Page 67 of Into Ember

He leans back and pulls me with him.

His heart under my ear, going like a hammer, and mine keeping up.

The floor is a lake. Several candles did not survive. I regret nothing.

“Stay there,” Erik murmurs into my hair, his arms not loosening at all. “Just — stay.”

“I live here now,” I tell his collarbone. “This is where I live.”

From the other room, distant, muffled, and absolutely unmistakable, comes Gunnar.

“FINALLY.”

I groan into Erik’s chest. He’s trying hard not to laugh and failing, his body shaking underneath mine.

I grin, I can’t help it.

“I’m executing him first.”

Chapter 25

Gunnar

I don’t sleep.

I try. Sleep says no.

Typical.

I lie on the couch with my boots on in protest. I stare at the ceiling, where some dead artisan spent a year, maybe more painting clouds, and I memorize it twice. Early in the night, the castle got loud.

One guess who.

Good for them. Truly. I had six better lines than FINALLY and Brock made me swallow every one of them. Reality owes me those.

There’s a ball coming. For her. Nobody’s told us when, and nobody’s told us why, and the people throwing it are the same ones I’m not sure we can trust anymore.

I think we’re all feeling it though, so that saves me the trouble of having to explain it.

The Vestry has been the power my entire life. Longer than that. Going back to the time right before female dragons all but disappeared, if my history lessons are to be believed.

And there’s Pops.

The paperwork thing. That’s all it is. A paperwork thing.

Just as you said you would.

My father. The most rule-abiding man in every realm I’ve ever been to. Reported his own son’s unit before breakfast, then walked into our kitchen and grinned and told everyone how proud—

No. Nope. Not before sunrise. Maybe never.

The sky through the windows is going gray at the bottom.

“You’re vibrating,” Brock says from the other couch. Not asleep either. Of course he isn’t.

“I’m lying perfectly still.”

“Loudly.”