“He is not mine! I am not his, or yours. I am my own damn person, and I can defend my own familiar.”
I flexed my fingers at my side to keep from grabbing the post at the head of the bed and snapping it in half.
“Being at your side to support you is not the same as rescuing you. I grew up in this cursed place. At least let me use what I know of it to help you.”Let me show you that it was all a mistake.
“Why?” she demanded.
“Because I love you, Koryn.” I yelled it, and I did not care if all of Balar Shan heard.
Koryn’s face paled. “You do not love me. You do not even know me.”
I knew that something had changed for her in the hours since we parted this morning, and it was more than the altercation with Margeaux. There was a wildness in her eyes that had not been there before. She was scared, her hand reaching for Isanara to reassure herself, even though the dragon had not been more than a few inches from her. The pointed fingernails of her other hand dug into the velvet of her sleeve.
“What are you not telling me?”
She did not answer.
“Didhedo something?”
Koryn avoided my eyes. “This is not about him.”
“Then tell me what it is,” I said gently. “I am here, Koryn. For anything you have to say.”Even if it is that you love him. That you never want me to touch you again.
Where had that thought come from?
Koryn scraped her nails over the raised velvet fibers, the sound so soft and yet so telling against the silence. She lifted her hand from Isanara’s head, gently nudging her. The dragon padded over to the hearth, nestling herself halfway underneath the new wingback chair I’d brought in to replace the one we’d burned to ashes.
Koryn turned back to fully face me. Her hands fell to her sides, palms open.
“Touch me, Garrick. Take me,” she whispered. “The bed is right here.”
She was shaking. Her dark, fathomless eyes were luminous. With tears. She was unmoored. She would seek me for comfort but not tell me why.
I could not take her like this. It would staunch the bleeding on her internal wound, but then it would fester. It would hurt even more in the aftermath, and she would blame me. I would blame myself.
“Please,” Koryn said.
I couldn’t let her beg. It would break both of us. “Witch?—”
I did not even get the rejection all the way out.
She reached past me and threw open the door. “Get out.”
I wanted to take it back. All of it. The bargain, the betrayal, my declaration that I would not touch her until she was ready to give in to her feelings for me, as well. But it was Koryn’s regrets driving this moment, not mine.
I did as she asked. I left.
The door slammed behind me, but I could not bring myself to leave her. I melted back against it. But he allowed me no respite.
He stood directly across the narrow corridor, bare arms crossed over his body. He wore only the thick black brocade vest, though this time it was unbuttoned to show the column of his throat. His long, sinew-covered arms showed every muscle. Lean but powerful. And the bane of my existence.
“Do you purposefully select the most horrendous moments to show up?”
He shrugged his shoulders, the movement of his silken black hair emphasizing the graceful movement. “Immortality is boring. I take my pleasure where I can.”
I leaned my head back against the door. Quietly. She’d told me to go. But she had not been specific about how far. “Of course you get pleasure out of causing strife between us.”
“You two are more than capable of causing all your own problems,” the Dark God said. “And resolving them, too.”
