Chapter 48
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
SANORA
When I woke up, Thrax wasn’t by my side.
We’d gone to bed the same as always, fallen asleep with him beside me. When I listened, I realised the house was too quiet. He wasn’t downstairs.
I swung my legs out of bed and padded to the door, going down the stairs. I was in his shirt, had not touched any of the clothes he’d bought me since we walked home from my exile four days ago, and really, why would I? His shirts smelled like him, and I’d rather sink into that scent and stay there.
None of us had left the house since I returned; he’d even stopped going to the cave. Still, a small part of me wondered if that was where he’d gone before I woke.
I gulped water and let out a deep breath, stretching out the stiffness from my muscles.
I’d let my running routine die since I came to Nimorran, and my body was feeling that impact.
My bones ached in a way that made me move sluggishly, so in the kitchen, I did a few half-hearted exercises—stretching, squats, jogging on the spot—just enough to loosen the pins and needles.
When I finally felt a little less like a folding chair, I headed back up the steps, hands reaching for the rail. I reminded myself that I needed sunlight after being cooped up inside for four days straight. I needed to walk. I needed to go outside—
The front door opened.
I turned on the third step and my chest did a ridiculous little somersault at the sight of Thrax standing in the doorway in his coat, head bowed as he closed the door.
He raised his gaze to me, and those bottomless eyes swept over me slowly—the way he always did—before settling, and I felt something in my throat loosen.
I rushed down the stairs, going on my tiptoes as I threw my arms around his neck, burying my face in the hollow of his throat. “Good morning,” I said into him.
His hands closed around me, soft at first, then firm, and he pressed a kiss to the side of my head. “Tell me you just woke up.”
I pulled back and grinned, my heart a restless thing in my chest. “Do you do this every day? Sneaking off while I’m still asleep?”
“Since you came back? No. Just today.” He peeled off his gloves.
I glanced at his palms, expecting the familiar healed scars, but there were none. I looked up at him, curious. “Where did you go?”
“Searching for Winifred. Figured it’s high time he got fucked up.”
“Why?”
He cocked his head like the answer to the question was obvious. “Why do you think? You don’t think I’m going to let him live after what he did to you, do you?”
I blinked at him.
“The only reason I didn’t kill him that day was because you called my name.
After I brought you home, I couldn’t find it in me to leave you alone again.
And I couldn’t bring myself to leave your side ever since.
Also, when you left some days ago, I couldn’t think of anything else but how to bring you back here.
Let’s just say this is the only time I’ve been able to spare for the bastard. ”
“You can’t kill or harm anyone in Nimorran.” Only after the words left my mouth did I realise how pointless they sounded.
Thrax chuckled without humour. “I’m already experiencing the highest damage Nimorran could ever cause a person.”
Yeah...the cold could not kill him. And even though killing Winifred might kill him, I was sure he would accept his death, the one he’d always wanted, with open arms.
“I saw him a few days ago.”
Thrax stepped back, scanning my face. “Where?”
“At his place. He was getting into a car with the help of another man. They seemed in a hurry.”
“He’s up to something.” His jaw worked. “Did he say anything to you? Try to touch you?”
I shook my head. “He didn’t touch me. He only said nonsense.”
His dark eyes hardened. “What nonsense?”
“That I should go with him. He said I was going to end up dead.”
He let out a deep breath, closing his eyes for a moment before straightening. “I’m going to burn him.” The words spilled like venom, and his whole expression changed.
When he left me and started making his way to the stairs, the words I’d been caging in my chest clawed their way out before I could stop them, the timing too perfect to let slip.
“What if I did?” I said quietly in the space.
He froze mid-step, every line of his back going stiff. The muscles beneath his clothes locked, shoulders rigid. For a long second he didn’t turn, didn’t breathe, as though he needed the world to steady before he faced me.
Then, slowly, he looked at me, his brows cutting together. “Did what?” His voice was flat, but I could feel something else beneath. “Go with him?”
I swallowed hard, throat tight. “Gave you. What if I—”
“I fucking told you not to even think about it.” His tone darkened, darker than I’d ever heard, his face warping into rage, like even the thought of it had flipped his entire being inside out. “Don’t you even try.”
“But I’m just—”
“No. No, Sanora.” His voice rose, as if to nail his disapproval into my skull. “Don’t even entertain the idea. That is a nightmare. Do you hear me? Another person dying on my behalf would—” His jaw tightened. “—it would end me.”
