Fire Kin by M.J. Scott Page A

return to Summerdale, but the ones still here were the ones who, like me, had decided that this was where they were supposed to be, no matter what. I only hoped they would all live not to regret that choice.
    At least, with so few of us left here now, we were able to keep tabs on one another, stay close to the hospital and away from the Night World. There had been no more disappearances, and for that I was thankful.
    I was less thankful for Ash. And for the crumbling control I had over my memories. They kept sneaking out to catch me unawares, striking like daggers when I let my focus wander. The first time Ash had smiled at me and my heart had skipped. The first time he’d spoken my name.
    The first time we’d kissed. That one kept returning. A deadly snare. Pulling me back to a night when, if only I’d made a different choice, I wouldn’t even care that Ash had returned.
    One night. One little choice . . .
    There were flowers on my stairs again. Small unassuming flowers, delicately green and white. Glowing in the moonlight that streamed down on the garden outside my rooms.
    I knew what they were, of course. Bryony flowers.
    From the plant I was named for. They weren’t usually beautiful, though bryony had useful healing properties.
    These ones, though, were beautiful, softly shining and filled with a perfume that no bryony plant had ever issued.
    I’d been finding bryony flowers in odd places for weeks now.
    I thought I knew who was leaving them.
    I hoped I knew who was leaving them.
    But surely even he wasn’t crazy enough to sneak onto my father’s lands to leave flowers at my doorstep.
    Asharic sa’Uriel’pellar had a wild streak a mile wide and fire that burned deep within him, but I didn’t think he was insane. But maybe I was.
    Because I bent to retrieve the flowers and then stepped out into the moonlight. “Ash?”
    One heartbeat. Two. And a third.
    Then he appeared, stepping out of the darkness beneath one of the vast oaks that grew here in our gardens to walk toward me. “You knew it was me.”
    Hoped. Not knew. I didn’t correct him, just watched him come closer, my heartbeat speeding. He wore a white shirt, one sleeve torn, dark trousers, soft boots. But my focus was on the night-lit-water shade of his eyes. On the heat warming that color to something fierce. Something undeniable. The fire that lived in the depths of his power called to me, as did the man himself.
    He stopped maybe a foot away and sketched a bow. “My lady. Do you like my flowers?”
    I looked down at the shimmering blooms. “They’re beautiful.”
    He smiled at that and I knew at that moment that the rest was inevitable.
    â€œMy lady, do you perhaps like me?”
    The flowers fell from my hands, the words catching in my throat, seemingly too big to utter. Instead I moved closer and pulled him to me. Brought his mouth down on mine.
    And learned what fire truly was.
    â€¢Â Â Â â€¢Â Â Â â€¢
    Finally, near midday on the fourth day after Asharic’s return, a messenger arrived. Not my uncle this time, but Hennin, one of the guards who had served my Family for longer than I had been alive, was the courier. I had never seen him set foot outside Summerdale, and I caught myself before I could express my startlement in a way that would only embarrass him.
    The envelope he carried was sealed with both my father’s seal and his magic, the night-dark blue sheen of it floating around the paper like fog. My father’s magic always felt heavy to me, like the air on a hot summer’s night. Weighty. Hard to move. Prone to storms.
    I took the envelope and smiled my thanks at Hennin. “Did you come alone?”
    He nodded.
    Interesting. Then again, my father’s logic would be that either Hennin, skilled warrior that he was, would manage the journey with ease or, if he didn’t, then, well, he was only a servitor after all.
    I