Page 6 of The Stars are Dying

The moment his hands dropped from me I swallowed the protest, at mental war with myself for the naïve cloud that had overtaken my sense of self-preservation.

“No one can tell you how to feel. You observe, you draw on your knowledge, and you handle the responses your judgment makes.”

I thought on his words. Maybe I even admired them, but I fell short in one aspect that didn’t seem fair: knowledge.

“I know nothing about you.”

“Then what does your instinct tell you?”

Impulsive things, I thought. Everything but what I knew to be logical: getting far away from him. Instead, I asked, “Will you tell me your name?”

His silence was an assessment of me. Eyes of gold flickering with stars.

“Nyte.”

“That is not your name.”

The curve of his mouth grew. “Why ask my name, only to deny me ownership of it?”

I could admit I found the name fitting, if hard to believe. Though I didn’t have to as my traitorous eyes took my argument and silenced it with wonder. His hair couldn’t conform to simply being black; it was midnight, the kind of color that could shift tone from a depthless obsidian to strands of a deep navy in the light. The disheveled tresses falling over his dark brows were an entrancing contrast to the gold of his eyes. Sometimes I thought they changed—that they’d glow or dull or flicker. For my own sanity, I chose to believe it was nothing more than the influence of candlelight, even though I knew he hadn’t moved and no wind had disturbed the flames.

Then there was his neck. The obscure tattoos there stole my attention. A constellation, perhaps. The rush of desire to pull back the material of his jacket doused me with incredulity.What an inappropriate thought.

He remained still, watching me with intrigue while I shamelessly assessed him.

I swallowed hard. “Nyte,” I echoed, the word like a comet—fleeting, but a flare of dangerous brilliance wrapped in beauty. “Like what surrounds us right now.”

As I said it, we both looked up. The domed roof encased us in our own globe of soothing darkness and constellations. It shimmered like peace, but I often wondered if it was simply my own confusion that thought the stars were dying, slowly stretching farther apart, and that turned my admiration to sadness.

“Exactly like that, Starlight.”

Our eyes fell back down to meet.

“You have called me that twice now.”

“And you have not corrected me, so what am I to do?”

My pulse surged up my throat with the step he took that left only a slither of space between our bodies. I breathed in light notes of mint and something woody.

“What am I to do withyou?” The last word tapered off as a caress, traveling from his tongue to race down my spine.

Impulses roared to ignore reason and find out how his warmth would embrace me. How different he might feel compared to Hektor, who was always so cold even when lust should smother it.

His hand raised, and still I did not stop him. I was held by him. Not by any physical means; what pulsed between us drew forth a current of electricity I wanted to keep building. Grazing under my chin with his fingers, he tilted my head back. Those irises dazzled against the moonlight, flooding his features to highlight high cheekbones and the sharp angle of his jaw. His lips formed a perfect bow, and realizing where my attention had dropped lashed me back to reality so fast a gasp escaped me.

“Nothing,” I offered. “I’m not of any interest to you.”

A brief darkening of amber shivered over me.

“What would you know of my interests?”

“It’s not hard to guess from where we are,” I breathed, willing my throat to find full words, but it dried out and I licked my lips.

It was the wrong thing to do. His fiery gaze flashed to them with a flickering glow. I had never allowed another to get this close to me before. I had neverwantedit out of all the handsome men I’d watched in Hektor’s main room. Even now my mind battled with itself over why I stood rooted despite the rationality to gain distance. There was nothing good to be gained in those ethereal eyes, nothing more than a dangerous allurement, and I was allowing myself to become pitifully trapped like so many others who had probably come before me.

My body shook when his fingers combed through my hair. I watched him examine the tresses as they spilled over his palm. Curiosity danced across his features.

“Do you use an enchantment?”

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