Slowly, I lowered myself to the floor to lay next to Ilian. Our faces were inches apart and I could feel his breath tease my skin. I put one arm under the pillow and the other rested under my chin. Ilian rested his hand on my arm and closed his eyes.

“Thank you for letting me sleep with you, Kiri. I feel safer with you,” Ilian whispered as sleep slowly dragged him under.

I stayed awake a while longer and listened to Ilian’s breathing as he fell deeper into his sleep. His heartbeat slowed down gradually and I could feel the tension release in his muscles as he fully gave in to his slumber. He seemed so peaceful like this. Ilian’s presence emitted such a potent serenity that I found it hard to be away. It was addicting to be near him.

Finally closing my eyes, I allowed myself to surrender to my exhaustion once again. Ty’s face didn’t return to me this time, instead I was graced with Ilian’s gentle embrace. His laughter danced in my dreams for the remainder of the night.

I awoke the next morning to the sounds of Ilian fumbling as he tried to change into his clothes. He barely had his pants buttoned when I opened my eyes. A deep blush painted his cheeks as he straightened his pant legs out.

“Geez, a minute sooner and I would have blinded you,” Ilian laughed as he pulled his shirt over his head, “Good morning.”

“Morning, Ilian,” I said as I rolled to lay on my back and shift my arm behind my head, “Did you sleep okay?”

Putting my clothes back in their bag, Ilian offered me a teasing smile, “I don’t know, someone kept stealing the blanket. It just gave me an excuse to scoot closer to you though so I really didn’t mind.”

“Sorry,” I said laughing, “I guess I’m not used to having to share the blanket.”

Ilian flounced to the ground next to me, “Don’t be. I don’t know about you, but it’s the best I’ve slept since I got here.”

“Honestly, same,” I said, turning to look at Ilian’s smiling eyes, “And on the plus side, I didn’t wake up to someone trying to rob me, so that’s a win!”

Ilian hit me gently, “You’re silly. Did you need me to watch you as you feed? Make sure you don’t take too much from yourself.”

Sitting up I shook my head at Ilian, “I can’t feed from myself anymore.”
Ilian cocked his head and gave me his lovely, quizzical look, “Why can’t you?”

“I didn’t eat with you guys last night because I wanted to come in here to study some more. The author found out that we need nutrients from the blood, and by feeding from ourselves we aren’t supplying our bodies with the extra nutrients it needs, so it just slowly kills us. Stops the hunger, but it’s going to end up killing me if I continue to feed from myself,” I explained to Ilian.

“Oh, that sucks. Maybe you can feed from me?” Ilian suggested.

“I think that’s a horrible idea. I can’t control myself yet, what if I don’t stop? What if I take too much?” I asked, shaking my head at Ilian’s suggestion.

“What if we asked one of the guards to watch, so they can stop you if you can’t stop yourself?” He pondered.

While I didn’t enjoy the idea of having a watching party as I fed, it might be for the best until I learned to control myself. I was scared of hurting someone, scared of hurting Ilian. The more I thought about the prospect of feeding from Ilian, the hotter my blood ran, and that alone terrified me more than anything else. I shouldn’t be this excited about getting to taste his blood, but I was. His scent, the sound of his voice, the feel of his skin on mine, all of it lit a fire in my blood and I could feel my affliction clawing its way out of me. It wanted to know his taste.

“Maybe for now, we can see if someone else can feed me,” I suggested.

Disappointment flooded Ilian’s eyes as he spoke, “You are doing so much to help me, Kiri. Can’t you let me help you?”

“I want to, Ilian. I really do. And that’s the problem. The overwhelming desire that I have to know what you taste like scares me and I don’t want to hurt you,” I explained to him.

Heat flooded Ilian’s cheeks and he turned to break his eye contact with me. His voice had the slightest tremble to it as he spoke, “Do you really… well no. I don’t want to know the answer to that actually. We’ll speak to Finney today and see if we can find someone else to feed you.”

