Chapter 70

Checking to make sure that Lucia is still sleeping, I slide out of bed and quietly make my way across the hall, bare feet brushing softly on cool stone.

I hesitate for only a moment at the door across from my own, then knock. Damion must have been standing near his door because it only takes a second for the door to pull open and he's suddenly there, staring down at me.

He's not wearing a shirt, like he was in the middle of undressing when I interrupted, and my mouth goes dry at the unexpected sight of his bare skin. At the swirling black lines of black tattoos that I love tracing my fingers over. The hard planes of sculpted muscles that I just want to press into. He's a work of art that I could stare at for hours.

He blinks down at me with hooded black eyes, "Why are you knocking?"

His question takes me aback, "Sorry, I know you're probably tired," I say, "I just wanted to see you, to make sure you're alright."

His dark eyebrows draw together in confusion, then understanding dawns in his eyes. His arms snakes out to grab me, gently tugging me through the doorway, "That's not what I meant, darling. I wasn't asking why you were knocking because I wanted to know what you were doing here. What I was asking you was why did you *knock*. You don't *knock* on my door, this space is as much yours as it is mine. I *want* you here."

His words send a spear of warmth through me, "Oh," I say and it comes out more breathily than I mean it to.

His lips tilt up at the corners, "Yeah, *oh*."

Shutting the door behind us, he pulls me in for a quick heated kiss --a fast greeting that doesn't last more than a few seconds, but still takes my breath away and makes my heart beat in a stutter. As he pulls away, there's a barely perceptible stiffness to his motions- not quite a wince, but close. But it's so unlike his normally smooth movements that I notice.

When I pull away to get a better look at him, I see bloody lines on his side half bandaged and I suck in a quiet gasp.

"Gods, Damion, are you alright?"

"What- oh, that." He looks like he wants to brush it off like it's nothing, but it's *not* nothing, emphasized by the fact that there's blood still dripping down his side, staining the top band of his black riding pants.

"Yes, that! What happened?"

"There was a small incident at the border-"

*Small?* I've seen Damion fight, and if he'd managed to get injured like this it must have been more serious than something small.

"Are you alright?" I ask again, eyeing the large piercing cut, worry making my voice tight, "We should get you to a healer."

"It's really nothing," he says with a tilt to his lips that says that he finds my worry over him endearing, "Shifters tend to heal more quickly than others. This isn't as bad as it probably looks to you- it should heal by itself by morning. It probably won't even leave a mark."

I chew worriedly over my bottom lip as I consider his words, taking in the gash again -if I had a cut like that, it would take at least a few weeks to scab over and heal up. "Do you have any bandages?" I ask, "At least let me help you get it cleaned up."

His eyebrows come together, something in his eyes flickering like he's not used to having someone worry over him, "You don't have to, Lily-"

"I *want* to," I say, pushing him to sit down on the couch near his fireplace, and he lets me- his frame so sizable that I know I wouldn't be able to push him around anywhere he didn't want to go unless he allowed me to, "Now where do you keep the bandages?"

He tells me where to find it, and I feel his eyes on me as I move around the room collecting the supplies I need from the chest near his bed before stopping off in the bathing chamber to grab a dampened washing cloth. Supplies in hand, I hurry back over to where he's waiting for me and kneel down on the couch beside him.

I move the warm damp fabric over his skin, cleaning up the dripping blood, careful not to get too close to the wound.

"What happened?"

"Stray arrow," he says nonchalantly, like it's nothing, but my eyes still widen as I work, "The arrow wasn't even meant for me, but the Unseelie can't aim for shit. The shot didn't stick, it just grazed past me while I was finishing with a few others. I barely felt it when it happened."

I chew on the inside of my cheek as I move on to drying the area, "It must have more serious than that if it managed to get past your fighting leathers."

He grimaces and admits, "You'd be right if I'd been wearing my leathers."

My eyes flash up to him with a worried look, but his eyes aren't on my face, they're stuck on where my fingers work on his warm skin, "We hadn't been expecting a fight, we were scouting along the border where we had last seen a group of Seelie soldiers around the area where they're usually spotted attempting to do their mining. We were only meant to be doing a bit of reconnaissance, but a group of unseelie managed to surprise us. You don't need to worry about it though, there were more of us than of them so it was over quickly."

I let out a slow breath, making a mental note to ask more about that later, before putting my focus back on the task in front of me. With gentle fingers, I smooth on a bit of salve onto the wound that will keep it from getting infected and as I work, he sucks in a breath.

"Fuck me," he groans under his breath, his voice strained like he's in pain, and my fingers stop moving on his skin.

"Did I hurt you?"

My eyes fly to his, which are squeezed closed in what looks like discomfort, but when they open, they've shifted to a sparkling wine shade of red- it's a shade of red that I recognize easily after last night. It's a color that has my thighs squeezing together.

"You didn't hurt me," he explains, voice strained. His jaw flexes, and he rubs a hand over his eyes, "Those gowns you wear at night."

I glance down at the thin white material that dips a little low on my collar bone but isn't scandalous by any means, "My night clothes?" I ask him bewildered.

He swallows roughly, the pulse jumping in his neck, "The memory of you in those has kept me up at night more than is probably healthy."

I grin, a silent laugh shaking through me as I go back to finishing placing the bandage over the now clean wound, "You mean from that night during the earth storm?" I ask.

He nods, his lips tilting up in a wry grin, though his eyes still pulse with that same deep shade of red.

I remember that night a little too well myself. The night he'd barged into my room in the middle of the night and carried me up to the gardens. He'd been shirtless that night, and I'd be lying if I hadn't thought extensively of the feel of his hot skin through the thin material of my night dress on more than one occasion.

The night he'd kissed me for the first time.

"Crouching over you," he says, "while you were wearing *that*. It was like my own personal hell and heaven all at once." He rubs a hand roughly over his jaw, "I knew I shouldn't have kissed you, but every part of me was so drawn to every part of you-" his voice cuts off, strained, as I lean in closer.