The corridor to the inner baths held the hush of a chapel after midnight—torches banked low, shadows soft as velvet, the scent of warm mineral water riding the air. Lou moved through it without a sound despite his size, his arm secure beneath my knees, my cheek tucked against the heat of his collarbone. Every few steps he looked down, as if to check I hadn’t vanished between one heartbeat and the next.
“I can walk,” I murmured, though my body told a different story—hands shaking, joints buzzing from the Heart Stone’s surge, the echo of the duel still ringing in my bones.
“You can,” he rumbled, pushing the carved doors with his shoulder. “You won’t.”
Steam rolled over us, soft and fragrant. The chamber opened like a secret garden carved from the mountain: a wide pool cupped in pale stone
