But it was. Ohgods,it was truer than anything he’d ever said, because Ezer wasfree.
In a way he never had been and never would be.
“I didn’t tell you at first,” he said, “because it’s my duty to hold the secrets of the Citadel. Why would I offer that up, risk penance and punishment, for a stranger? For a woman in a tower with a mountain of debt upon her head?”
He sighed.
Get to the point,he told himself. Because she was listening. Because he could see her edges softening, and despite himself...it was working.
His truth was working.
He’d always held parts of himself back. Even with Soraya, his best friend.
But with Ezer?
He showed hereverything.
And it felt so damned good.
“And when Ididget to know you...why would I wish to break someone who seemed already broken? Because I was broken, too, Ezer. I couldn’t even conjure a flame to save you, but you didn’t need me to. You saved me, and then you saved yourself in those woods, and however you did it, I don’t know. And I don’t care. Because...everything about you, what’s what I love.”
Love.
He hadn’t expected to say the word, but it poured out of him like a second breath.
He felt it.
In every fiber of his being...he felt it for her.
He dared step closer. “And once I knew who you were...I couldn’t speak the truth aloud.”
“It wasn’t your choice to make,” Ezer said.
“I know that.” He nodded. “And I was going to tell you, but the more I got to know you, the more time we spent together, the more you challenged me and frustrated me...the more you began to step into who you are here...the more I realized, Ezer of Rendegard, thatyoucould not be broken. But I could.” He swallowed, and his hands shook at his sides. Pain swam through him, for his loss. For his mistakes. Forherpain, inflicted because of him. “I could be broken if I lost you. So, I hid the truth. And it was wrong of me, and I am a coward for it, and I will spend months, years – gods, whatever it takes – trying to make it up to you.”
His words were terrifying.
They were terrifying and honest and raw things...and they slidaway from him, freeing him. Making it easier to breathe than it had been in days.
She stared up at him, through her curls and her scars...and she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. Suddenly, he couldn’t even remember another face but hers. She wasallhe saw, the only woman he wanted to look at, the only woman he wanted to dream of and dreamwith.
And it would kill him to walk away from her.
But he’d do it, if it eased her own pain.
He’d do it, if it healedher.
He no longer gave a damn about himself.
She was what mattered.
She deserved the world, even if she didn’t want him in it.
“I have been lied to my entire life,” Ezer said. “And you expect me to forgive you? To fall into your arms and... and what then, Arawn? You’ll be king soon. And... we arenotto be Matched.”
He took a deep breath. His hands went slack at his sides, like he was surrendering.
And he was.
