Shadow of Flame

by Caitlyn McFarland

  “Don’t...think so.” Rhys bit the inside of his cheek against a moan of pain and dug his heels into the sand. The magic was closing his most life-threatening of his injuries first—not a comfortable process.

  He had to take care of his leg, but options were limited. He hadn’t brought medical supplies because there was a supply of them on the Sacred Isle. And blankets. And food.

  She squinted. To his surprise, a ball of golden flame winked into existence above her shoulder. She’d called it on her own, injured, with obvious strain. Proud as that made him, he closed his eyes and turned his head from the light.

  A soft intake of breath. A curse. “That’s too much blood. Why isn’t it healing?”

  He inhaled through his teeth when she pushed at the leg of his pants, catching some of the torn flesh. “It is, but not fast enough. Deadliest wounds heal first. I don’t have enough energy to heal everything at once.”

  In his mind, he sensed her wince, as well. “Sorry.”

  “It’s fine.” He looked around for something to use as a bandage, but he hadn’t brought anything. He pulled his shirt off over his head and handed it to her. “Put pressure on it.”

  Kai took the wadded fabric, shook off the sand, and pressed it against the injury, leaning down hard on her unhurt arm. The edges of the world went fuzzy, and Rhys gasped.

  “Sorry!”

  “I’ll be fine.” Speaking was so much easier when he didn’t have to move to do it. “Just another set of scars.”

  “I’m in your head now. I know that isn’t true.” A minute passed, and she pulled the shirt away. Her voice held an edge of panic. “It’s still bleeding.”

  His options had run out, then. “You have to cauterize it.”

  “Oh, hell!”

  Dizzy from blood loss, Rhys smiled. At least she was safe. Unless, of course, he died and left her stranded. Her warm hands tracing the edges of his injury, her mind utterly repulsed by what she was about to do. But she’d do it willingly, to save him.

  Ancients, he loved her.

  Her hands froze. Rhys’s eyes popped open, a sick, nervous feeling descending upon him. Mentally, he pulled back from her. He couldn’t meet her eyes. He’d thought he’d her say—think—that she loved him during the pledging, but since then, he’d doubted himself. Perhaps he’d made it up, because he’d wanted so badly for her to feel what he was feeling.

  That had been one benefit to mental isolation—he’d been able to keep his secrets. “You’d better seal it before I pass out.”

  “Oh.” Kai lifted her hands from his side. “How—?”

  “Like the fireball, but instead of pushing heat into the air, just concentrate it in your finger. You’ll have to push the sides of the wound together.” Finally, he met her gaze. “To burn me, it’s going to have to be hotter than normal fire. Much hotter.”

  “Will it hurt you?”

  “Yes.” Gritting his teeth, he leaned forward and ripped the fabric of his pants from ankle to mid-thigh, completely exposing the wound.

  “Oh, ew. Oh, wow. Okay.” One-handed, Kai took off her belt, doubled it, and put it in his hand. “In case you need something to bite.”

  Rhys put the leather between his teeth. Kai ripped off part of Rhys’s shirt and soaked it in the ocean, then wrung it out with her teeth and one hand over his wound to rinse out the sand. He bit down on the belt.

  She took a breath and settled her weight on his leg, holding it down. “Well, here it goes. Scream if I’m doing it wrong.”

  Her voice shook, but her hand was steady. Using her thumb and middle finger, she pinched the first gash closed. Wincing in obvious pain as she moved, she pressed her first finger to the ragged tear and moved it downward.

  Rhys barely had the presence of mind to throw up a shoddy mental shield between himself and Kai before the pain registered. It burned. He bit down on the leather and let out a muffled scream, using every ounce of willpower not to writhe.

  Kai gagged, but started on the second slash. Wetness splashed against Rhys’s knee. Kai was leaning on him, crying as she worked, her breathing as heavy and hard as his own. She stopped, pulling her hand away. “Like her. It smells like her.”

  Ancients, he’d forgotten. The dragon Kai had killed.

  “Keep going,” Rhys said, muffled by the belt. But her eyes were far away.

