If the fire hadn’t died in the early hours, Lyris would have sworn she hadn’t slept. As it was, she drifted where she sat, propped against the tree trunk with the left-over rain drops dripping in chorus to the forest floor. One moment, she was awake and watching the burnt umber of the flames as they danced against the night-time shadows. The next, the fire had died and she was cold, damp, and Kit was snoring like a bear in winter. It was in those hours that she missed Arn the most. Selfishly his physical warmth, but also his easy smile and effortlessly positive approach to the world.
The young woman continued to worry for her friend, the man she’d come to feel more deeply for. She’d kissed young men before, and even taken a lover in the previous year. Yet nothing, nothing compared to the
