Chapter 12 Drowned in Distraction
DROWNED IN DISTRACTION
The tension Maeren left behind was suffocating.
Ella sat, rigid, on the edge of the bed, her fists knotted tight in the blankets, ribs aching where Jakobav’s very large, very solid body had pressed against hers.
His scent lingered both in the air and in her thoughts, and no matter how she tried to banish it, it refused to let her go. Gods.
She replayed every word she had thrown at him, each retort pulling more gravity than she cared to admit.
She had snapped, cursed, practically spat fire into his face.
To be fair, he had shoved her down and pinned her beneath the covers.
She should’ve been furious. It should’ve been unforgivable.
Yet her body had betrayed her all the same, liquid heat pooling low, her breasts tightening at the faintest graze of his touch.
She was more concerned that she wasn’t angry.
What is wrong with me?
The memory of him clung like a bruise, inescapable to all but time. His breath had scraped her ear, his voice rasping low enough to rake along her spine, every syllable barbed with possession. It hadn’t been gentle. It hadn’t been invited, but gods, it had lit something within her.
And that was the worst part.
Not that he had forced her down or left her body strung tight with sensation, but that for one wild, blinding instant, jealousy had burned hotter than rage.
The woman who had barged into his chambers had spoken to him as if she belonged there, as if she knew him in ways Ella never would.
It made no sense. Dravaryns were known for brutality and silence, yet with him, she’d seen something else entirely.
Not tenderness, not cruelty, but something in between.
The way they spoke to each other was respectful, threaded with the kind of ease and teasing that came from history.
Ella pressed her palms hard against her eyes, as though she could smother the thoughts before they consumed her.
He cleared his throat, a quiet reminder that he was still in the room.
“You have a temper,” Jakobav said at last, his voice low.
He leaned against the wall as though nothing had happened and he was still deciding whether to chain her or let her set him on fire.
She squared her shoulders. “You have a boundary problem.”
The corner of his mouth lifted. Not a smile. A shadow of one. “Then stay out of my reach.”
Her head tilted, her smile sweet as poisoned honey. “You would miss the entertainment.”
The words were not as cutting as her usual barbs.
This was something else entirely, reckless, born of the way his soft brown waves had fallen loose across his forehead.
She had wanted, for one dangerous second, to push them back just to see his face unguarded.
Instead, her mouth had betrayed her first.
His eyes darkened, steady and unflinching. “I can think of a few things far more entertaining when it comes to you.”
The air thickened, her pulse stumbling into a dangerous rhythm. He looked away, but too late. She had already seen it. Already felt the spark ignite, treacherous and undeniable.
His hands curled tight at his sides, as if holding himself back from closing the distance. He pushed off the wall and stalked toward the bathing chamber. He paused at the door, his voice rougher now. “You think I don’t notice every time you pull away. But I do.”
Buckets clattered in the adjoining chamber as servants hurried to fill the basin with hot water, steam rising in ribbons that drifted into the room, cooling the moment just enough for her breath to return.
The quiet that followed was almost worse. It left her alone with the turmoil circling her thoughts, always returning to him.
She couldn’t afford this. Not his distractions. Not his stares. Not the way he had found a path beneath her skin and refused to leave.
Ella had never been docile, and she was not about to start now. Charm had its uses, but submission had never been part of her arsenal. She prided herself on quick retorts and stubborn fire, yet this infuriating beast of a man seemed determined to drag her under, drowning her in him. Fuck that.
What unnerved her most was the suspicion that he was not even trying. Jakobav seemed to simply exist that way: commanding, relentless, impossible to ignore. People probably lined up to obey him.
He was everything she needed to avoid: powerful, loyal to his kingdom, entirely too perceptive.
And worst of all? He was the kind of dangerously attractive that ruined kingdoms. That angular jaw. Those full, smug lips.
And then, as though her traitorous thoughts had summoned him, he returned. Shirtless.
Fresh from the bath, damp hair sticking to his temples, a towel slung low across his hips, moisture still glistening on his chest. Scars mapped the ridges of his body, stories she didn’t know. Tattoos beaded with water droplets shifted across muscle like constellations blurred by stormlight.
Jakobav looked down at her with eyes that burned, teeth grazing his lower lip as though weighing whether to speak or to do something far less sensible.
Ella forgot how to blink.
Which was why Bryn’s voice startled her all the more.
“Oh, for the love of the seven sacred herbs,” came the exasperated voice from the doorway. “Would it kill you to wear clothes, Jake?”
