Gods. Every second with her feels like a lifetime I never thought I’d get.
We stay like that until the water cools and our skin puckers, and even then, I can’t bring myself to let her go. Eventually, I scoop her up again—because she’s gone limp with satisfaction and refuses to move—and carry her back to bed. Her glasses are tucked onto the nightstand, her curls damp and sticking to her cheeks, her limbs boneless and warm against me.
“Don’t you dare leave me here,” she warns me, eyes already drifting shut as I settle her into the blankets.
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” I say.
She grumbles something unintelligible and promptly passes out, a little smile still playing at the corners of her mouth.
And as I pull the covers over her, tuck myself in behind her, and rest my hand on her hip, I realize something with absolute certainty.
I’ve waited ten years for this, too.
And I’d wait ten more, if it meant ending up right here—with her.
14
IRIS
The Grand Library of M’mir gleams like a citadel of glass and runes, rising from the canyon edge in a sweep of golden light and gravitational spires. Even after six months of working here, the place still takes my breath away—partially because it looks like someone crossbred a cathedral with a spaceship and gave it a pulse.
Everything here hums. The walls shimmer with refracted data. The archivists wear rune-coded bands that unlock personalized access to thousands of ancient vaults. A levitating lift carries me up through the atrium while mechanical ravens circle high above, trailing parchment from their claws like gossiping messengers of some long-dead god.
It’s beautiful. It’s prestigious. It’s everything I thought I wanted.
And I’ve never felt more out of place.
I step into the eastern wing—a rotunda strung with vines and hollowed-out moonstone shelves—and spot my boss, Davina, near one of the hovering scroll towers. Her hair is cobalt, twisted high in a crown braid that wraps around her antlers, her skin gleaming like bronze. She doesn’t seem to notice me as she sorts through a stack of books, brow furrowed.
“Davina,” I call softly, not wanting to interrupt her flow.
She glances over her shoulder. “Iris,” she says. “Back already? I thought you were taking a few days off to visit your friend.”
I blush at the mention of ‘my friend’—a word that doesn’t come close to describing what I have with Garrik, not now. “Yeah…I came back a little early to ask you something.”
“Hmm,” she hums, arching a brow. “You’re glowing.”
I blink. “I am not.”
“You are,” she insists, turning to face me fully. “Something’s changed.”
I hesitate, stepping closer. “I wanted to talk to you about a transfer,” I say at last. “To the Arborium Archive.”
That gets her attention.
“The Arborium is…charming,” she says, in the same tone one might use to describe a rustic barn or a particularly well-trained goat. “But it’s hardly the Grand Library.”
“I know,” I say. “But that’s kind of the point.”
She studies me for a moment longer, then gestures toward one of the curved benches tucked beneath the into the bookshelves. I follow her down, and we sit—her posture crisp and upright, mine considerably less so.
“Talk,” she says.
I exhale slowly.
Because yeah…I’m about to quit my dream job.
“The work here is incredible,” I say. “Truly. I’ve learned so much here in just six months, more than I ever could have learned on Earth. But it’s not…I don’t think I belong here.”
