The storm continued to howl and he had no idea which way to go. For that matter, he wasn’t even sure which way he’d come.
They were both going to die of exposure out here.
Few humans possessed enough survival skills to live through a night like this.
He doubted if Ariel would even think to find shelter before the cold overtook her.
His heart shattered as he saw images in his mind. Ariel laughing with the children. Of her reaching for him with desire glowing deep in her eyes.
The sweetest taste of her lips on his. Her hands roaming freely over his naked body.
No other woman had ever wanted him.
No one. Period. Had ever touched him with a kind hand.
Not even his own mother.
And the truth was, Valteri couldn’t imagine a life without Ariel anymore. Of returning to the empty isolation he’d known since his birth.
Losing her would be like losing a limb.
Nay, it would be like losing the heart that beat inside his chest.
“Please, help me,” he whispered. That, too, was something he’d never done as a man.
He’d stopped asking for help as a boy when his pleas had fallen on the deaf ears of his tormentors who’d had no compassion or mercy for him.
No one cared.
The world was cruel and it was merciless.
You are nothing to anyone.
Bastard born. Your own parents wouldn’t claim you.
Only Ariel had ever cared. Only she had ever seen anything more than a worthless piece of shit.
I can’t fail her.
Suddenly, a foreign warmth spread through his body. One the likes of which he’d never felt before. It started in the center of his gut and radiated outward, toward his fingers and toes.
Throwing his head back and closing his eyes, he let out his war cry. His breath billowed around his head in a thick cloud.
Breathless, he felt so peculiar. And when he straightened in the saddle and opened his eyes again, he could see.
Not like before. This was different.
He still saw the blizzard, yet he could see through it, too. Just as clearly as if it were a sunny day.
No longer did he feel the cold. This was how he felt in battle. That serene calm where he was aware of everything and nothing. Where he heard the universe and yet he was disconnected from his own body.
Valteri would never forget the first time he’d felt this way. Not long after his knighting, his lord had thrown him into war.
“Die with dignity, you bastard! You better not run!”
Why should he? There was no one who would have welcomed him home. So Valteri had gripped the leather straps of his shield and the hilt of his sword. Not even on a horse, as his lord hadn’t deemed him worthy of one.
He’d run toward the enemy, hoping to find peace at the end of a lance someone would run through him.
