35. Basten
Chapter 35
Basten
M y thoughts scatter like leaves in the wind. I can’t tell what’s real and what’s a dream anymore. But if I’m dreaming, then hell, let it be this one .
Let me dream of her.
Her smile. Her power. That fire in her eyes when she looks at me like I’m more than a street boy with bloodied knuckles. Maybe I can’t remember our past, but I can feel it. It’s as alive in my bones as my marrow, giving me strength. I guess one fae tale was true, huh, Sabine? We’re Aron and Aria all over again. The Fate-Spun Lovers. Destined to find one another.
But it’s more than that, isn’t it? It’s about choice—choosing you each time, in every lifetime, cost be damned.
I don’t care if I never recover a single memory of us. I’ll make new ones. Even if it’s only this. Here. Now. One final memory. Hearing the rumble of your voice nearby, as quiet as a stream but just as capable of reshaping the world.
And if my last first memory is of saving you?
Then I’ll die happy.
Because I feel the blood leaving. Emptying like an overturned glass. And I don’t care. I want you to have all of it, all of me, because it will all be worth it to know that I found you, I looked in your eyes, and I saw every answer to every question a man could ask.
Sabine, I’m not afraid to die.
Not if it’s for you.