.
“I’ll swoon for you in a moment,” Rain replied. “Let’s just see if this is the Barrow Witch.”
“Barrow Witch?” the crone spat. “Does this look like a barrow to you?”
“Then I suppose that makes you the Cave Witch?” Daric asked.
In answer, the crone tried another incantation, hissing unfamiliar words that seemed somehow to Rain to relate to bowels melting. No wonder everyone hated sorcerers—and she should not have understood a word of that.
Isme dolunde vaten crew punched into her with new vigor. The sorcerer’s words in Upper Ash had meant little to her at the time, leaving only the impression of hardship and the near certainty that she could decipher their meaning with time and effort. That impression deepened upon hearing the witch’s chant. The language of sorcery became clearer, and Rain suddenly knew down to her very essence that there was a terrible choice to come.
Daric advanced and stuffed a wad of the woman’s own tattered shawl into her mouth. The witch glared at them. Rain did her best to shake off the feeling of dread now weighing her down.
“Let’s get a bloodstone and leave this place,” Daric said.
The witch grunted muffled protests.
Rain hesitated. “She might know where the Barrow Witch is.”
“The only barrows in Leathen are in the Wood of Layton,” Daric said. “Near Braylian’s Cauldron.”
“She might not be home,” Rain pointed out. “I think we should ask.”
Ceding to her wishes, Daric turned back to the witch. “We may have started off on the wrong foot. Please forgive us for bursting into your home uninvited. We didn’t realize it was occupied, and we all startled each other.”
The crone narrowed her eyes, but she was listening.
Rain nodded for him to continue. Daric was nothing if not diplomatic.
“We need to find the Barrow Witch. Would you happen to know her?”
The old woman just watched him as he slowly reached out and removed the gag from her mouth.
“Do I look like I frequent barrows, you idiot? I’m a Cave Witch and therefore frequent caverns.”
“I see,” Daric said, all dignity, as usual.
Rain almost laughed at his unwaveringly cordial expression. She wasn’t duped. To her, his face looked crisp, like a sour apple.
“We were led to believe this cavern contains a rare gem called bloodstone,” Rain said. “We need some.”
“Oh, do you now?” The witch cackled. “Well, I need a cook and a maid. Which one of you likes to stir the pot and who prefers to clean?”
“I think we’ll just take a bloodstone,” Rain said, losing some of her humor and patience.
The witch bubbled with unhinged laughter. “You’ll never get one without me. Even with your magic that needs no words.” She glared at Rain, as though trying to dissect her strange abilities.
The Cave Witch attempted her spell again, and Daric stuffed the gag back into her mouth. “None of that,” he said sharply. He turned to Rain. “Shall we?” He offered her his arm.
Rain took it. Side by side, they moved deeper into the cavern.
Daric was still reeling, although he tried not to show it. The slight weight of Rain’s hand on his arm was the only thing keeping him steady. He’d suspected that Rain still had some of her magic, but he’d never imagined she was this powerful. A true force of nature.
And he’d almost kissed her.
He desired her, admired her, loved her as intensely as always. Nothing had changed, except he was now more certain than ever that he didn’t deserve her. No one did. He was a mere man, and he wasn’t even sure Rain was mortal.
“Did you notice the witch said we’d come in through her back door?” Rain asked.
Daric cleared his throat. It seemed so tight all of a sudden. “I did. I’m hoping there’s an easier way out.”
Rain murmured her agreement as they were confronted with a fork in the tunnel, both options fading into complete darkness.
“There are two paths,” she said, eyeing the set of torches on the wall. They were lit and ready for the taking, surely the Cave Witch’s method of seeing her way around. “Should we separate?”
Daric hesitated and then shook his head. “I’d rather stay together.” His lips quirked, and he added, “I may need you to rescue me.”
Rain huffed. She gripped his arm more tightly. “I’m nervous in the dark.”
Daric knew that. It was unsurprising. The first time she’d ever truly been in the dark, not seeing the world around her, big hands had grabbed her and dragged her from the existence she’d known forever.
As always, the memory chilled him. At the same time, having Rain by his side was a source of endless heat and energy. It was in part this contradiction that had kept him from revealing his true feelings. Could she really love him as he loved her, with the kind of passion and devotion that burned a hole in one’s chest and filled it with longing, when he’d been responsible for ending her life as she knew it?
She’d wanted a kiss, but that would never be enough for him. Rain needed to want more, everything, just as he did.
Daric took a torch from the wall. If he’d spoken up two years ago and Rain had agreed, he might have been able to convince his father to let them marry. Now, it was too late. They’d both been bartered away, him for a canal and Rain for her own safety along with that of the household.
“Your thoughts look darker than this cavern,” Rain said, following him with the other torch.
Daric stayed watchful and alert as they moved deeper into a tunnel. “Do you have my mother’s Ashstone ring with you?” he asked instead of addressing his thoughts. They were indeed dark and dismal.
She shook her head. “I left it at the castle.”
“Promise me you’ll wear it,” he said, taking her free hand and squeezing. “If things don’t go as we hope, it’ll connect us. We’ll remember how we once lived together in the House of Ash.”
Rain stopped and swung an iron-hard gaze on him. “Don’t give up before we even start.”
“I’m not giving up,” he hastened to assure her. He would never do that.
“You’re giving me an odd look I don’t like at all.”
“You’ll outlive me by far, Rain. Maybe by millennia. It’ll be something to remember me by.”
A storm flashed in her eyes. He saw it for what it was now. “I’m as mortal as you are.”
“Are you though?”
“Yes,” she said emphatically.
“Mortals don’t grow vines from nothing and make gale winds blow.”
Her budding anger abruptly disappeared, and her face fell. “Are you afraid of me?”
“Of course not.” The need to wipe away her horrified expression made him pull the first thought from his mind. It was an inane one—inevitably. “Although I would think twice before turning you backside-up for a spanking.”
Rain’s jaw dropped. Heat billowed inside Daric like an inferno.
She laughed suddenly, the bright sound chiming through the cavern. “A little vulgarity suits you. Suits us,” she corrected. “It’s amusing.”
“I strive to never bore you,” Daric admitted, his voice rougher than a rockslide.
The smile on Rain’s lips widened, so beautiful it was heartbreaking. She started moving again. “I can safely promise, Daric, that you never bore me.”
Every already raw and heightened emotion inside him swelled painfully. Rain was both his joy and his affliction. She was his everything.