As we say our goodnights, and night falls and my body slips into its scales, I drift off to sleep, wondering if Zhoric will show himself.
I don’t wonder for long.
I hear the sound of running water before I even realize I’m asleep.
I stand still as I finally come face to face with Zhoric, watching him cross the room. He stops the moment he sets eyes on me, then his gaze drifts away before he continues on his way. For all I can tell, I may as well be a phantom rather than a manifestation of myself he can actually see. But I know better than that now. “Good of you to show your face tonight,” I say.
He ignores me as he heads into another part of his suite that’s fully open with no doors. The bathing room. In the very center, the basin, large enough for two, is filling with water from a long, curved faucet. Zhoric shrugs off his robe and it pools to the ground behind him. I spin away as fast as I can, but not before I notice the whole of his back. Like his front, the skin is flawless. No scars cross his arms or body, save for three brutal lines running in jagged ridges across his back, right behind where his heart lies.
“A few nights without seeing me doesn’t mean I cease to exist.” I think back to those first few days manifesting before him where he couldn’t see me, but those days are far behind us now.
“Be gone, Kaisa,” he says, but he doesn’t push me out.
I sigh. “Clearly, I would if I could.” Even I’m tired of saying the same words. I’m certain he’s sick of it.
When he says nothing to that, I try for a more conversational approach. Endearing. Welcoming. “What are you doing?”
“Bathing. Clearly.” His reply is curt and to the point.
I clench my teeth and whip my head back toward him at the exact moment his pants fall to the ground, revealing the curve of his backside. Also lacking scars. Also very nice, which I could have gone my life without knowing.
“Gods beyond,” I say, flustered and exasperated, spinning back around. “A warning next time would be nice.”
“As far as I’m concerned, you are not here.”
I pin my gaze to the ceiling.I will stay calm. “Why not shove me out again, then?”
“I’ve decided that ridding myself of your presence isn’t worth my effort.”
I hear the slosh of water. A half sigh, half groan slipsfrom him as he sinks down into it and my low belly responds instinctively at the indulgent sound. Once I’m certain he’s settled, I turn back around. His head is tilted back with his throat exposed. I’m reminded of the images of him I saw when I was still savage right after entering the Realm.
“If you’re intending to pretend I’m not here, then why speak at all? Or do you perhaps talk to yourself often?” I bite my tongue. Antagonizing him is certainly not going to help, but I can’t seem to stop myself. Then again, maybe any response from him other than apathy is progress.
His arms dangle outside of the tub on either side, and I see his fingers twitch. “Endlessly.”
I purse my lips to keep from smiling. Still studying the column of his throat, I walk closer to the bathing chamber, but stop at the door frame and lean against it. From the top of his head to his mid-abdomen he is completely, utterly smooth. An errant thought crosses my mind, an image of me raking my fingernails down his chest, across his back to mark him. That reaction can’t be natural. I make a note to ask Ozias or look into Atlanta’s book to see if the bond affects physical desire. I swallow thickly, needing a distraction.
“Who did that to you?” I nod to the smooth expanse of his skin. It’s not a question I meant to ask, but it’s taking up residence in my brain. I can’t stop noticing it. I can’t stop thinking of it. Not after what Ozias said about scars. I hadn’t even remembered he didn’t have scars before seeing him again.
There’s a beat of silence, then, in a whisper, “Someone tried to tear out my heart.”
Everything in me goes deadly still, but a wave of dizziness blurs my vision. It takes me a moment to regain my composure to clarify my question. “I meant who took the scarsaway.” I stare him down. He opens his eyes and holds my gaze for so long I don’t think he’s going to answer.
“Alixor’s aggression had nothing on the one who chose me. But that is long since passed and matters no more.” His head falls back again, unbothered, as if he didn’t reveal something deep and intrinsic about his past—abouthimself.
I asked, but I didn’t expect him to answer. I didn’t expect to feel a pang of sympathy strike me to the core. He’s saying that his bonded partner did that to him? Or someone very near to it did? I push off the wall and enter the bathing chamber, not stopping until I’m at the edge of the tub by his feet. I thank the gods that the water is cloudy so I don’t have to fight a blush. I squat down, the slits of my skirt parting to fall between my thighs—one near flawless, the other torn through with the new, nasty scar from Ozias, still sore and healing. I fold my hands over the lip of the tub and rest my chin on them.
“Then I’m surprised you aren’t taking the effort to push me out. I know what me coming here means now. Does that not make you afraid of me?”
His head tips back up so that his dark, forest eyes are on mine. I’d never seen another color like it until I entered the Realm. “Is that why you are here, then? To attempt to seduce me into bonding with you so you can have someone powerful at your side?”
My blood cools in my veins. I try very hard not to let my gaze track down to the god scale pinned to his chest. I ignore the pressing feeling inside me, pushing me towards him. The aggravation of feeling anything but hatred for him seeps out with my next words. “There’s nothing that could make me want you.”
His pinky twitches, the muscles in his shoulders going supernaturally still.
Cleary, seduction isn’t my strong suit. Still, this is not a man who will easily be caught off guard. How can I possibly endear myself to him, then? If I pretend to feel or be something I’m not, there’s no doubt in my mind he’ll find out. If I fail, I fail Ninon. I fail Ozias, Atlanta, and Issa. I fail my people.
After a pause, he sits up and leans over so that our faces are inches apart, his hands braced on the edge of the tub, his elbows jutting out on either side like a grand pair of alabaster wings. “Perhaps it isyouwho should be afraid. Perhaps, if you keep coming here, I’ll enter the Realm andsteal you away to claim you as mine. I know what great power you hold. It could be of use to me.”