Did he think I didn’t know?
I knew. I’d known since the second the truth sank its teeth into me.
I’d tried to push it down, tried to bury it beneath kisses and skin and the illusion of peace in this house, but the thought wouldn’t leave.
It pressed at me in the dark, whispered at me in the silence, clawed at me when he wasn’t watching.
Maybe it was okay to surrender myself. Maybe it was okay to give my life if it meant he could finally live again. The ‘maybe, maybe’ wouldn’t leave my head.
I was made specifically for his sake. I was made to transform him back to a mortal. I was the only one who could. I was his only chance at becoming a normal human again.
And if I refused him that…wasn’t that selfish?
Because in the end, I would still die. My soul would still perish into nothing. While Thrax—the man I loved beyond logic—would be forced to keep existing, empty, soulless, forever. Because of me. Because of my choice to cling to breath a little longer.
“This is different, Thrax.” My voice cracked. “Can’t you see? I was created for this. I was made so you could—”
“Sanora, no.” He cut me off, eyes burning with a fury that bordered on desperation. “You have your own life to live outside of here. When the next train comes, you’re leaving. You’ll go back. You’ll live.”
A dry laugh escaped me. “You think I can return to my daily life after knowing this?”
He glared, his silence heavy. He didn’t think so either.
“I’m sure Kalimetryna would have wanted me to give her soul to you.” I lifted my chin, my throat thick with tears I wasn’t letting out. “The soul isn’t even mine.”
“But it’s your life,” he snapped, every word sharp.
“Yes, and it’s my decision.” I held his gaze. “It’s up to me what I do with my life.”
His head shook. “Not when it means you dying. Because then it’s both our lives, not just yours anymore.”
“Thrax—”
“Sanora, this isn’t even worth discussing.
” His voice cracked under the weight of it, the first fissure in his anger.
“I don’t want your soul. Do you hear me?
I don’t want it. I don’t want you, someone I love, dying.
” His eyes shone, black and endless. “This world would mean nothing without you in it.”
I blinked back the tears welling up in my eyes.
I’d thought his punishment was the greatest torture a man could endure—to walk endlessly without a soul. But no. The real punishment was this, to feel what it was like to have a soul through me, but never quite owning it. It was like feeding only an aroma to a starving man.
And I could try, but I could never completely know how empty he must feel without me around.
“Kalimetryna and I are different,” I let out. “She’d done that out of the love she had for you. But I’m...I’m doing—” I faltered, scrambling for words. “I’m not—I don’t have to love you to—it’s logic. Even if I didn’t love you...if I don’t love you—”
“Don’t you even say you don’t love me.” His voice thundered low, and in three heavy strides, he was upon me.
Thrax seized my chin in his iron grip, tilting my head up so I was looking up at him.
His breath burned against my lips, his eyes black fire.
“You love me, Sanora. Don’t even try to deny it. ”
His finger pressed against my chest, right over my hammering heart.
“I feel it—the way it races when I’m near.
” His hand slid to my stomach. “The way you clench in anticipation. The way your skin hums with joy, gods, the way your body burns with lust. I feel it all like it’s mine.
Every beat. Every breath. So don’t you dare tell me you don’t love me. ”
That wasn’t what I’d wanted to say.
But staring at him now—the raw desperation in his face, the fury laced with terror—I realised he hated this talk more than anything.
The way he stared at me...like he’d do anything to erase this from my head, made me realise that there was no way I’d have known that his curse could be broken because he’d have kept it from me.
He knew I would think like this. He knew I would be willing to make him mortal again.
And maybe I should be happy that I found out, maybe I should feel sad that I did. But all I felt was the ache of him, that he’d rather carry the curse forever than risk me.
“I do love you,” I whispered, my voice breaking.
Only then did he breathe, a shuddering exhale like he’d been drowning. His grip loosened, his forehead pressing briefly to mine. “Then don’t bring this up again. Promise me.”
My chest ached, but I nodded slowly.
“I need you to use your words, Sanora,” he murmured, wrapping me into his heat, his hands coming around me.
“Promise,” I whispered.
Thrax lowered his head and kissed me.
My hands snaked up his shoulders, behind his neck, locking there as I pulled him closer because I needed him as much as he needed me.