“Gods, Mira,” he murmurs, wrapping me in his arms as I cry against his chest.
As the trembling subsides, Vale gently guides me back into the bedchamber and to the small basin to wash up. We remain silent as he lifts the pitcher and pours water over my blood-smeared hand. No less intimate than the night I washed his hair, I find us bonded now in a new way. What we have witnessed together just now—it changes everything.
One more vicious thought breaks free past my lips before I can leash it.
“Will you still want me?”
I cannot even give the fear its full shape through words. Vale pauses from rubbing the blood from my skin, his brow furrowing at my question.
I go on. “You chose me. Vowed to spend a lifetime with me. A mortal lifetime. If I’m not?—”
“Mira.” His arms wrap around me. Wet hands press into my hair as he cradles my head. I feel the cool, damp touch as he raises my chin and looks into my eyes. “I meant what I said. One lifetime would never be enough. However long I am lucky enough to call you my own—yes, I will still want you, Mira. Always.”
I press a half-hearted kiss to his lips, then move away, taking a linen towel with me to dry my hands.
He leans against the wall, arms crossed. He does not reach for me again. Not yet. His mouth twists as thoughts take shape in his mind. His eyes dart slightly as he searches for sense in them. The corners of his lips begin to crack. Looking up, dark lashes fluttering as he fights back a tear, he mutters, “Gods above…”
Rushing to me this time, he lifts me high into the air, turning as my dress catches flight.
“Gods above, Mira!” He lowers me again, and Iwitness the purest light and joy behind his eyes. He softens just so as he lowers me. “This is the greatest blessing of all.” I steady my feet, my heart still soaring alongside his. “I remember stories.” His palms cast wide, excited energy rippling through him. “Stories older than the Fade. From a time when my kind and your own lived together. I thought they were just myth!”
He runs his fingers through his hair, then leads me to the bench at the foot of the bed—the one we claimed when we first arrived—and speaks with even greater passion.
“Legend said the Gods themselves might, on the rarest of occasions, bless a mortal with the gift of eternal life. I always thought it was a story the priest used to unite our kinds in the church. I don’t know that I ever heard a first-hand account. But Mira… maybe—just maybe—you have been blessed in such a way.”
He kisses my hands as if they are the greatest treasure ever discovered. My heart leaps for a moment. It is not the thought of evading death that ignites something in me, but the feeling of being so loved and cherished by this man. Then the blood drains from my face as it begins to sink in that I… I may well live hundreds of years.
So many thoughts whirl through my mind. How will I age? Will I age? I have seen enough silver hair and deep creases in skin to know even The Blessed are not wholly untouched by time. But Vale—he looks much the same as in the portraits I’ve seen standing beside his parents. Clearly, time works differently for them.
For us? Could it really be?
“The tree, though,” I say softly. “Even if I am blessed as you say, what about the tree?” So many questions.
“We may not know the truth of your nature for some time,” he answers gently. “As I said, we are dealing with myth here. But things of a more elemental nature—those we can uncover.” He quiets his excitement just enough to meet me in the moment, in this vast, overwhelming truth.
Leaving me with the only word that matters among them all.
“Together.”
He gently brushes my cheek with his thumb, the delicate turn grounding me in him. Those remarkable deep brown eyes look back atme, holding far more truth than secrets. The emotions give way to something new. Need.
Our bodies inch closer, each of us caught in the fundamental force of choosing each other over and over again. Our lips hover, barely a breath between us, the charge in the air hanging just before the storm breaks. Through everything that has built between us, we both feel it—the raw urge for release. To break into ruin—together.
In little more than a flash, clothes are discarded. Our mouths and bodies find one another tangled in the bed. Heat ebbs and flows between passion and tenderness. From delicate touch to primal grip, I give in to it all. I want to be consumed by it. With no room for questions or mysteries, I answer the call that roars through us both.
“Vale.” His name breaks on my tongue like a prayer answered.
As his mouth claims my throat and my leg wraps around him, I feel whole.
We stay like this for what feels like hours. Journals are left forgotten. We forgo the dining table in favor of a tray of meats and cheese that we pick our way through right there on the bed. A blanket low around his waist, clutched to my chest, neither of us bother with clothes we know will only get in the way soon enough.
After the emotional highs and lows—not only of today, but of every day before—it just feels right.
Long after the fire, not only in the hearth but also in our veins, finally begins to subside, I realize how much peace it has brought me.
This was not merely giving way to carnal desire—though there was plenty of that. It was something far more powerful. It was union. True, honest union. Of bodies. Of hearts. Of souls.
Lying in the soft light of the pale moon, my back resting against his chest, his arms wrapped tightly around me—I echo the word that stitches my whole life together in the only way that makes sense before drifting off to sleep.
