Page 119 of The Last Remaining Light

“Elowynn. Please.” He swallowed, and she watched his throat work as he did.

The way he said her name—like prayer. Like pain. Like something loved too long without knowing if it had ever been loved in return.

It undid her in ways she couldn't define.

Elowynn lifted one trembling hand toward him, fingers brushing against the side of his throat beneath the dark waves of his hair. His pulse jumped beneath her touch.

She could sense he was barely holding himself back.

“I think,” she whispered, “that if you do not kiss me soon, I may actually lose my mind.”

Caelyn made a rough sound low in his throat that almost resembled agony. She didn't have time to analyze it, because he wasted no time.

He kissed her. Gods, did he kiss her.

This was no tentative, cautious kiss. This was many turnings of longing that crashed between them all at once. It was all tongue and teeth and devouring emotion.

It was consuming.

His hand slid against the side of her face while the other braced hard against the stone beside her, like he needed the support to keep from buckling to his knees. Caelyn pressed his body to hers, the space between them gone. Elowynn’s fingers gripped into the sides of his coat as relief and longing collided inside her, powerful enough to steal the breath from her lungs.

How many times had she imagined this? She had lost count, thinking it was simple fantasy or curiosity. Nothing could have ever prepared her for the reality of what it was like to kiss a man who loved her.

Because Caelyn kissed her like a starving man. Like devotion. Like grief. Like he had already mourned losing her again long before he ever had the chance to call her his.

A broken sound escaped her, and his restraint fell away upon hearing it.

He thrust one hand through the thick locks of her hair and the other arm wrapped tightly around her waist, pulling her fully against him. Elowynn arched into his hold, noting how perfectly her body fit against his. She could even feel his heartbeat pounding against her chest, meeting her own, beat for beat.

Both hearts raced fast and wild, chasing each other into unknown territory.

A spark had been ignited between them, and they were both fanning the flame.

Elowynn could feel how the kiss affected him, the evidence pressing against her lower belly. That only served to fuel her own desire, kissing him just as greedily, desperate for more—

The sound of frost cracking across the stone floor split through the chamber like breaking glass.

Caelyn instantly went rigid, and Elowynn jerked back from him. Her lips were swollen, chest heaving with heavy breaths, and she was dazed as her lashes fluttered.

Blue-white resonance flashed beneath his skin before turning to inky black.

Then every lantern in the room died.

Darkness swallowed the chamber all at once while the astrylite beyond her terrace extinguished in rapid succession down the corridors outside. Shouts erupted beyond her door.

Reality crashed back into place around them. Elowynn’s pulse began to race, and she stared at him through the dark, discerning what was happening.

The words she spoke to him broke her, but his safety was the most important thing.

“You need to leave, Caelyn. You are not safe here.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

“The stars do not disappear during Blackwake. Something is placed between us and them.”

— Heretical astronomical theory

Caelyn had felt helpless as Elowynn tore herself from his arms and began pacing the length of her chambers. He was left staring at the snow that had accumulated against the observatory windows from the earlier squall of the night, his body on fire still from her kiss. He had wanted to do that for so many turnings, and it was over far too soon.