Herbalists' Cache [m] tejano blue

She was solid but pliant against him, and at her first unsteady breath, Arcadian forgot all the world's worries. All his hard-won wisdom, too. The embrace grew more and more arduous until, minutes or hours later, clarity returned to him as they were finally released from one another.

He felt cold and bereft where air snaked in between their bodies.

"Your name?" he asked her, now that the spell had been broken. "You never told me your name."

He knew what might come of this. And he was terrified, suddenly, of the prospect. Not of fatherhood, but of this woman walking away from him, never to be seen again. He knew nothing about her — not whether she had a man already, or if she was someone he could learn to hate, or if she knew the significance of what they'd done.

He tried to find her gaze, his own bright and imploring.