Page 109 of Empire of Flame and Thorns

Yes, he’s ruthless and domineering and an absolute bloody menace. But he’s also unexpectedly kind and thoughtful and funny. He has protected me from attackers and a wolfbear, and he gave me his own shirt so that I wouldn’t have to walk through the halls naked for everyone to see. He sees me. Sees all the partsof me, even the ones I try to hide from the rest of the world. And he makes me laugh.

With him, I feel free. Free in a way that I have never felt before. I don’t have to hold myself back or make myself less for him. I don’t have to choose my words carefully. For some reason, he makes me feel like the real me is enough. LikeI’menough. With him, I never feel as if I have to adapt my personality to fit the people around me. I can just be me.

Panic crackles through me as I sprint through the forest. But panic for a different reason this time.

Because Goddess above, I actually like Draven Ryat.

What the hell is wrong with me? He’s the Commander of the Dread Legion. The leader of the enemy army. I should feel nothing but rage and hatred towards him. And yet, I can’t forget the feeling of his warm body holding me last night. The feeling of his hands as he brought me to the brink of an orgasm in his room. The taste of his mouth as he kissed me like he was starving for it.

Confusing and highly conflicting thoughts whirl inside my soul as I leap over fallen trees and dash towards the river.

But when I at last skid to a halt in front of the flowing water, the grass around me is empty. My pulse thrums in my ears as I whip my head from side to side. But Draven is nowhere to be found.

My heart clenches.

Channeling my magic, I use the same technique that I used on Fenriel earlier. I try to find and latch on to one of his emotions so that I can follow that bond towards his location.

I throw out my magic, searching for a spark of anger.

Nothing.

I try annoyance.

Nothing.

Impatience. Frustration. And several other emotions that he surely must be feeling.

But every time, I’m met with nothing.

A growl of frustration escapes my own throat. What could he possibly be feeling?

On a whim, I throw out my magic towards a spark of worry.

I gasp.

The purple spark of worry in Draven’s chest is so massive, so all-consuming, that I have to scramble to pull my shields up so that I won’t be affected by the emotion as well.

Stunned, I just stare in the direction that the emotion is coming from. Draven isworried. And not just a little worried. Based on the intensity of the flame, he’s so worried that he must not even be able to breathe properly.

Giving my head a few quick shakes, I snap out of my stupor and instead start running towards him. Since I need to manipulate the emotion to keep my connection to it, I decrease it ever so slightly while I dash across root and stone. But the worry is so overpowering that it barely makes a difference.

My heart jerks as Draven at last comes into view a little farther down the river.

He is pacing the grass like a caged wolf, clenching and unclenching his hand while whipping his head from side to side.

When his gaze finds mine, he stops dead in his tracks. For the briefest of moments, I swear I can see relief flicker in his eyes. But that unyielding expression that he so often wears remains firmly on his face and betrays no emotion as he looks at me. As if he couldn’t care less whether I showed up or not.

But because my magic is still connected to him, I can feel that raging flame of worry in his chest go out with awhoosh.

I cut off my magic. Still stunned by his reaction, I walk the final distance to him. He just watches me with unreadable eyes.

“Took you long enough,” he mutters when I come to a halt before him.

I was planning to say something snarky in reply, but instead, I find myself saying, “You were worried about me.”

Alarm flashes across his face for a second. Then he draws his eyebrows down in a scowl and crosses his arms. “No, I wasn’t.”

“Are you forgetting that I have emotion magic? I could literallyfeelyour worry. It’s what I used in order to find you. I followed your intense worry to get here.”

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