  He took the belt from his mouth and used a tone that could cut across a dozen shouting council members. “Kai!”

  Her eyes snapped back to his face.

  He took a ragged breath, fighting the pain. “When you killed that Derkin, you did what needed to be done to save yourself. Just like I’ve done, and Ashem and Cadoc and Ffion and Deryn. We’ve all had to kill. Now I need you to keep me alive.”

  The smell of his own scorched flesh rolled over him, and he fought not to vomit. He caught her hand, bringing it back to the wound, softening his voice. “Do it and be done. Please.”

  She squeezed his fingers, both of their hands sticky with blood, and closed her eyes. “Do it and be done.”

  She finished cauterizing the wound, and Rhys fell back in relief.

  A pinprick of pain from Kai. Rhys raised his head. She had his shirt in one hand. “Can you tear this into strips for a bandage? I can’t.”

  Wrung out and still dizzy, Rhys pushed himself up. “Let me see your arm.”

  Kai turned. Her shoulder was a mass of bruises, but it wasn’t broken or dislocated as she’d feared.

  “You’ll be all right.” He brushed hair from her face. “Thank you.”

  She nodded, not meeting his eyes, and he remembered his accidental confession of love. He swallowed. She hadn’t said anything. Had she not heard his thoughts? Did she not return them? They might be connected, but he could only see what she showed him. He’d withdrawn from her to protect her from the pain, and neither of them had pushed closer, yet. Rhys wanted to, but he didn’t want to drive her away, so he buried the questions too deep for her to sense.

  “Here.” He held out a hand. Kai placed his shirt in it, and he tore it in strips. “We should sleep.”

  “Yeah.” She bound the strips of cloth around his leg. When she was finished, she helped him to his feet.

  Rhys scanned the cliffs, high and dark. He saw no caves, but spotted an overhang. He pointed it out to Kai. She pulled their bags above the high tide line, retrieving the blanket they’d brought from her bag and laying it out underneath the jut of rock. The Sacred Isle, where they’d been planning to say, was fully stocked and had a bed, so their supplies were meager.

  They lay down on top of the blanket, Rhys placing himself between Kai and the sea. After a while, he flipped onto his side, propping his head on an elbow. If he reached out, he could touch her. Amazement filled him when he realized he’d only known her two and a half months. He’d known some of his friends for thousands of years, but with Kai, there was an intimacy he’d never experienced before.

  He ran his fingers over her salt-roughened hair, unspeakably grateful that they’d both survived; that he would wake up and see her looking back at him. Hear her say something in that mellow, dry tone that would take him off guard, make him laugh.

  Sunder me; I am in love.

  * * *

  Kai woke in the middle of the night to the sound of waves and night insects and the wind in tropical trees. Experimentally, she rolled her shoulder. Though a blanket on the sand was not the most comfortable bed she’d ever had, it felt much better.

  “Rhys?”

  No response but deep breathing.

  Kai sat up and called a dim little ball of fire, bringing it close to the shining burns on Rhys’s thigh. They’d been angry and red, but the flesh around them was cool and there wasn’t any swelling. Thanks to his accelerated healing, the burns looked weeks old.

  She let
the small ball of flame drift upward, turning the skin of his torso to gold, his indicium shimmering crimson. With soft fingers, she brushed sand from his jaw. His face was smooth, relaxed in sleep, his burdens momentarily lifted. Except for the scales, he looked like a guy she might have met walking around campus.

  “Did I hear right?” she whispered so low it hardly reached her own ears. “I mean, maybe I was wrong. I’m new to this whole mind-meld thing.” She hesitated, needing to know, her hope like a red-hot poker, light so mesmerizing she couldn’t help but wrap her hand around it and squeeze.

  She leaned close and pressed her cheek to his. “Do you love me?”

  She had only been half-paying attention to his thoughts when he’d “said” it...but then he’d acted as if nothing had happened. As if he hadn’t just taken her given her the entire world.

