MAYA
The night air in the forest was cold enough to bite, but I barely felt it. My own thoughts were gnawing at me far worse.
"Idiot," I muttered under my breath, pacing along the narrow path between the trees. "Utter, reckless idiot." No other name would have fit me at that point. I had made a stupid mistake. An idiotic one.
I should've walked away the moment Noah's lips touched mine. I should've shoved him back, thrown a sharp word in his face, and left him standing there to puzzle over my absence. But no—I'd stayed.
And for what?
Because he'd smiled that lazy, knowing smile and said my face reminded him of Aerya Lune from The Star of Thranor—a heroine I'd adored since childhood? Because I couldn't resist correcting him when he got the plot wrong, and before I knew it, we were trading lines and theories like two old friends in a library instead of… whatever mess we'd just made?
