Firmly setting aside the invidious temptation of that last resort, sitting crumpled and listless against the unyielding wall, she let herself sink into happy memories. Gabriel’s black eyes, filled with humor and warm affection. His hair, like moonlight, save for the single streak that matched his dark eyes. His magic curling around her, silvery cool, moon bright, a balm for all the aching empty pits inside her. She imagined she could sense him, his loving presence, the sensual caress of his hands, the firm embrace, his voice promising to protect her always. Her own magic leapt to him eagerly, flowing in a rush like an undammed river, churning when it met the wall of her channels.

I love you, Nic, he whispered in her mind.

She caught her breath on a sob. “I love you, Gabriel. Always.”

Will you share your magic with me?

“Take. Have.” She was weeping freely as she repeated the refrain, remembering how she’d first tantalized him with it, and how it had become a declaration of deepest love. She would give him everything of herself, if only he would live. She almost believed she could feel his magic strengthening around her, silver chains of moonlight under her skin, the refreshingly cool water that formed his silent core, and she reached for him in longing, pushing her magic toward him.

More, please. Just like that.

Letting out a watery laugh, because it felt so good to imagine that rapport with him again, she opened all those channels she’d been working so hard to keep closed. And it felt like unclenching a muscle grown tight with strain. The floodgates opened, and she poured her magic and love into Gabriel, giving him every last fiery bit of herself, imagining sending him a shower of bloodred rose petals.

He drank her in, his magic flowing into and around her, bracing and enveloping her in a bubble of fiercely protective love. She had the sudden urge to lie down and cover her head. Probably she had lost her mind, but this was so much better than sanity. So she allowed herself to sag into the hard cradle of wall and floor, curving her body into it, pressing her face into her hands so that all the world faded away and nothing remained but the sacred flow of her magic and his, freely exchanged in purest love.

So comforting was this imaginary embrace, that she didn’t even startle when the roof came off.

Meditation wasn’t Gabriel’s strong suit, so though he started out in a seated pose, trying to ignore the outside world, he ended up standing just inside the verge where the smaller saplings met the open meadow, House Sammael towering above in all its malevolent grandeur. With Selly’s hand clasped in his, coolly fresh as water from hidden spring, huge and bright as a full moon just touching the horizon, he reached for one of those towers, seeking the bloom of rosy fire that was his beloved.