  Rhys exhaled and shifted onto his back, his hands behind his head, the bony point if his elbow right where Kai was supposed to lay down. She sighed, exhausted, and laid her head on his shoulder instead, curling into him. The warmth of his closeness seeped into her skin like new spring sun. He didn’t wake, but tilted his head so his cheek rested against her hair.

  If she could have chosen someone to be here with—exhausted, injured, far from help—she would choose him.

  “I love you, too,” she murmured.

  Warmth prickled along their bond. His body tensed. The deep breathing stopped. When he spoke, his voice was quiet and not at all sleepy. “Do you?”

  “Damn it!” She sat up, letting her mussed hair fall in a curtain over her face. She drew her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, shooting him an accusatory look through the ebony strands.

  He tentatively touched her hair, hooking it behind her ear so her face was visible to him. “Kai?”

  Even with their connection, she couldn’t get a read on his feelings. He was evading her. “This is not how it goes in the movies. You’re supposed to stay asleep. That way I get to tell you my secrets without you actually knowing what they are.”

  Rhys gave her a heart-stopping half smile. “This isn’t a movie, cariad. Space. Hobbies. Time alone. Those we should have, when we need them. Not secrets.” He pushed himself up.

  Cariad. Beloved. All this time, he’d been calling her “beloved.”

  Kai swallowed. “You were sleeping...”

  “And then I was not.”

  “So I didn’t mishear you earlier. You said, or thought, or whatever—”

  He opened to her completely. Warm and sweet, his emotions were like honey and light and breathing. It was being wanted. It was coming home. Like a fire that raged forever, never completely under control.

  Love. She kissed him. Not hard or desperate, but softness didn’t diminish passion. He tasted like salt. When they broke apart to breathe, his eyes were unfocused. He stole another, gentle kiss.

  “Dwi’n dy garu di.” I love you.

  She kissed him again. Slowly at first. Lightly. He slid his fingers down her cheek, both gritty with sand, tracing her jaw back to her ear and cupping her neck. He pulled her forward, and she let him, unsteady breath quickening.

  Awareness shivered along her skin, raising goose bumps. Rhys’s hand was on her back, sliding up and down, fingers teasing the skin exposed between her shirt and the waistband of her pants. His other hand had gone to her leg, found a hole the crash had ripped in her jeans, and slid his fingers in to touch to the tender skin behind her knee, rubbing in small, insistent, maddening circles.

  Touching, breathing, scenting, pulling each other closer, though they were already as close as they could get. Kai nipped his lip with her teeth.

  “Kai.” Rhys’s voice was ragged with want and warning.

  For the first time in her life, heart, head, and hormones all agreed. She was ready.

  “Blood of the Ancients.” He sensed the thought and tilted her face up, his mouth hard and desperate

  It was good. She wanted him. Wanted to be closer to him than she’d ever been to anyone before. Forget fear or awkwardness or whether she’d fail utterly at adult relations. He loved her, and they were alive.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. Oh, hell yes.”

  She pulled him on top of her, his weight bringing on a wave of sensation that made her dizzy. A small sound escaped her lips. Rhys groaned, pressing against her. Another wave of dizziness assaulted Kai, glorious and dark.

  She didn’t notice the tingling in her skin until she saw the flames. The blanket was on fire.

  “Oh!” Kai jerked back. “We’re on fire.”

  He kissed her, passing his hands down her waist, leaving flames in their wake, burning away their clothes. To Kai, it felt like no more than a warm breeze.

  Rhys brushed away the ashes, exposing her skin. “Let it burn.”

  The fire was hot, but it only sensitized her body, deepening her ache. Minds connected, they discovered how to make each other gasp and moan and arch and need. There was pain when they came together, but it was swept away in a flood of desire.

  And then there was nothing separating them. Minds and bodies melded, they were heat and light, souls fusing in an intimacy that had nothing to do with heartswearing or magic, but passion and trust and love.

  The flames retreated, dimming to a soft flicker. Kai lay her head on Rhys’s shoulder, wincing a little. Overwhelmed by the tenderness in his expression, she looked down. “So...no one ever told me sex was messy.”

  Rhys laughed and kissed her forehead. A sort of golden contentment spread through Kai. She loved his laugh. He always sounded slightly surprised.

