19. Artemis
ARTEMIS
Like the cabin in Iceland, the cottage Caliban acquired for us looked like something straight off the pages of a storybook.
Stone walls softened by ivy, and windows glowed with warm light. A narrow garden sloped toward a view that opened into rolling green and gray, the city lights of Edinburgh flickering in the distance. The clouds hung low, drifting lazily over the sky.
I stood there for a moment too long, taking it in, because my brain needed to catalog it before it could move on. This was real. Not a fantasy. Not a book jacket. A place where we were actually standing. This was happening to me. God, how lucky was I?
Arthur unlocked the door and held it open for me. His posture was steady and his expression calm, but something was off. I’d noticed it back in the Uber. His shoulders were just slightly too rigid, his movements extra careful. He’d said he was only mildly injured, but I wasn’t convinced.
The moment we crossed the threshold, my internal switch flipped.
“You need to sit down,” I said, already setting my bag on the small wooden table by the door. “No. Lie down. Couch or bed. Preferably bed.”
“I’m fine,” he said automatically.
“I wasn’t asking.”
He sighed, then nodded and disappeared down the narrow hallway without argument. That should not have made my heart flip, but it did.
I followed him, dropping the bag at the foot of the bed and unzipping it. Caliban had packed it like a man who had done this too many times. There were clean bandages, herbal salves, and tonics in bottles labeled in careful script. The way it was organized scratched my brain just right.
“Shirt off, please,” I said briskly, because if I stopped moving I would think too hard about what I was about to do.
He complied without comment, sitting on the edge of the bed and removing it with deliberate care. My focus narrowed instantly, the way it always did when something mattered. This was not Arthur the man. This was Arthur the patient.
The damage was worse than he had let on.
Bruising darkened his ribs, spreading like spilled ink beneath his skin. There were shallow cuts along his back and one deeper one near his shoulder that was already beginning to knit itself together. Still, it wasn’t nothing.
My hands hovered for half a second before I caught myself.
“Tell me where it hurts,” I said. “And don’t say nowhere.”
He smiled faintly. “Here,” he said, tapping his ribs. “And my back. The leg is improving.”
I nodded, filing it away, already uncorking one of the salves labeled Trauma Resin No. 4. For Scale, Skin, and Muscle. I told myself the heat in my face was from concentrating. That was reasonable, since this required focus.
I cleaned the cuts first, trying my best to be both gentle and thorough as I watched his reactions carefully. The muscles in his jaw jumped.
“That one?” I asked, pointing to a particularly gruesome cut on his side.
“Yes,” he said. “But it’s manageable.”
“That’s not the same as being okay,” I muttered, applying the salve with slow, careful pressure. His skin was hot under my fingers.
I moved methodically, narrating my actions out loud because it helped me stay anchored. Cleaning. Dressing. Securing bandages. My brain locked into pattern and purpose, and the part of me that wanted to spiral about proximity and skin got shoved firmly into a box at the back of my mind.
My hand shook, but I didn’t notice it until Arthur caught it.
“Artemis,” he said softly.
I froze.
He lifted my hand as if it were something fragile, pressing his lips to my knuckles. It was a simple gesture, and everything inside me went very quiet.
“Thank you,” he said.
I swallowed and pulled my hand back gently, because if I did not reestablish momentum, I might sit down on the floor and forget how to speak.
“You’re healing,” I said, a little too quickly. “The salves are helping. You really should get some rest. No more heroics tonight.”
He shifted, sitting up a little straighter, and I realized with some alarm that he looked better already. His color was returning.
“I do feel better,” he said. “Thanks to you.”
I shook my head and shrugged. “It’s your shifter biology, and Caliban’s salves. I just assisted.”
“That’s not how it felt,” he said.
I opened my mouth to deflect, but he leaned in before I could. The movement was slow, giving me time to pull away if I wanted to.
I didn’t.
The kiss was gentle at first, questioning, like he was asking permission with his whole body. When I didn’t retreat, he deepened it just enough to make my knees weaken, his hand coming to rest at my waist.
The world narrowed to that point of contact. I forgot about everything and only focused on the knowledge that this was real and happening and not something my brain had invented to cope with stress.
When we parted, I rested my forehead against his, grounding myself in the steadiness of him.
