Bonds of Brass (The Bloodright Trilogy #1) - Emily Skrutskie Page 0,38

close my eyes and let my head drop back, a muffled gurgle filling my ears. Distantly I hear the sloshing of Gal’s footsteps as he wades into the river. Then a crash as he trips over a rock and goes down hard.

I sit upright in time to catch the sight of a disgruntled Umber prince sputtering and gasping as he flounders for his footing. “It’s cold,” he says, his voice so indignant that it’s almost a shriek. “How the rut did you…flop in like that?”

I shrug. “You adjust fast.”

“You have a death wish, Ettian Nassun.”

“A little river’s not going to kill you, Gal.”

He glances around, shrugging. “The plants look healthy enough. Probably no weird chemicals in this water.” Gal wanders over to my side and sinks gingerly into the water, as if it’s finally deigned to meet his standards. “Okay, fine, this is nice,” he concedes, stretching out his legs.

I give him about three seconds to enjoy it, then splash him.

“Ettian!” he chokes, shielding his face before another wave hits him. I scuttle back as he swings his arm around and lets a volley of water fly. I try to duck behind my elbow, but Gal grabs my arm and twists, cackling as he manages to get another handful of water in my face. My attempt to retaliate is blocked by him grabbing my other wrist, and I lose my balance to complete the indignity of it all, collapsing back into the shallows.

And of course, because he has an uncanny knack for putting me in the worst possible situation, Gal comes down on top of me. One of his elbows digs hard into my stomach, and his weight crushes my chest, driving the breath out of my lungs. I inhale water as my head goes under, then come up choking to find Gal bent over me. He’s breathless, his mop of unruly hair dripping into his eyes, down his nose, onto my collarbone.

I try to clear my throat, but it comes out as a weak noise, halfway to a whimper. I don’t know what to do with the way he looks at me. With the way he’s got one arm braced in the water over my shoulder. With his other hand hovering over my chest.

There’s a dangerous instinct that kicks in sometimes when you’re flying. The adrenaline pushes you into doing the most reckless thing you can think of the second the option appears. Recognizing that instinct is hard.

Stopping it is harder.

My hand curves up over his waist, running along the line between his skin and his soaking pants as I push myself up. Push closer. His eyes go half-closed, his gaze dropping to my lips. Ten inches. Two.

His hand presses against my chest, stopping me short. I jolt backward as the haze around my brain clears in a horrible instant. “Gal—”

“I—”

“I’m so sorry.”

He rockets to his feet and steps over me, rubbing his hands over his face. Without a backward glance, he wades out of the shallows and up onto the riverbank. I watch him tramp back toward the ship with his boots in one hand and shirt in the other, contemplating the option of slipping under the surface of the river, never to be heard from again.

My mind sputters with excuses—I was playing, it wasn’t serious, I didn’t mean—but all of them fizzle out. Gal knows me too well to believe any lie I spin. He knows exactly what that was, and now I know exactly how all of my questions get answered. Now we’re stuck with knowing.

Any illusions I had about lingering in the wild drain from my head. Better to hit Isla as quickly as possible, before I have a chance to rut this up even more.

* * *

—

When I return to the Ruttin’ Hell, Gal’s already up on a precariously balanced ladder, scraping furiously at the paint. His datapad sticks out of his waistband, blasting a chipper pop tune that drowns out the grating noise of metal against metal. He’s changed into dry clothes, but his hair is still damp, and if he notices my approach, he’s