Speaking of, it was past uncomfortable down there, and he reached his hand down to unzip and free himself. Her hand met his and she cupped him through his own underwear, the warmth of her palm spreading past his underwear to the skin underneath.
He groaned, whispered, “Do you feel what you do to me? This is you, it’s only you.”
He divested them of clothes, wanting skin to skin, breath to breath. He needed to be close to her. Adrenaline thrummed that they had survived, that they were together, and the book was safe, and the impossible had happened.
She was all slick and wet and heat, and she moved underneath him like they had been connected for years.
As she clenched around him, as he buried his head into her neck and groaned his own pleasure, hope spread through him. They’d conquered their first battle, together, and they’d do it again.
Chapter Forty
‡
Tec’s voice was an annoying buzz, flitting around her and poking through the haze of the slow change from sleep to full wakefulness. “Fallon, can you hear me? Fallon, report.”
She was groggy, not her usual way of waking, and it took a moment before last night’s images, last night’s attack, filtered through her brain. “What is it?” But she knew, she knew.
“The Spellbook is gone. The vault was broken into. It’s whole and nothing else is missing, but the magics around it were disabled. All items except the Spellbook are accounted for. Kyo is upset.”
“Nice understatement, Tec.” She threw her legs over the side of the bed, her eyes lighting on Tenro in its usual spot next to her headboard. It was bristling, its displeasure of the night’s happenings clear.
This needed to be put to rest, once and for all and before circumstances spiraled into places she did not want to go.
An old tree flashed through her mind, and her teeth ground together so hard the vibration rattled her eardrum.
No, it ended here, and it ended now, and maybe she’d been going about this all wrong. “Tec, get me to The Hill, and make sure they understand this is not a request they can say no to.”
A pause, then Tec’s voice came through, worry evident despite the obvious try to keep it hidden. “Why do you wish to go there?”
“Plan G just came to me.”
Chapter Forty-One
‡
The thing about solitary was that it wasn’t.
True, there was only one semi-durable cot in each cell, a cot with one thin, stinking mattress – the same mattress Nakoa was laying on, the lumps no longer noticeable due to familiarity. With only one mattress came only one prisoner, because here prisoners couldn’t be counted on to play nice or not maim each other if they had to share space.
That didn’t stop the twenty-four seven noise where the population cat-called and threatened or just fucking laughed the most insane laughs, noises which the guards tolerated even after lights out as long as it didn’t go above an unspoken acceptable level.
There was never peace, the peace of a moonlit beach and the salt air strong in your nostrils, the birds and waves serenading the few earthbound creatures walking the sand and making their way through the tide.
Next to his sister, it was that peace he missed most.
He breathed deep through his nose, a calming technique he was using more and more often even as it was getting less and less effective. The strands of an orchestral floated through his cell, the music a privilege that was his alone, and he hummed along with the notes, bringing them into himself to soothe the always bubbling anger that thrummed through every bit of skin and blood.
Kregen stepped up to his cell door. The sergeant only arrived when things were happening, and Nakoa turned his attention away from the beginnings of Che Gelida Manina in idle curiosity. Amana wasn’t here, and really, nothing else mattered.
“Don’t you think that music is kind of hard to listen to? Not like you can whistle to it or anything.” The sergeant was on the later side of middle-age but still in fighting shape. Nakoa had never been able to suss out what, if any, powers the man had or if he was something other than human, but that was par around here. It would be stupid for the guards to announce what they could and couldn’t do to the beings they were housing. The man ran the block fair and treated everyone with respect, and here, there was no higher praise for a guard. The inmates would still skewer him if that’s what it took to get out of here, but that was understood in this world.
“It’s about hope and love. Sometimes it’s nice to remember those things.” Nakoa stood, everything easy and non-threatening. He had no desire to be pulled from his music and thrown in the hole. Not today. The berserker was too close to the skin today.