Page 135 of Eldritch
He leaned in closer, his lips nearly brushing her cheek. “If their will is your death, then Idefythe gods,” he whispered.
She turned to face him, her lips perilously close.
As if the moon itself had bent toward the earth, he fell into her, breaching that forbidden boundary he’d been warned not to cross. He gripped her shoulder and, pulled by some unseen force, he pressed his lips to hers.
The cold of her flesh dissipated in the heat that surged through him. He felt weightless, drifting upward into the darkness of night where the stars loomed. Whispers echoed around him, sweet feminine sounds that spoke in unison, though he couldn’t understand the words.
An unbridled hunger stirred in his loins, tempered only by his reverence. He pulled away, and like the yearning of tides, he felt a shift inside of him.
The ancient and fragile threads which tethered him to the other world snapped.
Wide, gray eyes stared back at him, and she pressed a finger to her lips. From her pupils, bloomed a startling silver that spread across her irises.
Zevander stumbled backward.
Gods, what have I done?
A thousand years passed in mere seconds as he contemplated his mistake, and yet, he couldn’t summon the remorse he knew would follow.
A soft, silvery glow radiated from her shoulder where he’d touched her, and Zevander tilted his head just enough to see the marking left behind. A strange symbol that reminded him of an inverted bird’s eyes. Or scythes.
“A mark of death?” he whispered to himself.
“The mark of the witch.” The voice from behind urged him to turn around, where he found a woman, robed in red, staring in on them.
He hadn’t noticed her before, so caught up in that kiss he failed to sense her approach.
“Please,” the girl begged, the glow at her back quickly fading. “Take me with you, Angel. Take me away from this place.”
“I must inform Sacton Crain at once!” The robed woman spun away from the cell, her red cape flowing behind her.
Goaded by urgency, Zevander jumped to his feet after her.
Ice cold water splashed against his chest like a punch to his heart, and he gasped.
When he opened his eyes, Theron was staring back at him, the bucket that’d sat outside his cell clutched in his hands. “No. No, send me back! I have to go back!”
A shine wavered in Theron’s eyes. “I thought you were dead. You weren’t breathing.”
Zevander surged forward, the chains rattling with his abruptness. “I have to go back! Send me back!”
Slowly, Theron shook his head. “I will never send you back there again. Never.”
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
ZEVANDER
Present …
Firelight danced over Maevyth’s pale skin, the heat adding a soft pink hue, as Zevander lay at her back while she soundly slept. An ache throbbed in his chest, those familiar pangs of guilt that never ceased to remind him that he could never truly surrender himself to her, not entirely. She’d merely glimpsed the grotesque horrors that lived inside his mind. Showing her everything, the breadth of what his past demanded of him, would’ve surely frightened her away.
Damn him. Damn him for showing her what festered beneath his skin.
For centuries he’d buried those twisted cravings in the quiet moments when he was alone. Hadn’t needed, nor relied, on a woman to feed him the kind of pain.
That level of torment, he’d accomplished himself.
Her stubborn insistence had whittled him down too easily—a thought that’d chewed on his conscience for hours. He hated himself for needing her the way he did.