Relief poured through me that Ilian wasn’t trying to fight me on my decision. Maybe one day I would get to know what he tasted of, but hopefully not for some time. The day I feed from Ilian I want to be in complete control. I want to enjoy the experience, not spend the entire time trying to fight myself.

“Thank you,” I whispered.

The sound of rusty door hinges echoed from the end of the hall. Faint murmuring trailed its way back to our room as someone spoke to the hall guard. The smell of blackberries and wine danced in the air and I felt my eyes flaring in response. Finney was near, and he was injured. I don’t know how, but I knew his wound wasn’t fresh, rather it was a few hours old.

“You okay?” Ilian asked.

“Yeah sorry, I just… I can smell Finney from here which is new. And he is hurt. What’s weirder is I can vaguely tell the age of the wound. I’ve never been able to do that before,” I explained, wondering what could be causing the sudden shift in my magic.

I could hear the echo of two pairs of boots on the stone floor, as the sound grew nearer the scent of blackberry wine got stronger. Lingering with the smell of blackberries was the faintest smell of morning dew. Finney greeted us with a charming smile as he opened the door to our room. Behind him trailed Palaemon, who had his head buried in a small leather bound journal. 

“I figured I’d find both of you in here today,” Finney said with a faint chuckle.

Palaemone moved around Finney and finally looked up from his book only to flinch as he saw Ilian’s bruised face. He studied us for a brief moment before he spoke, “I swear at this rate my new recruits are  going to be gone by the end of the week.”

Finney’s eyes flared with shock at his companion's bleak statement as he slugged Palaemon in the shoulder, “What is wrong with you Pay! You don’t say that to a group of damn kids!”

Palaemon rubbed his shoulder and pinned Finney with an angry look before he growled in a hushed tone, “We have had them for less than a week and they have had more incidents than any other recruit team I’ve had. I’m being honest, Finney. This isn’t a place for children. It’s barely a place for grown adults to survive in.”

“We’ll talk about this later, go. I know you have other things you need to do today, I’ll take them to the tower,” Finney said in a dry tone.

“Fine,” Palaemon responded in an equally dry tone. It was clear that the two had gotten off to a rocky start this morning. 

Palaemon exited the room, the stride of his footsteps was much larger as he left, clearly eager to focus his attention on the tasks he needed to accomplish rather than us. The smell of morning dew disappeared with him. When Palaemon was out of earshot, Finney addressed us again, making an effort to change the tone of his voice to his playful yet witty one rather than the curt and dry one he had just addressed Palaemon with.

“Don’t listen to him, I’d like to give the benefit of the doubt to you instead of assuming you have a foot in the grave already. He can be rather pessimistic sometimes,” Finney said.

“What did you mean when you said you knew I’d be in here?” Ilian asked.

“I mean what I said. After the way you two interacted with each other, I just knew I’d find you in here. It was the same thing I did when I met Palaemon,” Finney explained. “Now get ready, I want to head out early this morning.”

Ilian stood with ease and extended his hand to me to help me up. I carefully folded our blanket and rested it upon the pillow before taking Ilian’s hand. I tried my best to straighten out my tousled hair as we made our way out into the hall where Finney now stood waiting for us. I attempted  to keep my hair out of my eyes and behind my ears, but the effort seemed futile as every small movement I made freed my frenzied hair. Seeing my struggle, Finney reached into a small pouch on his hip and produced a thin strip of ribbon.

“Here take this, I keep extra incase Palaemon needs to tie his hair back,” Finney said, handing me the ribbon.

I thanked Finney and used the ribbon to tie my unruly hair up into a tight ponytail. A few short strands teased my ears, but other than that it was up and out of my face for the first time in months. While at the castle, my father had kept my hair cropped short. Since moving out to the isle, my hair had grown rather long and while it was at an annoying stage where it was too short to keep behind my ears, I had to admit I liked it better long. 

“Alright, let’s head out,” Finney said, without gathering Landon and Pan from their room.

“Wait, what about Landon or Pan?” Ilian asked, “Aren’t they coming to study with us?”