Page 121 of Close Quarter
"It wasn't a daemon. In the sword."
Fine lines formed around Silas's eyes. "Then what--"
"It was the soul of Anaxandros's Quarter."
The words tasted like sand.
Silas's breath caught. For a moment, his jaw worked, but no words came out. Then they burst forth in a rush. "The Messenger told you this?"
"Yeah." Rhys pushed himself off the wall and walked into the main part of the cabin. If he didn't sit soon, he'd fall over. His legs shook. "But I knew before that." He sank down on the edge of the bed.
Silas had followed. That he was dressed only in his ridiculous tweed pants should have made Rhys laugh, but the scar was still there. Rhys looked down at the bloodstains on the cuffs of his shirt. He'd healed his hands, healed Silas too.
Wielded tremendous power, even though he wasn't supposed to.
Terrible, horrible things could be done with that power. Worse, he had nearly done them. His heart twisted with shame. Fear compressed his lungs. How much would it take to return to that darkness? His fingers would not stop trembling.
Silas knelt down before him and took his hands. "What happened?"
"When I thought you had died, I picked up the sword." He told Silas everything. The whispers, the darkness, how he'd made the trees groan.
"I wanted the whole world to burn."
"No," Silas said.
No?"I know what I felt." He would have pulled away had Silas not been gripping his hands firmly.
"I have no doubt that's what you felt. But it was not what you truly wanted, or we would not be having this conversation." Silas ran a thumb over Rhys's knuckles.
Because the angel would have killed him, not forgiven him.
"All this power..." Rhys stared at his hands in Silas's. "It's a little frightening." It would only get worse on land. "I don't want to become like that Quarter."
Silas kissed his hands, as some courtier from another century might. It seemed natural. "You shan't, I don't think. Anaxandros...liked to possess things. People. Power."
"That's what you feared, becoming like that."
"Yes." Silas looked up at him. "But I don't think I will."
Rhys slipped one of his hands from Silas's grasp and brushed unruly locks from Silas's forehead. "Good. Because if you ever do, I'll kick your ass."
That heart-stopping grin appeared. "I know."
"Promise me you'll kick mine too, if I start getting it into my head that I can rule the world."
"I can do better than kicking your ass." He let go of Rhys's hands, rose, and pushed Rhys back onto the bed. Rhys tangled his hands in Silas's hair as Silas claimed his mouth. Rhys wrapped his legs around Silas's hips as his fae thrust the hard bulge of his erection into Rhys's rapidly hardening cock.
Silas broke the kiss. "I'll lay you out, undress you, then make love to you until you remember yourself." He ground against Rhys.
Rhys bit back a moan and gripped Silas's shoulders. "Get out of those ugly pants."
"They're fine." Silas stripped Rhys of the remains of his shirt and tossed it off the bed. True to Silas's word of stripping him naked, Rhys's slacks followed. Only then did Silas finally shuck the tweed.
When Silas lay on Rhys again, this time skin to skin, Rhys couldn't swallow the moan. His skin tingled everywhere. Silas's deep chuckle vibrated against Rhys. "But they do get in the way."
Rhys kissed his neck, nipped at his shoulder, then stroked Silas's hair as Silas licked his way down Rhys's chest to his stomach. When he stopped to swirl his tongue around Rhys's belly button, Rhys tightened his grip and pushed Silas's head lower.
He didn't need teasing now. Warmth stirred inside Rhys. He wanted his cock inside Silas's mouth.
