“Morning and night. If it starts to look worse, let a maiden know. You’ll need a healer quickly.”
“You’ll destroy our court,” Luxuros said, tucking the salve into a pocket. “If you don’t get it under control.”
A ruby rage flooded her lungs. “Seems a little unfair to gauge my level of restraint from an unexpected attack by someone who, for all I knew, was my sworn enemy. The fact I didn’t kill you should tell you everything you need to know about my restraint, Commander.”
“And it would, if that’s all I was speaking of. There are rumors about you, Fire Queen. You’re reckless.”
“You don’t know anything about me, Commander.”
“I know you didn’t spend three years in Celene out of the goodness of your heart?—”
“Do not speak of them. I may not have left here on my own accord but that city is home to me and you’ll watch your tongue.” The rage simmered into a boiling ache as she willed it back down. “You may leave.”
Luxuros stood, the heat in the room rising. “You have to get your head above it, Princess, or we’re all fucked.”
“Good evening,” she forced as his hand hit the door handle. His arrogance was bad enough, but his flippant willingness to throw around Celene had her steaming. “And Commander?”
His head snapped left, one eye peering over his shoulder at her.
“If you find yourself on the edge of my blade again, know that I will not hesitate a second time.”
His lips twisted into something like a grin, an unbelievable coolness to his stare, considering his sweltering presence.
“If you had any grit to your fighting stance, I might just take you seriously.”
He closed the door quietly behind him, leaving her to seethe for the better part of the night.
“Don’t get excited, Commander. I only want to see the damage.”
Astra’s study was much less suffocating on this plane. The walls rippled as she approached the commander. The salve against her palm was cooling but not nearly as effective as it was in reality.
Luxuros held her stare once again, but here, in the dream version of him, there were fewer reservations.
He sat at her desk, untying the laces of his leathers and letting his chest piece fall away to the floor, revealing a soft linen shirt stained with whatever concoction he’d gotten from the infirmary. He pulled the collar of his shirt to the side, revealing a fist-sized wound at the top of his shoulder, tangled with golden ink that ran under his shirt and disappeared.
He hissed as she reached for it, pulling away. “Those hands cooled off?”
Astra rolled her eyes, pushing a leather cord around his neck to the side to make sure she fully covered the wound. He flinched as she worked, the faint heat between them popping and sizzling.
She touched the edges of the golden tattoo, tracing one of the lines. “Chains?”
“Don’t touch them,” he said softly. “They’ll only trap you.”
Astra woke sweating, her fingers tingling with the heat of his blood.
Chapter
Twelve
The feel of his flesh lingered the next morning, even through the muted maze of her dream.
It was worse when he passed her table at breakfast, laughing with a Mercurian advisor, the heat so staggering it lit up her nervous system anew.
“How did you sleep?” Mirquios asked from across the table, his eyes fixed far away. The energy in the room was stifling to Astra. They’d make their departures soon, either back to their home courts or to Pluto, and the anxious oranges clouded her vision.
“Fine enough,” she said quietly. “And you?”
“Quite well, considering. Though I don’t think Lux can say the same. That burn kept him up half the night.”
