his lips, and predictably Diana recoiled, her lips tightening as a flush crawled up her cheeks. She didn’t attempt to move any closer, and a strained silence settled between them, replacing the heat of intimacy that had burned in the air earlier.
Silvas felt the bite of regret, but it was necessary. What he experienced at the death of Dagani was still raw and unsettling. More so what it meant for him. Things had changed between him and Diana in a way he had not anticipated. He needed the space to think clearly. Searching for firewood to keep his human from getting chilled was a good distraction.
It didn’t take him long to find the logs that Raskyuil had dropped when they were attacked. Their arms laden with their respective burdens, they made their way in the same direction the crocotta had gone as they returned to camp, a strange silence stretching out between them.
Chapter 16
Diana frowned at the silvanus lying on a mossy log at the opposite side of the fire. He had stripped off his armor and lay in nothing more than his pants, the sculpted muscles of his chest and abs bare as he stared up at the leaves above them. She knew that he had to be grieving, because somehow she felt a strange echo of it within her own heart. But there was no knowing by looking at him. Silvas’s face was flat, expressionless, and beautiful in an otherworldly sort of way that was equally terrifying. He was inhuman, and yet in the flickering light of the fire he could have passed for a marble creation from the masters of old. He left no clue as to what he was thinking or feeling, and she didn’t even know how to broach the subject as he had made it clear that he wasn’t interested in receiving any comfort.
It was a change from the hungry stares as they stood beside the carcass of the wyrm. As he had stood there, naked and aroused, she had been tempted by the responding heat in her own blood. Diana had been aware of an echo of his presence moving beneath her skin as if he were already moving within her, exciting her need. But that was before.
Diana turned her gaze toward the flames, trying not to think of it as she burrowed deeper into the warmth of her cape.
This is so awkward.
At least the air no longer stank like the wyrm. After they had gathered the firewood, Silvas returned alone to take care of its corpse so it wouldn’t attract any predators to feed on its diseased flesh. That it had so easily dispatched the silvanus who protected this part of the forest was going to give her nightmares. She couldn’t stay awake forever, especially not with the distance they had to go tomorrow.
With a grimace, she settled into a bed of old leaves and soft grass and mosses and tried to get comfortable. Yet, as she looked up at the leaves, they appeared to be like moving shadows above that reminded her so much of the wyrm that anxiety rolled off her in waves and her thighs and arms tensed.
“Go to sleep,” Silvas muttered, the interruption of his deep voice through the silence startling her.
He had to be kidding. There was no way she was going to be able to sleep when every stir in the forest made her think of the wyrm. Even closing her eyes, fear surged through her that another would come upon her while she was unaware and snap her up in its jaws before she even had a chance to wake.
The lucomo sighed. “I can taste how strong your fear is from here. As sweet as its flavor may be, you require rest.”
Grateful for the distraction, she rolled her eyes. “Why do you keep saying that? You realize enjoying the flavor of my fear makes you sound just as bad as any of the tainted monsters you speak of.”
He raised an eyebrow, his glowing eyes cutting to her. “How so? Does my enjoyment harm you in anyway?”
“No, but terrorizing people is cruel… What if someone had a heart condition? Besides, some of the species out here eat flesh. You admitted it. I really can’t see the difference,” she said.
“Can’t you?” he asked as he rolled to his side, his eerie eyes staring through the flames at her. “Everything within the forest obeys the laws set forth within nature by the gods of the cosmic order, the