The Ippos King (Wraith Kings #3) - Grace Draven Page 0,117

of the person to whom they belonged. Anhuset smiled, her heartbeat speeding up in anticipation of Serovek's company.

“I'm surprised to find you still awake, firefly woman,” he said, stopping next to her. Cloaked as she was against the cold, he'd foregone a hood or cap. The sun lit red highlights and silver strands in his dark hair and even in his beard, which had thickened during their stay with the monks. After a sennight with the Order, their bruises were fading.

He noticed the focus of her regard and rubbed one cheek with a sigh. “I'll shave it off soon enough,” he said. “Definitely before the hot weather arrives.” He matched her stare with one of his own. “You prefer me clean-shaven?”

With the rare exception, Kai men didn't wear beards. It was more a cultural preference than a physical limitation as they bore the shadow of a beard when returning from days on patrol. Serovek bearded or clean-shaven, he was striking. Either look suited him, though the beard added years to him and a certain forbidding dignity.

“My preference shouldn't matter,” she said. “It's your face.”

“Your preference will always matter.”

They stood side by side, arms pressed against each other. He'd always seemed to correctly guess her quirks and read her moods. It was uncanny, and in this he remained unfailing. Another lover might have come up behind her, wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into the cove of his body. She would have shrugged him off instantly. Serovek did none of those things, understanding in some instinctive fashion that while her devotion ran deep and intense for a loved one, she didn't display her affection in over ways and never in a public setting where others might note it and use it against her later. Some might think her overly cautious. She preferred that to being overly dead. Still, she reveled in his nearness, the heat rolling off his large frame to warm her side this chilly morning.

The monks had given her a room to use at the monastery, a space as spartan and basic as any of the barracks at Saggara. She used it only to store her things. Otherwise, she was with Serovek in his chamber, and while she avoided public displays of affection, private ones were a different matter.

Their intimacy was intense, rough at times, and also lighthearted. Even now, she wore the marks of his passion for her on her skin, and her thighs pleasantly ached from the hard ride he'd given her a couple of hours earlier. He lived up to his reputation as an experienced lover with endless stamina, and he expected her to keep up with him, which she did with great enthusiasm. They'd broken his bed twice, apologizing to the monks each time. Serovek finally told them bedding on the floor would suit them better. They'd both grinned at the smothered guffaws from the Nazim who'd taken away the remains of the broken bed frame.

With him, she learned to unbend, to laugh more easily, though she'd never in herself the beauty he swore she possessed. Her lovers had found her a challenge to conquer, a notch in the belt at having bedded the formidable sha-Anhuset and lived to tell of it. Serovek had found her a challenge as well, though not in the same fashion. The way he looked at her when they first met was the same way he looked at her now, as if he'd just discovered the most sublime of all the gods' creations. Sometimes it puzzled her; other times it overwhelmed her.

While he might see her as some lovely flower, albeit with razor-sharp thorns, the monks saw a golden opportunity to train with a renowned Kai fighter. Several times now she'd accepted an invitation to spar in the training yard and came away from the bouts exhilarated and sometimes bloodied.

For his part, Serovek spent the hours in conference with the abbot of the order, a man named Tionfa, who'd once been an Ilinfan swordmaster. Anhuset's interest in the monks soared, and at her first meeting with the abbot, she commented on his history and the fact that the Ilinfan brotherhood was well known, even among the Kai.

“Do you still fight, Excellency?” she asked. Tionfa was an elderly monk, old enough to be her father or even Serovek's father. She didn't make the mistake of assuming his age made him any less an adept and dangerous fighter.

He smiled at her in a way that told her he predicted what