Page 29 of Summer of Sacrifice

“Echos?” she mimicked. “Mm. Let’s see what you can make echo, then, reaper.”

Grimm’s eyes flashed, and he pulled her inside the cave. With his lips on hers, he unbuttoned his pants and removed his shirt, all the while walking her backwards until she was against a stone wall.

“You do realise,” she said breathlessly when he moved his lips to her neck, “that our room was also a cave, yes?”

He murmured his disagreement, pulling the bodice of her dress down, and sucking a breath through his teeth when she was bare. His lips found her breasts, one hand caressing them and the other moving to meet the heat between her legs. When he began stroking her there, she lost all sense of time or any practicality, her fingers digging into his back. Without removing her dress, he pressed himself into her, holding her up by the waist as she melted onto him, almost whimpering with pleasure.

Grimm spent a long time coaxing echoing sounds from her until they both collapsed on a blanket she’d barely had the wherewithal to summon.

They lay on the cave floor, just at its mouth, looking at the stars. “You once told me your favourite time of day was twilight,” he mused, kissing her shoulder.

“Ah, whilst playing three inquiries with my loathed betrothed.”

Grimm snorted. “Look at you rhyming.”

“I have many gifts.” She made to rise, but he pulled her back down.

“No. Stay right where you are.” She smiled at him, his lips still swollen and smudged by her lip stain.

“Unfortunately, my Sister has been trying to summon me for the better part of our rendezvous.”

Grimm feigned a gasp, scandalised. “And you ignored her summons? Naughty, little witch.”

Agatha tipped her head back and laughed, grateful for snippets of light in their dark life. She tried again to rise, but Grimm grasped her waist and pulled her closer, kissing the tops of her breasts.

“I’ll make you a deal,” she said, shoving him back, but he only growled at her dismissal. “Keep your hands to yourself, and I’ll go see what Sorscha wants. Then, when we get to Achlys, you can remind me of every place we ever… anointed.”

Grimm’s eyes sparked, and he slid down her body until he was planting kisses up and down the inside of her thighs. “You do understand,” he said between feather-soft presses of his lips against her skin, “that we were in Achlys for ages and ages.”

“I do realise that. And we had four children to show for it, so I expect to be thoroughly ravaged.” From between her legs, he grinned up at her wickedly, and she used her magic to transport herself outside the cave before she gave in to temptation. “I’ll return before supper. Now, Prince Thackery Peridot, Thanasim, God of Night, and Heir to the Throne of Achlys, put your pants on.”

She just caught his deep rumble of laughter as she conjured a plum gown and let her magic find her Sister Spring.

To her surprise, Sorscha was in a heated debate with Seleste of all people, the two of them encased in a stifling greenhouse.

Both of them ignored Agatha’s arrival.

“It doesn’t coincide with what we already know, Sorscha.” Seleste’s arms were crossed, a sunflower tucked into her many braids.

“We know next to nothing.” Sorscha fiddled with a pink blossom of creeping thyme that dangled from the glass ceiling. “You’re only seeing what you want to.”

The hint of a scowl crossed Seleste’s brow but did not fully form. She simply regarded their Sister Spring coolly, though Agatha could only see her clouded eye from where she stood. “Surely you know by now that I do not base my deductions on personal preference.”

“What is going on here?” Aggie cut in, fanning herself against the suffocating humidity. She was likely to have a damned river of sweat between her breasts before this conversation was over, and it made her want to rage at both her Sisters for that fact alone. She was not built for heat.

Sorscha opened her mouth, but Seleste’s attention snapped to her, the look on her face silencing Sister Spring. “Sorscha seems to believe since Mother had the only remaining goddess quill to pen these journals”—she held Sorscha’s worn copy aloft—“that she might also be responsible for meddling with the Grimoire and, subsequently, our Orders.”

“Think about it, Aggie.” Sorscha cut a scathing look at Seleste as she spoke. “Mother wanted the Sisters Solstice erased from History. She spent her life trying to do just that. She never told us what we were and stuck her head in the sand, pretending we weren’t truly the Sisters. What if she worked with Chresedia?”

“She told me what we were.” It was not meant to sound proud, and Agatha softened her tone to make that evident but hurt still flashed across Sorscha’s face. “There had to be a reason she only told me, and I’m coming to believe that reason, and the reason she had us erased from History, was simply that she knew much more than we ever thought possible.”

“I agree with that assessment,” Seleste stated plainly. Sorscha began muttering curses. “Winnie should be here for this.”

A moment later, Winnie stood before them, frowning in a remarkable, ice-blue nightgown.

“Goddess.” Sorscha whistled appreciatively. “Aren’t you a seductive vision? Thought you had to return to the Druids to rescue them from Laurent.”

Winnie raised one brow. “And how did you expect me to distract him so thoroughly?”

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