  She raised herself up on one elbow. “Don’t worry, Juli gave me very practical pre-sex advice about drinking cranberry juice to avoid UTIs.”

  He lifted an eyebrow. “Health is important.”

  Kai chuckled and lay down against his side again, tracing his indicium with her fingers. “I’m glad we had this romantic talk. Also...” She propped herself up on her elbow again. “You burned my clothes!”

  He grinned wickedly. “You burned your clothes. I only helped. Be grateful I didn’t let you burn the blanket, or there would be sand in awkward places.” His eyes cruised down her soot-smudged body.

  Kai blushed. She was well aware of her shortcomings: the flatness where there should be curves, the occasional breakout, her hands, rough from years of gymnastics, then climbing. The long, shining scar that ran from right wrist to elbow, courtesy of Kavar.

  She brought her arm up to hide her breasts and curled in on herself as much as she could, lying against Rhys as she was. Damn it. I don’t even have another blanket. Where’s my bag? Freaking hell, it’s all the way down by the water. I have to walk down the beach naked while he watches!

  “Stop, cariad.” He tilted his head toward the knotted skin of the scar that distorted his indicium and sliced in a thinning white line down his abdomen. “Bodies are bodies. And yours is...peraidd.”

  Kai caught the meaning behind the word, now. Delicious. Sweet.

  “Mm. Speak to me in Welsh forever.” Kai’s unease lessened, but despite her words, it didn’t disappear entirely. She traced her fingers over his shoulder, down the scar to his stomach, relishing his shiver, the desire that ignited in him. She kissed his shoulder and he slid his hands up her back, pressing her to him. Kai turned her face into his chest, memorizing the exquisite, intimate strangeness of touching another person with so much skin against skin.

  The sex had been good, but this, the closeness, was so much more.

  Her smile faltered. Unlike her, this hadn’t been Rhys’s first time. “Was Morwenna...you know...better?”

  “No.” Rhys’s eyes were blue flame as he traced the indentation of Kai’s waist, drawing his fingers up her body to trace her jaw. He drew his thumb across her lips, soft and serious. “I nev
er felt for Morwenna what I feel for you. And she never set me on fire.”

  Something new rose inside Kai, utterly, unspeakably tender. Embarrassed, she touched Rhys’s cheek. A wave of love rolled over her so strong she thought she could drown in it.

  He pulled her close. “Dw i’n di garu di am byth,” he whispered fiercely. “Tan o fy enaid, fflam o fy nghalon.”

  I love you forever. Fire of my soul, flame of my heart.

  Tears burned behind Kai’s eyes, her joy so strong it couldn’t be kept inside. She dashed them away and pulled herself up to kiss him, whispering words of love against his lips. Around them, the fire rekindled.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Harbinger of War

  Rhys woke to the sun in his eyes, salt on his lips, and Kai’s head on his chest. Her dreaming mind brushed against his, fuzzy and content.

  Warm emotion washed through him—he was more relaxed than he’d been in a long time, as if something deep inside him had uncoiled. He ran his fingers down the smooth skin of her side. The sex had helped, but that was only part of it.

  Down near the bright blue water, the harness he’d worn last night was a twisted wreck. Rhys’s contentment faded. The sky was empty, but the Elemental had escaped. It might not be empty for long.

  He shifted Kai to the side and sat up, examining his leg. She’d done a fair job, considering it was her first time using her magic under that kind of pressure. He stood and took a step then bent his knee. The skin was tight, but nothing a little stretching wouldn’t fix.

  He retrieved their bags from the shoreline. A few sea birds scattered at his approach, their calls a raucous counterpoint to the steady, incoming waves. Luckily, the bags had been tied high on his back behind Kai, so their contents were dry. He pulled out clothes, warm from the sun, and dressed.

  His eyes went back to Kai, curled, pale and naked, on the dark blanket. Though they’d arrived in less than ideal circumstances, what they’d found here...Ancients, he wanted to stay.

  Shaking himself, he went to examine the harness.

  “Rhys?”