Page 44

A whimper.

Good God. He wasn’t even awake.

In the months we’d known one another, I’d seen him in any number of ways, but never like this. Was it a sickness? He’d been so pale last night and I’d not even thought—not paused to check on him. I’d been so caught up in my own worries—in the investigation.

“Dark … so dark,” he muttered as he pressed himself harder into the plaster walls, begging them to swallow him up.

A dream. It was only a dream.

I could handle that. A prickle of worry tugged at the edge of my mind. Ruan told me he rarely dreamt, and yet he was most certainly caught in the midst of one. Could the place be affecting him? The proximity of another pellar? Something else entirely? My riotous mind jumped from theory to theory, none of them helpful. Not when Ruan was so clearly in pain. I shook the thought away.

Pellars are people, Ruby Vaughn, not magnetic forces.

My hands flew to his face, holding him steady. His skin was impossibly cold. Just as Félix’s had been in the lake. His lovely eyes were wide open with that terrifying thousand-yard stare I’d seen in countless others through the years. But never in him. My chest ached as I moved my thumb over the coarse stubble of his cheek. It was a dream. That’s all it was. Some terror brought on by this godforsaken place.

“Ruan … darling, I need you to wake up.”

His breath was shallow, unsteady.

“Ruan … do you hear me?”

He stared past me—through me—out the window to where the broken spires of the priory church loomed in the predawn sky.

He trembled beneath my touch, murmuring to himself in Cornish, and I cursed myself for having not taken the time to learn his language. Granted, most of Cornwall no longer spoke it.

Only my pellar.

Mine.

The voice echoed in my head. He was mine and I would snap him out of this dream.

Is mine, the voice corrected.

I crawled into his lap—desperate to pull him from his own horrors as he always did for me. But I had no power over him. Nothing but my hands and mind and heart—broken as they were. My thin white nightgown strained against my thighs. I felt every inch of the wooden floor, cold and rough against my bare shins. I was going to have to try a different tack. Gentleness wasn’t working, so perhaps force might. I prodded him hard with my elbow. “Wake up, you great big ox.”

I was growing panicky. It was dangerous to wake a sleepwalker—at least that’s what they say. As it was usually me doing the sleepwalking, I had no idea how one went about the thing. Why would he not just wake up? I placed both hands on the side of his face and pressed my forehead against his. “I’m here. It’s Ruby … I have you.”

Streaks of silver flashed in the pale green depths of his eyes. He was reaching for his power. Something shifted in him and Ruan’s brows drew up. He stared at me uncertainly, slowly focusing upon my face.

His voice was hoarse and cracked as he ran a trembling hand over my cheek. “You came back.”

“I’ve been here all along. It’s all right. It was just a dream.” I hugged him tight as his arms slammed around me, fastening us together.

His damp cheek was pressed against my chest as he muttered to himself in Cornish. The air around us grew crisp and sharp as he continued murmuring. His breath hot through the cloth of my nightdress. “Please don’t leave me with them. Not here…”

I took his hands in my own, wriggling away from him and pressing his palm against the thundering of my heart. His own pulse eerily slow, as always. “I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. Not without you.”

Suddenly, the last of the dream gave way. Ruan shuddered, breathing out my name on a sigh. “Ruby … Gods … Ruby…” He pressed his forehead to mine. His breath warm on my skin and relief washed over me.

I ran a hand over the bare skin of his back, tracing the roped scar along his spine from where he’d nearly died in the war. Was that what he dreamt of? I hoped not. I’d not wish those terrors upon anyone. “I’m here, darling. I’m with you.” My voice was hoarse—weak. It was this damned investigation getting to him. That had to be it. It was driving him mad. I’d nearly gotten myself killed, brought him back to Belgium, where he’d told me in no uncertain terms he would never return. The ghosts were strong here. Echoes of a past we both sought to avoid.

Ruan’s rough fingers trailed their way down my thin nightgown. “Stay … please…”

I had no intention of leaving him. Not ever. His roving fingers slid down my body until they found my bare thigh. Skin to skin. Heat followed each place he touched. His own hands shaking as he explored with the same reverence as they had the very first time. There was something strange in the way he touched me, something I could not quite under—but before I could finish the thought, he kissed me. Hard and desperate like a man who’d returned from war. And perhaps in a way, he had.

A metallic taste flooded my mouth as his kiss stung my lips. The power of him surged through me. It had never been like this before. Raw, broken and afraid. I’d never loved him more than in this very moment.

His voice was low, guttural as he spoke against the bare skin of my throat. “I could not bear it if you left me again…”