New Season

ELIA

As Summer passed into Autumn, and Anima's greens and yellows turned orange and red, Elia found herself not only with a purpose, but with increasing anticipation of the Festival, and her life. It was as if she could feel the strings of everything she'd ever wanted pulling together and all she had to do was make sure they pulled against each other in the right order, the right direction, to make everything tie up in a pretty bow.

Elia was elated. And overwhelmed. It seemed too good to be true.

Reth's devotion never waned. She'd thought that their appetite for each other would ease over time, that lovemaking would become less exciting. But in fact, the opposite was true. She was embarrassingly forward with him now—and he seemed to revel in it until there had been more than one missed meal, and even one mortifying moment when Reth forgot he'd told the security council to come to the cave and they were almost interrupted. Again.