His arm wraps around me without thinking.
The stars flicker overhead.
And just before sleep takes me, I hear him murmur, so quietly he probably doesn’t know he said it aloud:
“Mine. In every star.”
CHAPTER 16
TATEK
Ican’t sleep.
Not because I’m unsettled.
But because for the first time in… stars, I don’t even know how long—my body is quiet.
No hypervigilance. No pulse-racing shadows on the edge of my vision. No fight curling in my gut waiting to be used.
Just… silence.
Mara’s breathing is soft against my chest. Slow. Steady. Her hand lies limp over my heart, the tips of her fingers brushing my skin like a tether. Her leg is slung over mine, anchoring me. She’s not even fully draped across me, but the weight of her is enough to keep the world away.
And I realize, slowly, thatthis—this stillness, this warmth—is what my people once built temples for.
Not gods.
Not conquest.
Belonging.
We used to fight for this. Whole generations bled for the right to hold what I’m holding now.
And now that I have her—truly, finally—I understand. There is no mission. No ideology. No allegiance strong enough to make me give her up.
She stirs, just a little. Her nose brushes my collarbone. A sleepy hum escapes her lips as her fingers flex against my chest like she’s dreaming of holding tighter.
I press a kiss into her hair.
She doesn’t wake.
Not yet.
But her body shifts again, curling even closer.
The simulation still hums around us, the soft projection of starlight scattered over the curved ceiling, the impossible flora glowing faintly at the chamber’s edge. A false garden—but I swear, lying here with her, I’ve never known something so real.
I run my fingers lightly down her spine.
She breathes deeper, arching faintly into my touch.
And I feel it.
That pull.
Not lust.
Not even need.
