Soft footsteps approached. Trey, not Kiro, the stone told me. He knelt in front of me, his gaze a heated caress that skimmed me. Even though he made no immediate move to touch me, I couldn’t help whispering, “Don’t.”
“No,” he repeated. I had a vague thought he knew precisely what was happening to me. “Lord Kiro, it would be best if you go back to the masque and reassure everyone that nothing of consequence has happened. Some would have heard the anger in the wind, and many would have felt the tremor. I’ve asked the earth to whisper reassurances that the tremor they felt was a minor event caused by an untrained child, but still—”
“I will,” Kiro said. “But what of Lady Pyra? We need to know what went on in this room, and what part Neve has played.”
“Yes, but she’s in no state to deal with questions right now.” His gaze still hadn’t left me, and my body shook under the force of it. But the strange awareness was growing stronger—deeper—because the wash of his breath, soft and distant, felt as fierce against my skin as any summer storm. “As for Pyra—the earth will take care of her.”
“They all know she left with Neve and will suspect wrongdoing.”
“Which may yet play into our hands.”
Kiro’s gaze joined Trey’s and I felt like weeping under the double pressure. For freedom’s sake, what was happening to me? If the wind knew, she gave no answers, and the earth had never deigned to even help me until today.
“There are questions that desperately need—”
“Yes, but she undoubtedly has just as many. Pyra tried to kill her, Kiro, and the quake was the result of protecting herself. This has to be dealt with now, and then we need to bring her fully into our confidence.”
There was a long silence then, “You will perform the ceremony?”
“Yes. We have no option right now.”
“And yet the ceremony is not without its dangers. We can call in a priest—”
“There isn’t enough time. Look at her, Kiro. The power all but consumes her.”
Consumes me? My whole body might be on fire, and every breath—every quiver of movement might feel like a blow—but I wouldn’t have said the sensations were so intense that I’d fall under the pressure of them.
Kiro hesitated, then said, “Be careful, Trey. We’ll continue this on the morrow.”
“Come back at three. Not before. And tell the maidservants to keep well away until then.”
“As you wish.”
The stone trembled under the weight of Kiro’s steps as he walked away. As the suite door closed and the sound echoed around the broken room, I forced my eyes open and looked into Trey’s. There was sympathy there, as well as understanding.
And desire so fierce perspiration began to dot my skin.
I swallowed heavily and said, “What is the deal between you and Kiro?”
A smile tugged his lips. “Of all the questions I expected you to ask, that was not one of them.”
“You know what’s happening to me, don’t you?”
“Yes, and I’m afraid the cure will make things a whole lot worse before they can get better.”
“I don’t think that’s possible.”
“Then you’d be wrong. As to what’s happening—” He took a deep breath and released it slowly. “What you’re experiencing is the end result of raising magic you neither understand nor fully control.”
I frowned at him. “But I didn’t—”
“You did. Who else was here to raise the earth? It certainly didn’t answer Pyra’s call.”
“But how is that even possible? I’m unlit—”
“The hows and whys aren’t important right now. We need to perform the ceremony of Gaia immediately. It will bind you to the energy of the earth and stop these uncontrolled events. You’ll still need training, of course, but it will ease the risk to both you and everything around you.” He hesitated, and the wash of his desire increased, making me tremble under its force. “But I have to warn you—the ceremony is sexual in nature. Given we have no time to call for a priest, I’ll have to take his place as the earth’s representative.”
While I was all for having sex with Trey, any sort of touch in this hypersensitive state would be nigh on unbearable. “What happens if I don’t do the ceremony?”
“You’ll be torn apart by the forces you cannot yet control.” His voice was grim. “And you might just take a good portion of Winterborne with you.”
“Then there is no choice.”
“No. Can you walk?”
I snorted—a soft sound that somehow hurt. “You already know the answer to that.”
“Given your propensity to keep doing things you shouldn’t, I had to ask.” He paused again, and the amusement that had briefly flirted with his lips fell away. He reached to the side, picked up a smooth piece of what looked to be the remains of a chair’s leg, and said, “Place this in your mouth and bite down into it.”
Fear stirred through me. “Why? What do you intend to do?”
“Pick you up.”
He placed the wood against my lips. In my current state of being, I could taste the varnish on its surface, feel the eons of life from the tree it had once been. Could smell the minute droplets of blood that had been sprayed across one edge.
“Trust me,” Trey said softly, “you’ll want this.”
After a moment, I opened my mouth and accepted the gag. He shifted to my right side, the movement washing waves of air across my skin and sending another shudder through me.
“Ready?” he asked.
No, I wanted to say, even as I nodded.
He hesitated, then slipped his hands under my knees and behind my back and, in one smooth movement, lifted me. It felt like every nerve ending in my body was being ripped apart. The pain I’d felt before was bad, but this—this was a tsunami. I bit down on the chair leg so hard my teeth cracked its surface, but it didn’t stop the scream that ripped from my throat. Nothing could.
And though he held me so very gently against his body as he carried me from the bedroom, the rub of his silk shirt against my flesh felt like sandpaper tearing away layers of flesh.
We moved outside, onto the patio. The icy air stung my skin, drying the blood on my face but providing no release from the heat and the pain. I could feel through the night’s vibrations that the party still went on above us, could hear the music and the violence of the sea far below us, but none of it came close to the overwhelming sense of power and desire coming from the man holding me so close.
He didn’t stop at the railing. He simply climbed over the capstone and stepped out onto the ten or so feet of dangerous wilderness that now separated us from the long drop to the sea.
“Are you intending to throw me over that cliff?”
It came out more than a little garbled, given the chair leg, but he obviously understood, because he laughed. It was a soft sound that caused both pleasure and pain. “No, I most certainly am not.”
Good. But this time, I didn’t say it. Couldn’t.
“When I set you down, Neve, I need you to kneel and hold out your hands, palm up. Can you do that?”
I nodded. He stopped, carefully placed me on the ground, and then pulled away. The pebbles and twigs that littered the ground felt like knives digging into my skin, and the wild grasses became lashes of leather. I bit deeper into the chair leg, fighting the bile that rose up my throat and the blackness beginning to affect my vision, and slowly, carefully, assumed a kneeling position.
Knees touched mine. The contact was skin on skin and electric. My heart began to beat a whole lot faster. I forced my eyes open and discovered he was as naked as I. And lord, was he beautiful; his brown skin gleamed like warmed chocolate under the moon’s cold light, his arms and his chest were well muscled, his abs well-defined, and his erection thick and fierce.
Whatever doubts I might have had about his desire for me were in that moment irrevocably shattered.
He carefully removed the chair leg from my mouth, and then placed his hands on top of mine. Though his touch was light, it burned through my nerve endings and sent a shudder through my entire body. Despite that, energy stirred between us, energy that was sexual and yet not, and came not just from him, but from the very ground underneath us.