Jakobav didn’t flinch. “You’re a healer. You’ve seen worse.”
“Yes, but now I will have to unsee it before lunch.”
The old man swept in, basket hooked over one arm, his expression vaguely offended by the sight of Jakobav’s chest. He gave Ella a deliberate once-over as he set the basket down with a thunk.
“Still alive, I see,” Bryn said cheerfully, breezing into the room as if death was no more troublesome than a stubbed toe. “That’s promising.”
“She’s stable,” Jakobav replied, his voice clipped.
Bryn raised a brow. “Stable isn’t the word I’d use for someone who threatened to disembowel her rescuer.”
“I didn’t threaten,” Ella said. “I strongly implied.”
“Ah.” Bryn’s eyes glinted with mischief. “Semantics. Now, let’s have a look at your wounds, dear. Don’t worry, I’m mostly professional. I’ll leave the ogling to Jake.”
Ella grimaced but lifted her shirt enough for him to inspect the bandage. His hands moved with disarming efficiency, too precise for someone so endlessly distracted by his own running commentary. She almost forgot to flinch, until he paused.
Her breath caught. His eyes were not on the bandage anymore. They were fixed just above it, staring at the place her ancestral mark should have been.
Panic surged. She looked down, desperate to confirm what she already knew: the sigil was still invisible. But his stare made her chest feel exposed all the same, as if he could see the power branded beneath her skin.
Jakobav’s gaze flicked toward her at that exact moment, tracking her stillness, and though his expression never shifted, his attention landed heavy, as if he’d filed her reaction away to be examined later.
Bryn’s easy smile remained, but for all his quick hands and quicker tongue, there was something in his stillness that unsettled her.
Humor made him appear harmless, but his eyes belonged to someone older than he looked.
Not in his face, not in the nimbleness of his work, but in the way his gaze fastened on details most would miss, in the way his words sometimes tasted like warnings instead of jokes.
“Hmm.”
Ella’s head snapped up. “What?”
“Oh, nothing,” Bryn said lightly, too lightly. “Just that your skin is looking a little pale. Like someone doused your inner flame with a bucket of ice water.”
But he was not looking at her wound when he said it, he was looking straight into her eyes.
And in that gaze, older than his face and keener than his grin, she felt as though he knew far too much.
Her mouth went dry. How much did he suspect, and how much did he already know?
If he’d felt her flame, if he’d glimpsed the invisible sigil, then he knew exactly what she was; only those of royal blood carried the mark of Orchid.
Her stomach turned.
Had he already told Jakobav? Or was he waiting for her to confess it herself?
Either way, that was never going to happen.
“Strange,” Bryn mused, tilting his head. “Usually trauma makes it flare brighter, not vanish. Unless…” His grin widened, wickedly pleased. “Something distracting you, sweetheart? Emotional upset? Someone scrambling your internal compass?”
Heat rushed to Ella’s face so quickly her ears burned. Jakobav’s eyes shot to her, dark and intent, and the awareness of him made her skin prickle.
“Stop talking,” she hissed at Bryn.
The insufferable healer only grinned wider. “Say no more.”
With an exaggerated flourish, he packed his kit, snapped the latch shut, and rose.
“The one marked with secrets appears to be healing beautifully.” His wink was all mockery as he glanced toward Jakobav, who was pulling a tunic over his chest. Then Bryn swept out the door looking far too smug for someone who was supposed to be a healer.
Ella stared at the closed door, then dropped her face into her hands. “I hate him.”
“No, you don’t,” Jakobav said, his voice unreadable, his back turned as he adjusted his tunic.
She didn’t answer because truthfully, she didn’t hate any of this, and that was the problem.
For her, and for the fate of everyone depending on her to succeed.
Her magic remained quiet.
She hadn’t come here to be saved, hadn’t come for a prince or a healer or the illusion of safety in the heart of the enemy. She had come for one thing: the object tied to the prophecy, the relic buried beneath this castle, the thing no one was supposed to remember.
And yet here she was, distracted by a man with soft brown curls and that stupid jawline.
Ella closed her eyes, forcing the words through her mind like a mantra. Focus.
The fates had already woven their part, and now it was her turn.
Uncover the truth, leave before she grew too entangled to run, and definitely, under no circumstances, would she give another ounce of thought to the man who had walked in dripping from the bath, wearing nothing but a towel, and wrecked her ability to form a coherent thought.
But the fates had a way of tangling threads no blade could cut.