Chapter 188 – The Quiet Between Battles
Eli
Ronan is at the table with the big map spread flat and pinned at the corners by whatever weights his hand finds. The whetstone, a mug, one of my belt buckles he must have stolen when I wasn’t looking.
He leans over the inked ridges and creeks like a general, which in a way he is, and like a patient man, which he isn’t at all. His shoulders are a wall. The lamplight outlines the cut of him and makes a shrine of it and I’m dying to offer myself on him.
“Tell me again,” he says without looking up, “Why we let Vaughn borrow five warriors when we’re short on the eastern line.”
“Because Mara will eviscerate you if you pretend Blackthorn is an island,” I say, prowling past him for the sixth time, then the seventh, then catching myself and prowling anyway. I can’t seem to sit. All my edges feel newly sharpened, like we came home and the grindstone was waiting. I need him to dull my edges.
“She only eviscerates me when I deserve it,” he says.
“So… Tuesdays through Mondays?” I lean over his shoulder, breathing the heat that coils off his skin, and watch the inked path of the patrol route that curls around the marsh.
“You left a gap at Frogwater. If Redmaw resurface, they’ll test us there.”
“They won’t resurface,” he says. “Redmaw’s broken.”
“That’s what the last idiot said before the gods proved they’re comedians.”
He grunts. It’s his version of conceding a point. Barely a sound, but I can feel it through the bond. A tiny shift, the mountain nodding once.
The hearth throws steady heat which I feel on my back when I cross to the far wall and back again.
I try to sit on the bed and fail at it. My legs want to move. My mouth wants to talk. My skin wants… everything.
“Stop pacing,” he says finally, mild as a lamb’s breath.
“I’m not pacing. I’m curating an atmosphere.”
“Of what?”
“Vibrant possibility. And boredom. Mostly boredom.” I catch the edge of his map and add, “You wrote ‘west ridge’ twice.”
“I take it you’re feeling restless.”
“Peace is loud,” I say.
“You can go be feral with the night patrol if you want,” Ronan says. “Take a loop and come back sweaty and tired. I’ll be here.”
I bristle like he’s suggested exile. “I don’t want to run away from you.”
“I meant with permission.” A ghost of a smile. He dips the quill and draws a neat cross at the ridge above the stream.
I then do a very unhealthy thing, which is to get annoyed because he’s being reasonable. I cross back behind him, put my fingers in his hair, and tug enough to get his head to tip back. “You used to be fun.”
He goes still, like he does when he’s about to kill or when he’s about to kiss. The line between those is thin in him. He looks up at me, eyes catching the lamplight. The color is human right now, but the wolf sits just behind it, ears pricked in interest.
“Did you just call me boring?” he asks.
“Yes.” I slide my thumb across his lower lip slowly. “We vanquished the villain, the pack adores you, you’re drawing neat little lines. So domesticated, Alpha. Should I fetch your slippers and find you a pipe to smoke?”
He catches my wrist. Not hard. Not soft. He looks at my thumb like a temptation he intends to make into a lesson. “If you’re trying to provoke me,” he says, “You’re very good at it.”
“I’m exceptional at it,” I say. “Award-winning. I should have medals.”
He sets the quill down, very carefully. It’s a warning the way thunder far off is a warning. He stands.
When Ronan stands, the room reorganizes itself to accommodate him. I step back and the table edge kisses the backs of my thighs. He doesn’t stop until my spine finds wood.
“Say it again,” he murmurs.
“What? Domesticated?” I try to keep my face straight and fail, the smile ambushes me.
“‘Boring.’”
I touch the collar at my throat without thinking. The leather warms under my fingertips, the metal ring a steady weight. It steadies me the way it always does. It’s the single smartest decision I’ve ever made, letting him fasten it there.
“You’re never boring,” I admit. “But I miss the part where I think the world might end if you kiss me badly.”
He huffs a laugh. “I never kiss badly.”
“I know,” I say, very helpfully, as if that proves my point.
The bond hums. It always does, a low background thrum like the earth’s core. Tonight it answers faster, a thread tightening.
He puts both hands on the table behind me, caging me in without touching, and leans forward. The furnace-like heat of him pours into the space between us, and the air changes temperature.
“Look at me,” he says.
I do. I’m not stupid. It’s what I want after all. His focus makes me feel like prey, but the kind that gets devoured on a mattress. And I’m all for being his midnight snack.
“Are you ready to play hard?” he asks, bond-soft. Hearing the question makes my chest feel too small for my heart.
“Always,” I say. It comes out a little breathless, like I’m already running.
“Then listen, Omega.” His voice slips lower, to the register he uses when it’s a command and a vow at once. “Because I’m about to prove that I don’t have a boring bone in my body. Especially not the one I’m going to be stuffing into your needy, tight ass.”
He closes the last inch and lowers his lips to mine. His mouth is heat and patience and the promise of not needing to rush. I breathe like I’ve been underwater for a week. His hands are still braced behind me, denying me the pleasure of his touch and making me ask.
“Please,” I say against his mouth, instantly furious with myself for how fast the word slips out. He likes me polite. I like me willful. It’s fine, I can hold both.
His hands come off the table. One finds my jaw, thumb tilting my face. The other slides to the back of my neck and pins me to the kiss like a specimen. My knees consider giving up on their job entirely.
He tastes like the tea Mara forced on him at council. Bitter herb, heat, a hint of honey if you know where to look. I know exactly where to look.
When he lets me breathe, I make an embarrassing sound. He waits, eyes on my mouth, thumb still at my pulse.
“Still bored?” he asks.
“A little,” I lie. “You should really put some effort into entertaining me.”
“You’re a terrible liar.” He kisses me once, brief and chastising. “We are going to have rules again.”
My spine lights up at the word. “Right now?”
“Now,” he says, and then, almost smiling, “But slow.”
I consider saying something clever about oxymorons and decide I like my blood where it is.
He steps back just enough for me to see him take the room in the way he does when he’s moving pieces on a board. He looks at the bed, the chair, the mirror leaned against the wall because he refuses to fix it in one place, then at me.
“Come,” he says, and nods to the strip of floor where the fire throws a long rectangle of orange. He doesn’t point. He never has to.
I go eagerly. He doesn’t need to give me an instruction manual. It’s printed in the way he says my name and the way my body answers before my mind can translate.
“Posture,” he says. “Chin up. Hands where I put them. Eyes on me unless told otherwise.”
“Otherwise,” I echo, because I am a scholar of bratting and must be true to my calling.
He’s in a good mood. He lets my mouth get away with it. His fingers slide over the ring at my throat, and I don’t look away. I hold his gaze while he traces the edge of what we are.
The bond tightens again. Contentment hums through it like a bass line under a song. His, then mine echoed back.
“I’m going to touch you like I’m remembering how,” he says. “Not like a starving man. Not like a conqueror. Like a mate who isn’t afraid of the quiet.”
I swallow. My mouth can’t help itself. “You’re going to practice being boring on my body?”
The sound he makes is low and delightfully threatening. “On your knees,” he orders.