Page 147 of Veil of Blood and Bone

“Well, Helene Ellen Blake,” I begin, “how about you rest? And then we’ll see what we can do about those memories of yours.”

Whenever she retrieves them, she’ll know.

She’ll feel the bite of the sword again and the creeping cold that accompanies death. She’ll know it’s my hand on the other end of the weapon, from first to last.

And she’ll never look at me the same way again.

Chapter 30

Wren

It’s no hardship to stay awake and watch the others sleep.

The rise and fall of Helene’s chest, the way her eyes dart back and forth between closed lids… The dreams must be good. Soft and easy.

The kind of dreams she deserves.

The ones you wish for after rough days.

Her feet rest on Forest’s lap with Nicholas sprawled at her side, the two of them falling into oblivion together with their voices low, neither one aware of their audience.

I shouldn’t have eavesdropped. My ears burned with the lilting cadence of her whispered fears and concerns. Now one of us stays sentimental in the face of darkness

Frigid cold and sharp lightning push and stress the seams of this house. It seeps through glass to reach us here.

My shadows speak and assure me of Audra’s rest.

The only respite she’ll get from visions and prophecies.

And maybe even a gift, if I’ve been good enough to get one.

I drag my fingers through Helene’s hair to muss the strands already roughened by sweat and fists. There’s no resolution to the need or the chaos. There hasn’t been in thousands of years, and when her lips part on a sigh, I wonder if this is finally the beginning of the end.

I’ve been lost to her for centuries. So you learn to savor the small moments.

I pull free of the warmth of the pile to face her, cradle her, kiss her neck. And when her body melts into mine, when her head angles over her shoulder and mouth opens wider, desperation crashes.

I swallow a groan of my own and kiss her back.

In sleep, she tastes like woodsmoke and mountain air, a remnant from days as long lost as sentiments and scruples are in this modern era.

She’d only seen a fragment of the memory. She’d pulled us out of it before she got to the part where we fed Hellevi with more than our bodies. When her tongue wrapped around stout cherry stems and her eyes darkened, juice dotting her lips and chin.

The same juice marked all of us by the time we'd exhausted each other.

It’s a danger to stay so deeply entrenched in the past.

To make the most of the present and the craving,

I drag my hand down the soft plane of her face as shadows dance across her spine. They pull her free and turn her on her side, flush to me, until the heat of her core seeps through my skin.

I was the first to take her this time.

Eat it, you bastards.

She’s soft and open and mine alone for the moment.

She’s also slow to react in sleep. Slow to wade up through the mire of exhaustion to speak when I trail kisses along her cheeks.