The bond hammered against my sternum, begging me to go to her. To wrap myself around her and warm her up. But I forced myself to remain mere feet from her. I would not give in.
Does she feel this ache too?
Mates weren’t meant to feel this fathomless trench between them. The depth of my torment devoured me whenever she held herself, tense and poised like she was ready to leap into a dance, at arm’s length.
Despite every warning in the rear ofmy mind, despite what I knew awaited us in Sivy, I spoke again. “Can I check on your knee?”
While she was still unconscious, the healer had said it needed to remain immobilized for at least a week until the swelling went down. After that, she needed to start bending it regularly, though nothing too far.
A tense moment passed before she answered me. “Okay.”
With controlled slowness, I rose.
The mattress dipped as I perched on the edge of it, close enough to reach for the bandage, but far enough that composure remained a possibility. Finding the ties, I tugged them loose, then unwound the fabric. She hissed as I brushed the surface of her skin, where the bones had been broken.
“Still bruised?” I asked tonelessly.
She nodded. “It’s better, but…it still hurts.”
The next pass, I ensured my fingers didn’t graze against her. Once it was fully unwrapped, I shifted on the bed so I could peer at it from above. “The swelling is almost gone,” I commented. But the color was still an ugly purple-green.
Sylaira leaned closer, breath dusting across my cheek as her rested face mere inches from mine. Ghostflower filled my nostrils, and I inched backward, out of the allure of her.
“It’s not the size of the boulder I smashed it into running from you anymore,” she stated, a hint of bitterness in her tone.
She never resisted a moment to remind me of exactly what had happened. I gritted my teeth and bit back a sharp retort. Once I’d regained a semblance of restraint, I offered her an olive branch. “Do you want to try moving it? The healer said if you ever wanted to dance again, you needed to start working it as soon as you felt ready.”
Her head snapped up, eyes crashing into mine like a thunderclap. “How…”
“I heard you think that you would never dance again.”Admitting I’d crept through the corridors of her mind was difficult because she’d be more aware the next time I attempted a surreptitious survey. Cracks in that icy wall she’d erected between us, left by her pain, had been my only way into the most intimate part of my mate. I shouldn’t have wanted to know the inner workings of her, but I couldn’t stay away.
To my shock, tears welled among ice. A sob lodged in her chest. She pressed her lips together to smother it, drawing my attention to their perfectly plump shape. “But…” She cut herself off, giving a small shake of her head.
“I don’t know much about you, Sylaira, but by the way you move, I assumed that was incredibly important to you. Especially with how distraught you were when the idea flickered in your mind. So I asked him what we needed to do to ensure dance didn’t become a distant memory once you were fully healed.”
A single drop spilled over and traced the curve of her cheek. She looked away, swiping at the wetness. “I don’t know what to say.”
She didn’t have to speak for me to feel the swell of sorrow in her. Our bond gave me full access to everything.
And these emotions, wide open like floodgates? They were a weakness—hers and mine.
I slammed a barrier shut between us before I drowned in what she felt. I was barely keeping my own head above water as it was.
“Tell me if you’re up for it.” The words were low, and I tried to sound as cold and neutral as possible. But around Sylaira, I was finding that mask increasingly difficult to maintain.
“I am,” she said, determination rising in sorrow’s stead. “But don’t think you can weaponize this moment. You’re still the Issaraeth who hunted and caged me.”
I raised a dark brow. “Would you rather me not touch you at all?”
My mate lifted her chin in a move that was pure defiance. “I didn’t say that.”
I heeled out of my boots and climbed onto the center of the bed so I was kneeling at Sylaira’s feet, facing her. “If it’s too much, tell me to stop.”
“I will,” she promised. But I knew if I didn’t ask, she wouldn’t tell me. As much as she didn’t want my help, she also didn’t want to look weak in front of me.
She was smart prey.
Gingerly, I lifted her foot, cupping her heel. It looked impossibly small in my large hands. With the barest amount of pressure, I pushed her leg backward, bending her knee.
