Chapter 32
TARIAN
T he sun was pouring over the edge of this Realm, and Tarian wished he could follow it. He got to the edge of the ocean, took his pants off again and flung them backwards, and then jumped in, hoping that the water would cool his racing thoughts and frustrated body.
He dove down, tracing fingertips against the sand and rocks, and surfaced, shaking his hair out of his eyes.
He was hopelessly devoted to someone who didn’t fully want him.
And somehow, he would need to make peace with that, if they were going to manage to continue.
But it wasn’t that he wanted to trap her in a Seris-shaped box anymore—he just wanted her to be guided by basic decency and common sense.
Which would be hard, seeing as he was him, and she was just a human girl.
He tried to think back to when he and Seris had met, on either side of a table of Sheer-ka.
She’d just beaten another player and she was sure that she could best him, and she’d been right.
He’d lost so badly he’d almost been tempted to use magic to cheat, but he couldn’t bring himself to, not after he’d heard her laugh.
He’d graciously accepted defeat, bought her a drink, and the rest, for a time, had been history.
But . . . now? With this girl?
Once he’d gotten inside her, he’d thought half the battle was over.
He never could’ve guessed that the worst was yet to come.
He resurfaced, snapping his hair back again, only this time he wasn’t alone on the beach.
She was there, hugging herself against the evening wind, watching him.
“I was starting to get worried,” she said. “You were down for a long time.”
“I can breathe underwater.”
“Of course you can,” she said, shaking her head, before walking closer to him.
“You are safer in the cave. You should go back there.”
“Yeah, about that,” she said, taking off the jacket she’d put back on, and kicking out of the rest of her clothes.
“You may not have noticed, but I’m not really great at following directions,” she went on, then came for the water’s edge.
When it splashed her ankles, she yipped, but didn’t stop walking.
The water was cold, and he knew he should yell at her to go wait for him by the fire, but the remaining sunlight was beaming at her now, too, draping itself around her like a cloak—and she was breathtaking.
“Okay, I’m coming out to get you,” she announced, and then plunged in, swimming strongly, before coming up with a hissing gasp. “This is fucking freezing!” she said, paddling herself out to be with him. “And—I’m sorry. Not for everything, but for that last bit. It was cruel.”
“It was,” he agreed.
“Can we go back now? Please?”
He kicked himself over to be near her. “No.”
Her eyebrows rose. “I thought you were overly concerned with my wellbeing? Like—in this instance, trust me, I want you to be.”
“My people swim in seas colder than this.”
“How?” she sputtered.
“Come here,” he said, taking her waist in his hands.
She felt the heat he was emanating at once, and instantly became clingy, pressing her whole body against him. “Oh, God, you’re like a radiator,” she panted in his ear.
He wound his arms around her, running them up and down her, to make her warm, and then started pushing his magic through the water around her, raising the temperature of the sea directly around them up, feeling her relax.
“Okay,” she said. “This is a slight improvement.”
Her head was tucked against his chest, and they bobbed together through one slow long wave after another.
She’d apologized. She was trying. And he knew his interest in her was not one sided. He reached up to pull one long lock of hair off her shoulder, lacing it behind her ear.
“I know how to heat you more,” he said, then let her go and disappeared.