Chapter 110 BOTH SIDES OF TEMPTATION PART 15

Chapter 110 BOTH SIDES OF TEMPTATION PART 15
They both moved together, their rhythm steady and deep, and my body trembled with every motion. I couldn’t stop the sounds leaving my mouth — they came out soft and breathless, like I was losing control of everything inside me. The world around us faded away until there was nothing but the rustle of the forest, the sound of my heartbeat, and the warmth of their touch.
It built slowly, like a storm rolling through me, until the feeling finally crashed down. My whole body tensed, then relaxed as a powerful wave swept through me, stealing my breath. I cried out softly, my fingers clutching the damp grass beneath me as every muscle shook.
Then, as if connected to me, they both stopped. The air filled with the sound of heavy breathing — mine and theirs — and for a long moment, none of us moved. I felt them pull away, leaving me empty, but the echo of their presence still burned in my body.
I lay there for a moment, sprawled on the soft ground. The grass beneath me was damp from the mist, and tiny specks of moonlight broke through the leaves, shining across my bare skin. I felt alive in a way I had never felt before — every sense awake, every thought still spinning.
Then, without warning, the second fae began to fade. His body shimmered, like smoke dissolving into the night air, until there was nothing left of him. Only silence and the faint echo of his touch remained.
I turned my head toward the golden-eyed one — the one who had never spoken his name. His chest rose and fell heavily, his skin glistening faintly in the moonlight. I thought he would vanish too. That would have made sense. Strange things came and went in the forest. But instead, he moved closer, his eyes never leaving mine.
He lay down beside me. The movement startled me at first, but then his arm came around me, strong and sure, drawing me into him as if I belonged there. My cheek pressed against his warm chest, and I could hear his heartbeat — slow and steady, like a song meant to lull me to sleep.
The scent of the forest clung to him: something wild and ancient, mixed with the faint sweetness of the night air. His hair brushed against my forehead when he shifted, and the gentle sound of leaves moving overhead filled the silence between us.
I didn’t know what to say. My mind was full of questions. Who was he? What kind of being could appear and disappear at will? And why had he looked at me like that — as if he already knew me?
Before I could speak, his voice slipped into my mind. Not out loud, but inside me, as though my thoughts had formed into his words.
“Aelric,” he said.
The name was soft, almost musical, but it carried a kind of power that made my chest tighten.
I lifted my head slightly. “Aelric,” I whispered back, testing it. “I’m Lily.”
He smiled faintly, his golden eyes glowing in the dim light. “I know.”
A small shiver ran through me. “How?”
He tilted his head a little, studying me as if he were trying to decide how much to tell me. “I just do,” he said finally. His voice — still inside my head — sounded almost tender now, though it carried the weight of something much older than I could imagine.
I wanted to ask more — where he came from, why I could hear him without sound, why he had chosen to come to me — but my body felt heavy, sinking into the soft moss beneath us. The night’s air wrapped around me, cool and quiet. I was too tired to move, too dazed to think.
Aelric’s arm tightened around me, and I felt the warmth of his body seep into mine. My eyes fluttered shut despite my effort to keep them open. The last thing I saw before sleep took me was the faint glow of his eyes watching over me.
When I woke again, everything was different.
Sunlight came through the small window in a soft golden glow, landing on my face like a warm hand. It was bright enough to make me blink several times before my eyes adjusted. I pushed myself up slowly, my body still heavy and weak, my head spinning a little. The bed creaked under my weight, the old wooden frame groaning like it always did when I moved.
I looked around the cottage, my heart beating faster. Everything was the same. The rough wooden table was still pushed up against the far wall. The blanket I had folded neatly the morning before was still at the foot of the bed, its edges slightly frayed. The faint smell of dried herbs hung in the air, familiar and comforting, yet somehow out of place now.
For a while, I just sat there, staring at nothing and breathing hard. My fingers twisted into the sheets as I tried to calm myself. None of this made sense. I had been in the forest. On the ground. In his arms. I remembered the cold earth beneath me, the sound of leaves whispering in the breeze, the steady beat of his heart against my back. It had been so real.
Had it only been a dream?
I pressed a trembling hand against my chest where his warmth had been. The memory of it felt too real to be imagined — his strong arms holding me close, his scent of earth and rain, the way his golden eyes had seemed to look straight into me. My heart fluttered at the thought, uneven and restless.
Then I noticed it.
On my wrist, just above the skin where his fingers had once touched, something glimmered faintly. Gold. Like sunlight caught under my skin. It wasn’t bright, only a soft glow that pulsed once, slowly, and then dimmed until it was barely there at all. My breath caught. I rubbed at it with my thumb, but the shimmer didn’t go away.
And then, faint but clear, a voice brushed through my mind like a breeze moving through leaves.
“You’ll see me again, Lily.”
I gasped, the air leaving my lungs all at once. My hands shook where they clutched the blanket. I wasn’t dreaming. I couldn’t be.
Something had started that night in the forest — something strange and wild, something bigger than me. And deep down, I knew whatever had bound us together wasn’t done with me yet. It was still there, like a golden thread wrapped around my soul, pulling me closer to him even from far away.