“Asha—”
“Don’t Asha me! I need to say this.”
“Then speak plainly.”
“I love you. It’s nonsensical and cruel, but it’s there. I love how you look, even if you are blue, and the way you get all growly when you’re frustrated. I love the way you make my body feel, and how dutiful you are to your tribe. I love how even though you don’t want us here, you protect us, keeping us safe from harm. I love you for a thousand reasons, finding more with each day that passes, and I thought I could do this. I thought I could have you for a night. But I was wrong, because my very soul begs to have you for a lifetime.”
He looks stunned by my confession, as if I’ve just slapped him in the face.
“You must think I’m foolish.”
She shakes his head sadly from side to side. “I do not.”
“But you won’t have me…”
“I…can not.”
“Is it my weakness that’s the issue? Would strong Meg have sufficed? Or perhaps Fiona?”
“Asha, it was never you. We are from two worlds, and while I understand why our tribes want to join, I cannot do so in the way the others do. Not with you or any of the Penticari.”
“Because we’re weak?” I say, choking back tears.
“Because our differences are great, Little Vaeyark.” He brings his knuckles to my cheek, and I brush it away.
“Don’t call me that.”
He looks off into the distance, giving a curt nod.
“I’d like to be alone.”
“That is ill-advised out in the greater?—”
“Just move away!” I gesture frantically to an enormous rock. “Go sit over there while I finish. It shouldn’t take long.”
19
RAMSEY
Never has my heart known such anguish.
Or my pain been so great.
But what am I to do?
Foolishly, I believed there could be more to us, and I had it in my heart that I would choose her even over the great princess.
Then she shared with me her mother’s fate. Her death during childbirth.
If her mother cannot birth a human child from a weak Penticari male, what gives Asha any hope of birthing one with Tempest blood? It is a risk too great to take, as I am not willing to sacrifice her for any amount of joy.
Even if it means giving up my own.
She could be pregnant now…
My heart quickens at the thought of a small child with her honey hair, though I know that dream is not meant for me.
It is not meant for any of us exiled, and we were fools to believe it was. But we cannot abandon them now.
