“You don’t usually talk to me like that. I thought maybe it was just because of my heat. That you were... different.” Her cheeks flush. “The words he used—you don’t say them.”
I go still.
“What words?”
“You always speak in Vraksûn when things start getting intense. Most of the time, I don’t even know what you’re saying. But he?—”
“But he what?”
“He used words that I could understand. The kind that...”
She stops herself.
I force myself to stay against the wall with every ounce of strength I possess.
“The kind that what?”
She avoids my eyes.
“So you liked it.”
She shakes her head. “I’m not saying that. I thought it was you. That’s why?—”
“But you liked it.” My voice hardens. “And I’ve never spoken to you like that.”
She doesn’t deny it. That’s the worst part.
Something frays in my chest. My lungs pull tight, like roots strangling themselves. I feel the shift cracking under my ribs.
“I never wanted to scare you,” I say softly. “Not with the way I spoke. Not with the way I touched you.”
My claws dig into my thighs.
“I thought... if I held back, if I let the bond settle slowly, it would give you space to choose me freely. To feel in control.”
The words scrape up my throat like gravel.
“I honored you.”
She looks over at me, wide-eyed.
“I could’ve taken you against that wall the first night you slept here,” I stutter, voice shaking. “I could’ve bent you over that tub a hundred times since, but I waited. I thought waiting meant something.”
She doesn’t say anything.
“Do you know what that means for my kind, Lumi? It’s unheard of for a mated pair to wait anhourto consummate the bond—and we’re not just bonded, we’re soulbonded. Picked for each other by divinity itself. And still, I fought every ounce of my biology to keep you safe.”
She opens her mouth. Then closes it.
“I would've spoken any filth you wanted,” I murmur. “Would've defiled the gods in every tongue I know just to hear you fall apart like that for me.”
My jaw ticks, barely holding it together.
“Tell me, Lumi. What else did he say?”
She blinks.
“What do you mean?”
