Kingdom of Ash

She made a low noise of wonder, perhaps something more, and her fingers stroked again.

“Say it,” she whispered, fingers stilling in his hair.

Lorcan opened his eyes, finding her gaze. “I love you.”

She swallowed hard, and Lorcan gritted his teeth as he sat up fully. This close, he had forgotten how much he towered over her. Atop that horse, she had been a force of nature, a defiant storm. His blanket slipped dangerously low, but he let it lie where it pooled in his lap.

He didn’t miss the dip of her stare. Or the long, upward drag of her eyes along his torso. He could almost feel it, lingering on every muscle and scar.

A soft groan came out of him as she continued to look her fill. Asking for things that he sure as hell was in no shape to give her. And that she might not yet be ready to give him, declarations aside.

He was immediately challenged to prove his resolve as Elide ran slightly shaking fingers across the new scar on his abdomen.

“Yrene said you might always have this,” she said, her hand mercifully falling away.

“Then it will be the scar I treasure most.” Fenrys would laugh until he cried to hear him speak this way, but Lorcan didn’t care. To hell with the rest of them.

Another one of those small smiles curved her lips, and Lorcan’s hands tightened in the sheets with the effort it took not to taste that smile, to worship it with his own mouth.

But this new, fragile thing humming between them … He would not risk it for all the world.

Elide, thank the gods, had no such worries. None at all, it seemed, as she lifted a hand to his cheek and ran her thumb along it. Every breath was an effort of control.

Lorcan held absolutely still as she brought her mouth to his. Brushed her lips across his own.

She pulled back. “Rest, Lorcan. I’ll be here again when you wake.”

Anything she asked, he’d give her. Anything at all.

Too shaken by that soft, beautiful kiss to bother with words, he lay back down.

She smiled at his utter obedience, and, as if she couldn’t help herself, leaned in once more.

This kiss lingered. Her mouth traced his, and at the slight pressure of her lips, the gentle request, he answered with his own.

The taste of her threatened to undo him entirely, and the tentative brush of her tongue against his own drew another rolling purr from deep in his chest. But Lorcan let Elide explore him, slowly and sweetly, giving her whatever she asked.

And when her mouth became more insistent, when her breathing turned ragged, he slipped a hand around her neck to cup her nape. She opened for him, and at her low moan, Lorcan thought he’d fly out of his skin.

His hand slipped from her nape to run down her back, savoring the warm, unbreakable body beneath the layers of clothes. Elide arched into the touch, another of those small noises coming from her. As if she’d been just as starved for him.

But Lorcan made himself pull away. Made himself withdraw his hand from her lower back. Panting slightly, sharing breath, he said onto her mouth, “Later. Go help the others.”

Dark eyes glazed with desire met his, and Lorcan adjusted the fall of the blanket over his lap. “Go help the others,” he repeated. “I’ll be here when you’re ready to sleep.”

The unspoken request lingered, and Elide pulled back, studying him once more.

“Sleep only,” Lorcan said, not bothering to hide the heat rising in his stare. “For now.”

Until she was ready. Until she told him, showed him, she wished to share everything with him. That final claiming.

But until then, he wanted her here. Sleeping at his side, where he might watch over her. As she had watched over him.

Elide’s face was flushed as she rose, her hands shaking. Not from fear, but from the same effort that it now took Lorcan not to reach for her.

He’d very much enjoy driving her out of her mind. Slowly teaching her all he knew about pleasure, about wanting. He had little doubt he’d be learning a good number of things from her, too.

Elide seemed to read that on his face, and her cheeks reddened further. “Later, then,” she breathed, limping to the door.

Lorcan sent a flicker of his power to wrap around her ankle. The limp vanished.

A hand on the knob, she gave him a small, grateful nod. “I missed that.”

He heard the unspoken words as she disappeared into the busy hall.

I missed you.

Lorcan allowed himself a rare smile.

CHAPTER 65

Dorian had gone to Morath.

Had flown from the camp on wings of his own making. He would have chosen some sort of small, ordinary bird, Manon knew. Something even the Thirteen would not have noted.

Manon stood at the edge of the outlook, gazing eastward.

Crunching snow told her Asterin approached. “He left, didn’t he.”

She nodded, unable to find words. She had offered him everything, and had thought he’d meant to accept it. Had thought he did accept it, with what they’d done afterward.

Yet it had been a farewell. One last coupling before he ventured into the jaws of death. He would not cage her, would not accept what she’d given.

As if he knew her better than she knew herself.

“Do we go after him?”

In the breaking light of dawn, the camp was stirring. Today—today they would decide where to go. Today, she’d dare ask the Crochans to follow. Would they heed her?

But to head to Morath, where they would be recognized long before they approached, to head back into hell …

The sun rose, full and golden, as if it were the solitary note of a song filling the world.

Manon opened her mouth.

“Terrasen calls for aid!” A young Crochan’s voice rang through the camp.

Manon and Asterin whirled, others following suit as the witch sprinted for Glennis’s tent. The crone emerged as the witch skidded to a halt. A scout, no doubt, breathless and hair wind-tossed.

“Terrasen calls for aid,” the scout panted, bracing her hands on her knees as she bent over to gulp down breaths. “Morath routed them at the border, then at Perranth, and advances on Orynth as we speak. They will sack the city within a week.”

Worse news than Manon had anticipated. Even if she’d needed it, waited for it.

The Thirteen closed in, Bronwen a step behind, and Manon didn’t dare breathe as Glennis stared toward the immortal flame burning in the fire pit mere feet away. The Flame of War.

Then she turned toward Manon. “What say you, Queen of Witches?”

A challenge and a dare.

Manon lifted her chin at the two paths before her.

One to the east, to Morath. The other northward, to Terrasen and battle.

The wind sang, and in it, she heard the answer.

“I shall answer Terrasen’s call,” Manon said.

Asterin stepped to her side, fearless as she surveyed the assembled camp. “As shall I.”

Sorrel flanked Manon’s right. “So shall the Thirteen.”

Manon waited, hardly daring to acknowledge the thing that began burning in her chest.

Then Bronwen stepped up, her dark hair blowing in the chill wind. “The Vanora hearth shall fly north.”

Another witch squared her shoulders. “So shall the Silian.”

And so it went.

Until the leaders of all seven of the Great Hearths stood gathered there.

Until Glennis said to Manon, “Long ago, Rhiannon Crochan rode at King Brannon’s side into battle. So has her likeness been reborn, so shall the old alliances be forged anew.” She gestured to the eternal flame. “Light the Flame of War, Queen of Witches, and rally your host.”

Manon’s heart raced, so wildly it pulsed in her palms, but she picked up a birch branch set amongst the kindling.

No one spoke as she plunged it into the eternal flame.

Red and gold and blue leaped upon the wood, devouring it. Manon withdrew the branch only when it had caught, deep and true.

Even the wind did not jostle the flame as Manon lifted it, a torch in the new day.

The Crochan crowd parted, revealing a straight path toward Bronwen’s hearth. The witch was already waiting, her coven gathered around her.

Each step was a drumbeat of war. An answer to a question posed long ago.

Bronwen’s eyes were bright as Manon stopped.

Manon only said, “Your queen summons you to war.”