Hands of Fire: Chapter Fifteen
He should not be kissing Rhyssa.
He shouldn’t be parting her lips to taste her, shouldn’t be gripping her hips to tug her body flush with his. He shouldn’t be walking forward until her back is pressed against a tree, or tugging the tie from her braid so he can tangle his hand in the mane of her hair.
But he is doing all those things, and she’s looping her arms around his neck and sighing his name against his mouth, and it only makes him kiss her harder. She’s so warm, and he asks himself not for the first time if it would really be so bad to stay here forever with her at his side.
He tears his mouth away from hers. “Look at me.” Gods above, why is his voice so hoarse?
When her brown eyes find his, he cups her face in his hand, stroking her cheekbone with his thumb and relishing the way she shivers from the feeling. “It’s my job,” he whispers, “to protect you. Not the other way around. When I tell you to run, you run. When I tell you to leave me behind, you do it.” The hand on her hip tightens, drawing her closer only half consciously. “I will gladly die if it means you’re safe.”
Before she can find the words to argue, before the spark in her eyes can catch fire, he captures her lips again, swallowing whatever words she might have said.
She turns her face, gasping, and he trails his mouth along her jaw, down her neck, across her collarbone. When she runs her nails lightly over the skin at the nape of his neck, he has to fight back a groan.
“Kaith,” she breathes, gripping his shoulders, arching into his touch, palms on fire even through the fabric of his shirt. “Kaith, we should—”
Then her hands are on his chest, pushing him back, and he pulls away just far enough to touch his brow to hers.
For a moment they catch their breath.
“What are we doing?” Rhyssa whispers, eyes closed.
Some part of his mind is screaming at him to kiss her again, and to keep kissing her until she can’t think anymore. The sane part makes him take another step back, running his hand through his hair as he tries to calm his racing heart. “I—I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that.”
But one look at her swollen lips and flushed cheeks has his hands shaking with the need to touch her again.
“I’m sorry,” he repeats, backing away from the questions in her gaze, flinching when she reaches for him. And when her confusion shifts to hurt, he does the only thing he can think of.
He runs.
Rhyssa trudges to the stream and sinks to her knees on the damp bank, cupping some of the frigid water in her hands to splash over her face. Kaith hasn’t spoken to her for three days, hasn’t even looked her in the eye, and Rhyssa doesn’t know what to think anymore. What she does know is that their kiss is to blame.
“Of course, if he was going to hate it so much,” she mutters as she peels off her sweaty shirt and dunks it into the icy stream to wash away the grime, “then maybe he shouldn’t have kissed me in the first place.”
So what if she kissed him back? It’s completely natural to respond when someone kisses you so . . . thoroughly. Only now when they’re in camp, she can’t stop staring at his lips, remembering the desperate way they’d moved with her own, remembering the way they’d felt trailing fire down her throat and the way—
Sparks burst from her fingertips. One singes the hem of her shirt while the other burns a hole through her left pant leg and sears the skin of her thigh. “Gods dammit!” she shouts, splashing water over the burn. Her magic is hard enough to control in this place when she’s calm, let alone when she’s angry and confused and . . .
And hurt.
Because some stupid, naive part of her had believed Kaith would be proud of her for trying to master her magic. That maybe he’d be grateful she cares for him enough to want to help him be free of Amara forever.
But she’s just the charge he’s paid to protect, a walking liability, and even when she tries to help, she ends up hurting him.
A tendril of fire curls out from her palm and winds its way up her forearm like ivy. It coils around her arm and over her shoulder until she feels the edge brush against her cheek, as if it’s trying to comfort her. Just for a moment, she doesn’t push it away or try to restrain it. She just lets the warmth soak into her clammy skin. She just breathes.
When her knees are screaming at her for kneeling too long and the cold mud has numbed her legs even through her thick pants, she lifts her head and quickly finishes scrubbing her shirt clean.
The flames stay wrapped around her arm, but she’s surprised by how calm they seem. They don’t snap hungrily or try to consume her hair and clothing. They just rest there, perched on her shoulder. If they had eyes, she’d think they’re watching her progress, studying her face.
“I’m alright now. Go back to sleep,” she whispers. Then, hesitantly, she adds, “Thank you.”
With a hiss, the flames wink out, not even a wisp of smoke left behind.
Rhyssa pulls her damp and now relatively clean shirt back over her head and stands, turning reluctantly back in the direction of their camp. It’s there she sees Galos, leaning against a tree, watching her.
“You understand now,” he says quietly, and she knows it’s not a question.
She nods slowly. “It’s part of me, and separate from me.”
He takes a step closer. “What else?”
“It . . .” Her brow furrows, and she studies her hands. “It isn’t just responding to my emotions. My emotions are like a signal, and it thinks I’m in danger. It’s trying to protect me.”
When she looks up, Galos is smiling.
Her chin lifts. “What’s next?”
“Call your magic,” he replies.
She holds out her palm. Her magic rises to meet her.
And Rhyssa is not afraid.