I wished I had burned my clothes in the godsdamned stove, too. I had to wash myself first. I wouldn’t allow any of his filthy scent anywhere near her.
I took out the red dress from the bottom drawer, her drawer, and placed it on the dresser. And alongside it, I carefully laid her necklace. Then I arranged a jar of water and a bowl of grapes for when she woke up.
I wished to lie next to her, to hold her in my arms and tell her that everything was all right. That he could no longer hurt her, but I feared she didn’t want to be touched. So I took the carpet instead, reaching my arm up if only to graze her hand.
I heard her wake, but pretended I was still sleeping, just to give her some time for herself.
But when she breathed my name, I practically ran to her. Then she froze me in place.
Oh. My. Fucking. Gods.
I saw her for the first time with her thick, wavy, dark brown hair set free, and I swore it reached down to below her tailbone. And the red dress, now wrapped tightly against every curve of her toned body, hit me in two ways. One was pride—pride at the fact that I was a part of this healthy change, and the other—the other just beckoned fervent want. It shocked me, her perfection.
Then my soul waltzed cacophonously while we kissed. It just couldn’t and didn’t want to contain itself.
She was mineand she kissed me back. No, not only, she also wantedmeto kissheragain…I knew I had healed her lips. They didn’t really still hurt.
I had bedded many women in the past, but this kiss, this, did not even dare to compare. It felt deliciously unworldly. Although I was confused at how tasteless it was, the mere touch of our lips, our tongues—it whispered of home. I was sure it did. I didn’t care that she was invisible to my senses; she was mine and I would take whatever she chose to give me.
She was mineand I was kissing her, leaning onto her, grabbing her, touching her.She was mineand she was cooing moans and spreading her legs for me.She was mineand I was licking her jaw and kissing her neck.She was mineand I lost all sense of self-control.She was mineand so I claimed her. Then lust and desire morphed into shame and self-disgust.
She deserved better.
GALEN
HEAD OVER HEELS
“Kneel.”
That was the first word the Queen of Ilma—Queen Mirana Briartide—said to me. Little did she know that I had already been brought down to my knees the moment I laid my eyes on her. The moment her sweet scent crept its way into my lungs, filling them with an intoxicating breath I never wanted to let go.
I knelt.
I lifted my head only to find myself lovestruck by just the sight of her cobalt blue eyes. They complemented her midnight blue gown that trailed behind her. I swallowed. Thousands watched, including her eight-or-so-year-old daughter, who stood at her side, back straight and attentive eyes identical to her mother’s.
“Galen Myrchorn, do you swear it on your soul to always respect and protect me, my family, my people, and my Land?”
I didn’t even have to think about it. “I swear it.”
She took one deliberate step towards me.
I shied away, yet my eyes lingered on her heart-shaped lips for a little less than a second before shunning her completely. My heart drummed the moment she reached for my face, the instant her fingertips lifted my chin, forcing me to look at her. I did.
Then she lifted her index finger and brought it very close to my blue eye. I felt the density of her power caressing my vision, guiding a strained tear out of the corner of my eye. It streamed down my left cheek.
She reached for it.
I restrained every ounce of my body not to shudder as I watched her place her wet fingers in her mouth, like a cook does when tasting batter.
“Then I bind these words from your soul to mine, for I know you tell the truth,” she murmured.
I had no doubt in that. What I swore was true: I would protect her and I would protect her family. Which meant…
How dare he!My soul rumbled and thrashed from deep within me as I watched a man move so very close to her. He placed his hand on her shoulder and whispered something in her ear. Not just a man. Her husband. It took every shred of my composure not to shift and leap for his throat, but the moment the bond kicked in, I knew I could never truly hurt a member of her family.
It was not the bond I wished to share with her—I wanted to give her all of my soul and I wanted to accept all of hers. Instead, I was left with just the taste of what it could have been, a fragment of a bond shared through the oath of tears. A taste was better than having nothing, I tried to convince myself. But at that very moment, I knew what my life had become—a living torture. To stay guarding her side, to smell her with every breath I took, to look at her wherever I went, hell, wherever she went, but to never get to touch or taste.
A fucking living torture.
