I’m shaking, I realize. Slowly, I reach up to touch his face. It’s wet with tears. My name escapes his lips, a crack of sound like lightning, then he sinks to his knees, wringing his hands in my shirt.
“Forgive me, Rose.” He buries his head in my stomach. “For making you question yourself. I know I’m not your friend, but you’re mine. The best one I’ve ever had.”
“All this,” I whisper, “this protectiveness…the refusal to break the curse. This isn’t just because of the way the mate bond makes you feel?”
His fingers knot tighter in my shirt, and his eyes are like moonlight off a frozen lake. “No mate bond could reach the depths of how I feel for you.”
I wish I could quell the quake in my voice. “Then what is this, Kel?”
He rises to his feet. Pressed against him, I feel smaller than I ever have, his powerful chest and height practically engulfing me. There are galaxies in his eyes; I lost myself in them long ago. He says each word like a story, and it is the one we’ve lived together. “This is love, Rosalina. I love you. This isn’t just the tie of the mate bond. This is loving you, one slip in your puddles at a time. Loving you each time I trip over an opened book. Loving you with every bread roll thrown and every half-eaten pastry I accidentally grab. I love you so damned much, Rosalina, I’m frozen by it. And if that’s made you think I only tolerate you, then I will spend the rest of my life seeking your forgiveness for it. Because it has been the joy of my life to slip in your puddles.To unfold your dog-eared pages. To be the one you throw things at.”
“Kel,” I whisper, “I don’t understand.”
“I love you, Rosalina. What more is there to any of it? I love you. I am imprisoned by my love for you. May it be my undoing.”
I stare into those galaxies and see myself reflecting back. Not who I am now but who I was. The girl in the cave, so uncertain and sick with love for him. Am I uncertain now?
No.
Because Kel has always been my eternity. Even when he’s been so stubborn, I want to scream. He was my first love. One that settled in my bones and never left.
I reach up, stroking his hair back, pressing my body closer to him. My voice is raspy with tears. “But, Kel, this love…it’s so heavy.”
“I know.” He wraps me in his arms, and I burrow my head in the crook of his neck. “I know, Rose. I’m sorry.”
Kel and I stay like that until long after the sun sets beneath the horizon. I don’t let him go, because at least in this tiny way, my love is strong enough to fend off the curse.
I know there are no answers for us yet. Kel was right earlier. There are some truths we have to face. Love alone can’t break his bargain or his curse.
But I’m stronger than I was when I was in that cave.
I can carry this love for as long as I have to.
30
Keldarion
Rosalina laughs as she stumbles through the snow, my bootsmuch too big for her. In fact, she looks a little ridiculous, dressed head to toe in my tundra gear: a thick coat of mottled gray and black hide, heavy pants we’ve had to tighten with a belt, and a woolen hat tucked over her pointed ears. The gloves too are oversize, but she keeps hold of me regardless. Even after everything I’ve done, she won’t let me go.
Under the half-moon, I remain a man while she touches me.
We’ve crept out of my tent and walked out of camp. The Tundrafolk are early risers, and the camp is quiet as everyone has retired to their own tents. I wasn’t sure what kind of reception I would get from the citizens of the far reaches of Winter, but it was surprisingly warmer than those in Frostfang. It seems the closer people were to my father, the more they resent his absence and my presence.
With the camp behind us, there is only the snow and sky ahead. A flat plain sparkles, gleaming blue underneath the half-moon. It looks as if the cosmos has opened up and rained diamonds. From beyond the glittering snowscape, a navy canopy dotted with light hangs overhead.
“There are so many stars,” Rosalina breathes, clutching me tightly. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”
“I’ve traveled to the reaches of all the realms and never found a better place to see them. I doubt they could be lovelier even from the Above.”
Though Winter is often admonished for its constant cold and barren wilderness, no realm could match this. Stars litter the sky, thousands and thousands of hanging gems. Out here, it may be cold, but it’s not dark.
Like most of the Tundrafolk’s clothing, Rose’s coat is woven in such a way she practically disappears into her surroundings. But her face is lit up, radiating with starlight.
“It seems so open out here compared to within the walls of Keep Wolfhelm,” she says.
A sound rumbles in my throat, and I’m unsure how to respond. She’s right. Keep Wolfhelm feels more cloistered than ever.
“My father built those walls out of fear. He believed they kept him safe. But I think they made him more afraid,” I say quietly. “So many times, I have been compared to my father. His appearance. His mannerisms. But I could never see the similarities. Never felt like I measured up. But in this, I know we are the same. We build our walls, and we hide behind them as best we can. At least my father’s walls are visible.”
