He didn’t smile.
“I’ll allow the delay.” Vann turned to Brand and gave his shoulder a squeeze. “Find me when you’re done?”
He didn’t wait for a response before walking—no, limping—away.
“Another thing he won’t tell us,” Brand said, sorrow underscoring the quiet words. “It came on slowly, over years and years. No one knows why, which is how he prefers it, but…” He turned hopeful eyes on her. “Perhaps you could try to help him?”
Lunara nodded, a bit dazed. “He’s…” There weren’t really words for what Vann was.
“Yes,” Brand murmured, understanding. “He is.” Lacing his fingers with hers, he tugged her towards the doors. “Come on, Sorcerit. Time to heal a Fae.”
In the end,it took nearly a week—and Lunara didnotfeel amazing.
She held the last ruined fibers of Fern’s wings in her shaking hands, the sweat-soaked linen of her dress clinging like a jilted lover as power surged between them.
It had taken an entire day and night to mend the gossamer membranes alone, the bird-like bones beneath threatening to crumble into dust at the slightest touch. The thought of botching them—of crippling this beautiful creature for the rest of her very long life—had nearly defeated her.
They’d made it, though. Somehow.
Lunara knew where she was, but barely. The haze of agony was so absolute that her mind had disconnected itself for the most part. Had swept her away into some deeper place she’d never gone before, trying to hide the desolation from her consciousness.
Repeatedly. Over six of the longest days of her life.
The thump of a book hitting wood sounded, footsteps after. Tingles along her spine told her Brand’s hand was hovering there, wanting to touch her, but knowing he couldn’t. Not yet.
He’d learned quickly after the first time—the only time—when he’d thought he was helping but she’d broken into sobs instead, begging him to get away from her until she could muster the strength to face it.
“It’s done, little moon,” he murmured. The heat moved to her hands, electricity jumping across the gap between them. “It’s done.”
She tried to open her eyes, but they were swollen shut, crusted with the salt of her dried tears. “I can’t,” she rasped. “I’m not?—”
“Take as long as you need. I’m here when you’re ready.”
Lunara’s eyes pricked anew behind closed lids. Her high-handed, overbearing Demon had kept his word. He’dastonishedher.
Using his power over the stone, he’d braced a seat behind her on the first day—lined with overstuffed down pillows—so she had somewhere gentle to land when her body inevitably failed. She’d only had to hit the ground once before the solution was in place.
With an innate sense of exactly when to do so, he’d wordlessly offered her water and food, and the soft flesh of his inner forearm at all hours. Her fangs had sunk into him so many times it was a wonder she hadn’t bled him dry.
Early on, she’d come alive after one such instance to find her hair flawlessly braided, every unruly strand tamed away from her face. It wasn’t until later, hunched over and vomiting into a pail he was holding, that she’d realized his thoughtfulness. The hefty weight of it was still there even now, a comfort as it dangled off the edge of Fern’s sickbed and reminded her she wasn’t alone.
There was a sort of terror that came at this stage of a more serious healing she’d never allowed herself to acknowledge. When she was drowning in her stupor and desperate to find her way back to the surface. Stuck, unable to remember how to control her limbs. Pain so appalling she was sure she’d never feel normal again.
That’s where she was. Again. Except, she had help this time. “I’m ready.”
He pried her fingers from Fern’s wing with all the force of a butterfly. His touch didn’t linger or press. Didn’t demand. It was exactly what she required, and nothing more.
“Are you able to sit up yourself?”
She was half-sitting down, half-sprawled across the floating slab, arms outstretched and cheek resting on the pad beneath Fern.
Her body tensed reflexively, the wordyesperched on her lips, ready to do it on her own because she always had before—until the edge of the stone dug into her abdomen, paralyzing the muscles there further, and Lunara remembered she didn’t have to. Didn’t want to. Not when Brand was there and had proven himself completely.
“No,” she finally admitted. Harder to do than she’d expected.
Just as he’d studied her body in the cave, Brand had watched and listened to her cues over the traumatic week, learning her in an entirely different way. He knew to slide his hand gently beneath her sternum, because it tended to hurt the least. To support the back of her head as he levered her backwards and settled her against the mound of pillows behind her.
He’d tasted the deepest parts of her, but this was more intimate. More vulnerable. He’d spent six days witnessing the worst she had to offer and was still here.
