WREN
Iwoke in the dark with his hand on my hip.
We’d been sleeping in the nest for three nights now. Ever since that first night, when he’d shown me what he was building and I’d climbed in beside him and neither of us had been able to pretend we wanted to be anywhere else. He’d offered to carry me back to my room each morning. I’d refused each time.
The nest was better. The nest wasours.
His hand flexed in his sleep, fingers spreading across the curve of my hip, and I felt the prick of claws through the thin fabric of my shift. Not enough to hurt. Just enough to remind me what he was.
As if I could forget.
I turned my head to look at him. The nest was dark, but my eyes had adjusted enough to make out the shape of him. The broad line of his shoulders. The feathers that now covered most of his chest, bronze and black in the dim light. The sharp angle of his jaw, relaxed in sleep.
He was beautiful. I’d stopped pretending I didn’t think so.
His hand moved again. Slid from my hip to my stomach, palm flat against me, pulling me back against his chest. I felt the heat of him through my shift. The solid weight of his bodycurved around mine. And lower, pressed against my backside, the unmistakable evidence that his body knew I was there even if his mind was still sleeping.
We hadn’t talked about this. About the nights when I woke to find him hard against me, or the mornings when I pretended not to notice him slipping away to compose himself before I opened my eyes. We’d agreed to wait. The bond couldn’t be undone, and he wanted me to be certain.
I was certain. I’d been certain for days.
But he was so careful with me. So determined to give me time I wasn’t sure I needed.
I should close my eyes. Go back to sleep. Wait for morning like a sensible person.
Instead, I shifted. Pressed back against him, just slightly, and felt his whole body tense.
“Wren.” His voice was rough. Barely awake. “What are you doing?”
“Nothing.”
“That was not nothing.” His hand tightened on my stomach. “That was very specifically something.”
“I moved. People move in their sleep.”
“You’re not asleep.”
“Neither are you. Anymore.”
He made a sound low in his throat. Not quite a growl. Something rougher. His hips shifted, pressing harder against me, and I felt the full length of him through the layers between us.
“Wren.” A warning this time. “If you keep moving like that, I will not be able to…”
“What if I don’t want you to be able to?”
Silence. His breathing had gone ragged. His claws tiny points of pressure against my stomach.
“We agreed to wait.”
“We agreed you wouldn’t bond me until I was certain.” I turned in his arms, facing him now, close enough that our breath mingled. “I’m certain, Tavrin. I’ve been certain since you showed me this nest.”
His eyes gleamed gold in the darkness. I could see the war in them. The desperate wanting fighting against two hundred years of control.
“The bond is permanent.”
“I know.”
“Once it’s done, you’re tied to me. Forever. You can never leave.”