My hands came up automatically to brace against his chest, fingers splayed like I needed proof of where I ended and he began. I laughed, too sharp and a beat too loud.
“Well,” I said finally, because silence felt dangerous. “That was medically inappropriate.”
He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Noted.”
I took a step back, then another, bumping lightly into the wall. I tucked my hands into my sleeves, rubbing my thumbs along the seams, eyes darting once around the room like I was suddenly unsure where to stand.
“I, uhm… I should take a shower,” I said, then escaped down the narrow hall before my brain could reboot and betray me again.
The bathroom was small, clean, and blessedly ordinary. I shut the door, stripped, and stepped under the water like I was surrendering to a necessary procedure.
I braced my hands on the tile and let the heat do its thing, but it didn’t calm my thoughts. They organized. Which was worse.
Arthur had kissed me. Intentionally. He’d kissed me like he had already decided something and was letting me catch up.
And yet.
I don't have time for romance.
The sentence replayed in my mind. It had been a statement of fact, delivered with a sincerity that made me believe he meant it.
My brain started sorting.
Option one: Arthur wanted something physical and nothing more. Attraction without intention. Heat without future. That happened. Normal people did it all the time and survived.
Option two: He wanted more but didn’t believe he could have because of his duty to his people. Also common. Also messy.
Option three: I was misreading everything because my brain sometimes took things literally when they weren’t meant that way, and then it looped back until the pattern collapsed.
I shook my head and counted the tiles. Counting always helped.
Could I do something physical without anything else?
The answer came faster than I expected.
Yes. I would very much like to jump him. Enthusiastically. With planning. Possibly a checklist.
But could I do it and not care?
No.
That one was clear. Painfully clear.
I liked Arthur. Not just his body or the way he moved or the way he listened like the world narrowed when I spoke. I liked how he obeyed when I told him to lie down. I liked how he trusted my hands. I liked how he thanked me. I liked how he saw me.
That was the dangerous part.
If this turned physical and stopped there, I would pretend I was fine when I wasn’t. I would replay everything. I would catalog moments and wonder what I’d done wrong. I would internalize everything.
I adjusted the water until it wasn’t as hot anymore, then rinsed my hair. This line of thinking needed a cool head.
I wanted to ask him questions, but historically, asking questions had led to me being labeled intense and overbearing.
Annoyance shot through me.
I could ask questions. Wanting clarity wasn’t a personality flaw. Either he wanted me or he didn’t. Me asking for clarification should not change that.
I nodded to myself. Later. I would ask him later.
I shut off the water and grabbed a towel. It was warm. I paused, fingers curling into the fabric. I touched the robe hanging on the hook.
Also warm.
I stared at both items, damp hair dripping onto the tile, my brain short-circuiting in a way that felt suspiciously like happiness.
He’d warmed my towel and my robe with his crazy dragon magic. Again.
There was no logical reason for that, except to give comfort.
I dried off and wrapped myself in the robe, staring at my reflection in the mirror. The gesture of comfort didn’t answer my questions. If anything, it made them more important.
And instead of feeling afraid of what that meant, I felt steady enough to believe I could ask and survive the answers.
I stepped into my pajama shorts, my skin humming, my brain doing that thing where it wanted to rewind the last twenty minutes and analyze every second of it until I ruined it for myself.
Now was not the time to overthink.
I finished getting dressed, tugging on clean clothes with hands that were weirdly steady, then I grabbed my phone.
I needed to call Eloise. I’m sure she was worried about me.
I hit FaceTime, and she answered on the second ring. Her glasses were perched on her nose, hair pulled back like she had been interrupted mid-monologue.
“Artie,” she said. “Please tell me you are calling because you are in a castle.”
“I am in a very cute cottage,” I said. “In Edinburgh.”
Her face lit up. “Oh. Oh, that is unacceptable. Turn the camera. Immediately.”
I laughed and walked her through the space, showing her the stone walls and the thick wooden beams on the ceiling.
“This is ridiculous,” she said. “Do you know how much money productions spend trying to fake that kind of atmosphere?”
I pointed the phone toward the windows. It was dark outside, rain tapping against the glass. “Okay, the view is not cooperating, but trust me, it’s dramatic.”
“I believe you,” she said. “This is exactly where a person goes when their life is about to change. You can feel it. The setting alone is begging for a third act revelation.”
“That tracks,” I said.