Page 107
“I would like to feed you.”
“Feed me?” I glance towards his satchel. “Well, I have been asking you for that cheese for the past quarter of an hour.”
“Not with food. Soulglimmer. Enough to settle the hunger until you feel ready to harvest for yourself.”
“Are you sure?” I ask. “I don't want you going without on my account.”
“I have more than sufficient strength to spare, Ophelia. It will not harm me.”
The prospect of feeling his soulglimmer again brings back rather unpleasant memories. The last time he'd shared it with me, I'd been lying in bed with the pestilence eating through my body, barely able to move for the pain of it. For a little while, his touch had brought such wonderful relief that I'd almost forgotten how ill I was. Then Gideon had discovered us, and what followed had eventually landed me on the floor of a crypt, dying.
But Beswick is miles behind us now, and there's nobody here to interfere.
With that thought, I straighten up and smooth my kirtle over my stomach, expecting Iscairn to somehow ease my belly-wark with a little of his blue.
Instead, his hands rise to cup my face, his long fingers slipping beneath my hair as he leans towards me. My mouth opens to ask what he's doing, but the question never makes it out.
His lips meet mine with a tenderness that makes my fingers tighten around his cloak, drawing him closer as his hands cradle my face. He tilts his head, his mouth moving gently against mine, and I kiss him back, slipping a hand into the silken strands of hair falling around his shoulders.
His thumb brushes across my cheek, drawing a quiet gasp from my lips, and with it comes the first trickle of blue.
It spills between our parted lips, warm and sweet upon my tongue, and slips down my throat before spreading beneath my breastbone. The hollow ache that's been gnawing at me all evening eases—the dreadful emptiness filling with a slow, delicious warmth that reaches deep into my belly. More glimmer follows, gathering behind my ribs before spreading through the rest of me, until my fingertips tingle and the last of the hunger gives way.
There's no blood this time, no blade or desperate struggle upon the crypt floor. The soulglimmer comes willingly, passing between us with each gentle movement.
His mouth is firm and surprisingly soft, tasting of cold winter air and dried clove. As the blue light pours into me, the kiss changes—deepening as his lips part mine, the tip of his tongue tracing along my lower lip with a warmth that has nothing to do with magic and everything to do with the man holding me.
A shudder runs straight down my spine. It’s an extraordinary feeling, intoxicating and new, to be held by someone who touches me as though I might shatter like fine glass. My fingers tangle deeper in his hair, pulling him down against me, wanting more of his taste, more of the heat that seems to melt the last traces of frost from my bones.
He groans softly against my mouth, a low, rumbling sound that vibrates straight through my ribs, and his arms shift, wrapping securely around my waist. He pulls me flush against his chest, lifting me an inch from the ticking of the mattress until there’s scarcely room for air between us. Every inch of him feels solid, and fiercely real.
His lips coax mine open wider, drinking me in just as I drink from him, the blue soulglimmer tangling together with our breath until the cold room and the long miles from Beswick vanish into the dark.
When he finally eases back, he doesn’t go far. His forehead rests gently against mine, his breath mingling with my own in shallow puffs.
“Better?” he whispers, his voice thick and rough around the edges, his thumbs gently smoothing over my flushed cheeks.
“Much,” I breathe, and let him draw me down against him.
In a lull between the drunken shouting downstairs, the little room grows quiet enough for me to hear the wind worrying at the shutters. My cheek rests against his chest, and beneath it, his heart gives a faint little beat.
It's a long while before another follows.
“It's bloody quiet in there,” I murmur.
Iscairn's fingers move slowly through my hair, easing apart a tangle near the nape of my neck.
“Peace usually is, Ophelia Harrow.”
I smile, settling my arm more comfortably around his waist.
Downstairs, somebody drops a tankard with an almighty crash, setting off a fresh round of swearing before the fiddle starts up again. But I don’t grumble or groan, because there’s nowhere to be in the morning. No medicines to prepare, no patients waiting outside my door, and no death cart to call for.
For once, nobody is depending upon me to keep them alive until supper, and I haven't the faintest idea what to do with all that time.
Perhaps I'll sleep until noon. Perhaps I'll wake Iscairn and insist upon a proper breakfast, if only because I rather fancy one.
For now, though, his arm is warm around me, and his fingers are still moving gently through my hair. I close my eyes and listen to another quiet beat beneath my cheek, letting the noise from downstairs fade as sleep finally takes me.
