“No,” I snapped, sitting straighter and rolling my shoulders back defensively. “You can’t leave. I won’t let you. You can’t go back, remember? There is no way to predict where the River of Mists would take you. What if you end up landing way in the past or far into the future? When anyone you knew is either not born yet or has long died already. You’d have no friends, no family to help you.”
“I’m stronger than you think. I can make it on my own. Or I can at least try.”
She was stubborn, I had figured that out about her on the first day we met. Maybe she was even willful enough to succeed in the impossible. But “maybe” wasn’t good enough for me.
“What if you don’t make it? What if you suffer and die? And I would never know what happened to you?”
She drew in a shuddering breath, running a hand down her face.
“Whatever suffering I may encounter back home, at no point in our history did humans have to deal with what I went through last night, Kye. I hate how weak, lost, and helpless I feel. I’m not myself here. I can never be what I want to be in this place.”
I felt her slipping away from me, like the tiny shards of the shattered glass butterfly trickling between my fingers, and I couldn’t grasp them or put them back together again. It was as if I’d already lost her, and I couldn’t bring her back.
“But I’m in love with you,” I blurted out in desperation.
That was a low blow. Selfish and unfair. The timing was all wrong. It made me look like I was trying to manipulate her feelings. And maybe I was. I’d try anything—everything—to make her stay.
I realized the problem was that I didn’t just want to keep Maren at my side. I wanted her to be happy about it. I needed her to crave my company as much as I craved hers. I wanted her to want me. To adore me. To love me back.
Of course, she knew me well enough by now to parry my selfish confession with an equally brutal answer.
“Kye, let’s be honest here. You fall in and out of love more frequently than people change their bedsheets.” She smiled to soften the blow. “There will be someone else soon enough. Let’s face it, if Leslo dragged in any other woman here instead of me, you’d be just as much in love with her now as you think you are in love with me.”
“Only if she was everything you are,” I muttered stubbornly.
I’d never had to deal with rejection before, and I had no idea how to handle it now. Do I beg her to reconsider like a love-sick puppy? Or should I put my foot down and order her to accept me like the fucking king I was?
Neither of these options seemed particularly good or even real. I couldn’t beg or force her into emotions she didn’t feel.
She sat in silence, absentmindedly spinning the diamond ring around the finger on her left hand. I suspected her fiancé gave her that ring. She hadn’t spoken about him for some time now, and I’d been hoping he was safely out of her mind already. She didn’t mention him now either, but I worried about what might be going on in her head.
All I could do was buy us some time in hopes that she’d come back to her senses soon.
“Please, let’s not make any rushed decisions, darling,” I said, trying to hide my fear and worry behind a soothing voice. “And please believe me, I want you to be happy. We can talk about it later, after you rest. You’ll tell me how I can make your life in Olathana better, and I will do everything to make it happen. Butif you’re still unhappy after that...” I let my voice trail off because I had no idea how to finish that sentence.
There was no fucking way in the Abyss that I would ever part from her. Not for as long as I lived and even after.
I had no idea how to convince her to give me a chance. I couldn’t find words strong or gentle enough to carry the message for me. All I had was music rushing through my brain. So I said nothing. And when the music grew too strong to contain inside me, I let it out in a soft hum. I couldn’t remember when or how the lyrics joined the melody, but before long, I was singing the second verse of the lullaby she loved so much:
“Hush now, fear not, my darling one,
While stars yet burn and the moon still shines...”
Maren inhaled deeply but didn’t stop me, laying down onto the pillow again. My voice was all I had, and it was everything—the hug I couldn’t give her, the kiss I couldn’t place on her lips, the words I felt in my heart but couldn’t form on my tongue.
So I just kept singing the song I knew she loved, putting all my emotions into the melody, since the only words I could muster right now were the lyrics:
“...By ocean and wind, my promise in song,
You will never face the darkness alone.”
I repeated the last line twice because I realized the lyrics conveyed my feelings well. Maren had been my light in the darkness, and I wished I could be that for her too.
“We’ll stay together, my precious butterfly. You and I,” I whispered the vow I meant to uphold with all my heart. “I’ll do everything to make you happy, Maren.”
Her eyes were closed, and I thought she’d fallen asleep when she murmured, “If you could touch me, Kye, what would you do right now?”
Oh, the things I would do. There was an entire gallery of images that ranged from naughty to lascivious to outright filthydepicting all the things I wished to do to her if I could only get my hands and my mouth on her.
