31. Naera
Naera
The steam curls up through the trees like breath from a sleeping god.
It gathers around our ankles like it’s been waiting for us.
I slip the cloak from my shoulders and drape it carefully over a moss-slicked rock. Then I reach back to undo the ties of my dress.
My fingers fumble at the knots, cold and clumsy.
But before I can try again, she’s there.
Selis.
I feel her before she touches me.
That heat—hers, not the spring’s—radiates across the inches between us. It wraps around me, tender and dangerous, curling beneath my skin.
Then her hands brush my back.
Rough, calloused fingers—so used to wielding knives and death—move with a slowness that steals the breath right from my lungs. She doesn’t tug. Doesn’t rush. Just… feels for the knots like she’s learning them, like untying me is something reverent.
My pulse flutters under her touch.
The ties slip, one by one, and I swear I feel each one loosening in my chest too.
Her fingers graze bare skin.
I glance back, heart thudding .
She’s not looking at my body.
She’s looking at my shoulders, brow furrowed just slightly, lips parted like there’s something on the tip of her tongue she’s not brave enough to say.
“Thank you,” I murmur, breath soft as the steam curling between us.
Selis’s mouth twitches—just barely. “Don’t thank me yet,” she says, voice low, rough, but touched with something teasing.
Eventually, the final tie loosens under her fingers.
The fabric surrenders all at once, falling open down my back, catching at my hips like it’s asking permission to fall further. My breath stills. So does hers.
She doesn’t move away. She lingers close enough that her warmth brushes my skin, and her shadow tangles with mine in the steam.
“Now,” she murmurs, “you can thank me.”
I glance back at her over my shoulder, smirking despite the heat blooming up my neck. “Thank you,” I say, soft and wry. Then, lifting my chin, “Well? Don’t look.”
She snorts. “Haven’t we been over this before, starlight?”
But she turns anyway, beginning to strip in the same no-nonsense way she did the last time we shared a spring. Like modesty is something for other people.
And I—Selene, help me, I still look.
Only for a heartbeat. Long enough to catch the shape of her. Until I see too much—until her trousers slide low on her hips and something in me sparks hot and flustered and helpless. I blush furiously, yank the dress from my hips, and hurry into the water with a splash that betrays my dignity.
The spring swallows me like a secret.
And behind me, Selis is laughing .
But I don’t care. I’m too warm to care. The heat is a kiss on frozen skin. A balm seeping into my bones. I sink slow, letting it take me inch by inch, until I’m weightless beneath the moonlight and steam. The ache in my shoulders unwinds. The chill in my chest loosens its grip.
Behind me, I hear her wade into the water. The faint catch of breath as she steps into the warmth.
I turn my gaze to the water. The mist. The moon.
“You’re very noble, starlight,” Selis purrs, “but if you keep acting like seeing me naked is a holy offense, I might start getting a complex.”
I laugh before I can stop myself. “I’m being polite.”
“Oh? Is that what it is?” Her voice is closer now, smug and warm as the spring. “Because I distinctly remember you looking last time.”
My ears heat. “I did not .”
“You absolutely did,” she says, closer still. “You were as red then as you are now.”
“I was just—making sure you didn’t fall,” I mutter, crossing my arms under the water.
She hums. “Sure. Watching out for me. Very heroic. You can look this time, you know. I don’t mind.”
My gaze darts toward her. She’s smirking—of course she is—shoulders gleaming in the mist, her braid damp and undone, floating behind her like a dark ribbon. Every inch of her radiates heat and trouble.
I flush and snap my gaze back to the rippling water. “What makes you think I want to?”
“Because those little ears of yours are red,” she says smugly, sinking to her shoulders with a satisfied sigh. “Dead giveaway.”
“Stop looking at my ears. ”
“Stop making it so easy.”
A splash hits my arm—light, teasing. I glance over and she’s watching me, head tilted, lips tugging into something softer than a smirk this time. Something that makes my heart stutter.
I glance away too quickly—right at her mouth, of all things—and then I’m suddenly very aware all over again of how bare we both are, how close we are. My cheeks flush hot, and I half-turn, dipping lower into the spring to rinse my hair.
“Are you always this dramatic when someone compliments you?” Selis says behind me, voice easy and low, that slight teasing edge wrapping around every word.
I let the water run through my hair like an excuse. “If that was a compliment, you need to work on your delivery.”
“Starlight, if I delivered it any better, you’d pass out.”
I roll my eyes, but there’s no real bite to it. “You’re impossible.”
