Looking at the bed probably wasn’t a good idea. I turned away from it and toward Aldair, who had just waved his hand, coaxing the glowing coals in the fireplace to more brilliant life. Flames began to lick up along the wood stacked inside, sending the aromatic scent of burning applewood throughout the room.
I’d more or less forced myself not to think about Jace up to that point, since I knew that would destroy my fragile composure more quickly than anything else, but the wood smoke made me think of him, the way his clothes had smelled that first time he’d held me in his arms. Only as a friend back then — and barely that, since we’d only just met — and yet even in that moment, I’d known somehow that he was destined to be much more. What was he doing now? Were Zahrias and Julia doing their
