Page 53 of The Deathless One
What the hells had she been thinking?
Even now, sitting with her back against the crumbled statue that had once been the Wizened Crone, an ancient goddess known for gifting knowledge to her priestesses, she could think about the memory. What had possessed her to hug the man who held her life in his hands? He was a dangerous god who wanted nothing more than to unleash chaos on her entire kingdom, and she had hugged him!
Shaking her head, she tried to focus on the book in her lap and not the one that she had taken to carrying around with her. The black book that the Deathless One had her grab from Benji was a curiositythat she wasn’t sure she wanted to explore just yet. It was a book that didn’t open.
That much she knew. She had tried repeatedly when they returned from the Owl’s Nest, hoping to make the Deathless One as angry as she was. But the book refused to open. It wasn’t locked. There was no clasp that held it closed.
It just… didn’t open.
She wasn’t sure if that was by mechanical or magical design. All she knew was that a thrum of dark power emanating from between the covers made her want to open it, and thus it was very frustrating not to be able to open it at all.
Grumbling under her breath, she sighed dramatically and closed the book thatdidopen in her lap.
“Jessamine, you have to focus,” she muttered to herself. “You cannot be thinking about these things.”
“And just what things are bothering you?” The voice came from behind her.
She was so used to him appearing out of nowhere that she no longer even flinched when she heard his voice. It came from all manner of places, and she supposed she expected him to always be around now.
It was exhausting.
She looked behind her to see a dark shadow leaning against the side of the Crone’s statue. He had his hands in his pockets, his ankles crossed over each other, and she felt her cheeks blush.
“I can see more of you today,” she said.
“Can you now?”
“You’re not so much a charcoal sketch. You even have pockets.”
He hopped down from the statue and strode around to face her. The Deathless One looked very much like a man trying hard to seem nonchalant. He looked at her expectantly.
“Well?” he said, impatience sharpening his words.
“Well what?”
“How much can you see?”
She blinked. It was like parts of him had shifted back into place. “A sharp jaw,” she murmured, her eyes tracing these new features as though they were her fingertips. “You have the faintest hint of stubble on your cheeks and chin. I can’t see anything else, though, just the outer edges of your face.”
Should she continue?
Some part of her whispered that she was playing with fire right now. Dangerous to keep going when all she wanted to do was touch him and see if that stubble had texture.
He swallowed, and she could see his throat working. “How interesting that I keep changing the longer I am around you.”
“Why is that?”
“I do not know, nightmare. Perhaps it is because you are the one who can resurrect me.”
She licked her lips, and it felt as though he was staring at them, but she wished she could see his features to know for certain that he was. “But I haven’t yet.”
“No, and that’s even more curious, isn’t it? I’m becoming more and more real, and here you are, defying me every step of the way.”
He took a step closer to her, standing in between her parted legs. Her borrowed trousers suddenly felt a little too tight. Or maybe that was her entire body, too hot because he was right in front of her again. Just like he had been when she wound her arms around him and clung to him like the only rock in the middle of a hurricane.
She’d been able to feel how strong he was. How every breath expanded those wide ribs and how much power was barely leashed inside a body that was so much larger than her own.
He stepped a little closer again, and a beam of light played along his strong jaw and the muscle ticking inside it. But for the first time, his form didn’t shatter in the brightness. “Jessamine,” he rasped.
