Page 40 of At the Mercy of Midnight
Amelia glanced up when he moved closer. There was warmth colouring her cheeks from the fire, her skin glowing in the soft light. Her dark curls were loose and falling around her shoulders. Her expression, usually cold and calculating, was warm and open as she met his gaze.
It punched him in the chest, shedding the air from his lungs.
She was entirely too beautiful; it was almost unfair.
Amelia closed the book, her finger holding her place, smiling softly. “I could never say that I enjoy the cold, but there is something satisfying about being warmwhileit’s cold.”
He returned her smile. “You look…very comfortable.”
Amelia sat up straighter, legs shifting beneath the blanket, as though realising just how comfortable she was in his home. She set the book aside and flicked some of her hair over her shoulder.
“Uh…have you confirmed your mother will join us for supper?”
With a fortifying breath, he rounded the couch and perched on the single wingback chair near the fire, facing her. “Look, there’s something I need to tell you about my mother before we see her.”
She shifted, her expression returning to its usual seriousness. He already missed the open, warm smile from when he had entered. “Alright.”
He considered his words carefully.
“Last year, we lost my father.” His eyes fell to his hands draped across his knees, unwilling to meet her gaze. “It was unexpected and left behind a darkness. My mother struggled considerably. To the point where she became an entirely different person.”
When he had the courage to raise his head, Amelia was looking away, brow furrowed as she stared into the fire.
“Being the eldest male, I took over the estate,” Silas explained, watching Amelia swallow and pick at her nails. “My mother didn’t take kindly to her son suddenly owning everything, though I believe it was more about her grief than it was about me.”
Her dark eyes lifted, and she looked at him with something he had never seen on her face before. Openness.
Silas didn’t know what to make of it. He was used to her looks of disdain or frustration, but not this. This was entirely new, and the urge to move closer struck, to reach for her…
The desire to touch her wasnotnew, though the wild thought that she might let him, was. Indescribably so.
With a ragged exhale, he looked to the flames dancing in the fireplace.
“What I’m trying to say is…I don’t come home often because of the way our relationship was forever damaged since my father,” he said, “so while she is our best bet with learning about pair bonding, she may not be entirely forthcoming.”
They fell into silence, listening to the crackling fire.
After a moment, Amelia broke it. “What if she won’t tell us anything?”
He sighed. “She spent years studying the history of pair bonds. While I always considered it a myth and uninteresting, mother was convinced that it was a phenomenon worth understanding because it was linked to…” He broke off. Hisfamily history was complicated, in a myriad of ways. Some of the things they had endorsed were considered ridiculous, fearmongering and nothing but tall tales and legends.
“Linked to?” Amelia prompted.
“The Midnight Realm,” he finally said, braving a glance at her, only to see her mouth falling open.
Depending on who you asked, the Midnight Realm was either a whispered legend, a scientific curiosity, or a forbidden truth. Some rare scholars, like his parents, had sought to understand it, or access it, believing it to be a place of great power, while others simply feared it or thought of it as nothing but myth.
Over time, the Midnight Realm had become obscured, misinterpreted, and fiercely debated with so little fact to bring the truth to the forefront.
“I didn’t realise you believed in the Midnight Realm,” Amelia said. He was grateful that her tone implied curiosity rather than scorn. He knew, from listening to her present a paper on the Monoliths, that she believed it to be mere legend.
Silas shrugged. “I can’t say that I do or don’t,” he said honestly. It was a fascinating topic, mostly because his parents had spent so many years researching and speaking on it, but as he grew older, he found the lack of scientific fact lessening his ability to believe. “But my mother does. And she surmised that pair bonded individuals have a unique access to the Midnight Realm.”
Amelia narrowed her eyes. “Why would that be?”
A plethora of lectures returned to him. “The theory is that the Midnight Realm is the original home of the Monoliths, and that through a source of great power, they broke through the veil and entered our world, granting us magic.”
Amelia listened quietly.