“That’s not a denial,” she murmurs, and I hear the smile in her voice.
But she lets the silence fall after that.
For a while, we just sit, the quiet full of steam and stars and the not-quite-touch of our knees beneath the water.
Mist curls around our shoulders. The spring glows faintly in the dark—moonlight catching the rising steam like silver thread.
Somewhere, the trees rustle, and it sounds too old to be wind.
There’s blood in this place—mine, hers, theirs—but the spring doesn’t seem to care. It takes the ruin of us and keeps on glowing.
After a while, Selis shifts. Her arms stretch over the stone behind her and she leans back, head tilted toward the stars. Her braid’s half-undone, wild and tangled from the fight. Her jaw is bruised. Her shoulder bears a fresh cut, slowly scabbing over .
She looks like something torn out of myth. Untamed. Impossible.
Like the kind of woman The Garden would’ve hunted—not because she was dangerous, but because she dared to be more than they allowed.
And somehow, impossibly, she’s here .
With me.
The silence stretches—soft now, like a held breath between storms—and I find myself watching her more closely than I should.
Selis shifts beside me, tipping her head back to rinse her hair.
Her jaw clenches. A subtle wince. The raw, angry line of the wound on her shoulder hasn’t closed all the way. It must ache.
I shift in the water, gathering courage.
“Can I… wash your hair?”
Her brows lift, just a little. There’s a beat of hesitation before she gives a single, quiet nod. “Sure.”
She wades over, turning her back to me without a word, and I blink at the easy trust of it. Her braid is a wild thing now—half unraveled, streaked with blood and ash and whatever else the day left behind. A battlefield’s worth of ruin woven into it. I reach for it gently.
The first knot gives way under my fingers, and then another.
I undo the braid slowly, working from the bottom, until the golden strands spill loose across her shoulders like molten gold.
I dip my hands into the water, bring it to her hair.
Let it pour through. Dirt and blood fade away in thin red streaks, slipping past my fingers and disappearing into the spring.
I run my hands through the length, slowly, parting the tangles like I might disturb something sacred if I move too fast.
Her hair is softer than I expect, thick and surprisingly fine .
My palm brushes the skin near her shoulder, just shy of the wound. I pause. Shift my hand higher, fingertips hovering over the torn edge of flesh. She stills.
I press lightly, just enough. My light pools into her, the glow subtle but sure, and her skin begins to mend beneath the touch. The wound pulls closed in a slow, steady line.
Selis huffs a breath, half a laugh. “Are you glowing me back together again?”
“Yes,” I murmur. “Hold still.”
She obeys, surprisingly. Just sits there while I finish, the wound gone now, smooth and whole beneath the water. I go back to her hair, rinsing it again with a careful touch.
Then I feel it—her breath deepening. Her shoulders loosening under my hands. And the sound she makes, low in her throat, is not quite a purr but close. She leans back a little, her head almost resting against my collarbone.
I run my fingers through the strands again, and the intimacy of it stuns me. This closeness. This quiet. No bruises. No fire. Just skin and steam and her spine beneath my touch.
“Keep that up,” she says, voice low, “and I might never let you stop.”
A smile tugs at my mouth. “You say that like I mind.”
She laughs—just once—but it’s real. Real and quiet and something I want to tuck away and keep. “You would mind if you had even an ounce of self-preservation.”
I huff, trying to hide my smile. “You’re not as frightening as you think, you know.”
That gets her. She shifts slightly, water rippling between us as she turns to look at me. For a moment, she says nothing. Just stares. Her expression unreadable.
“What?” I ask, voice softening .
She shrugs, but her voice dips. “Just… you glow , Naera. Everything about you glows.”
My breath catches. The words hit me like soft thunder. Gentle, but echoing. Like she doesn’t know she just shattered something.
She’s not smirking anymore.
Her gaze is quiet. Steady. It’s too much.
I look away again, throat tightening. “You shouldn’t say things like that.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’ll believe you,” I whisper.
The silence stretches between us—no longer hollow, but thick with all the things neither of us has said aloud. My heart thunders in my chest like it’s searching for a way out.
Then, from across the steam, her voice comes low.
“Maybe I want you to believe me.”
I look up, startled. “That’s a dangerous thing to say,” I murmur, trying for lightness, but it comes out more like a breathless truth.
Selis tilts her head, one brow lifting in that infuriatingly knowing way of hers. “Is it?” she says, voice curling low and smooth. “Seems to me you’re already halfway convinced.”