18. What’s the way to a woman’s heart?
WHAT’S THE WAY TO A WOMAN’S HEART?
ELENA – RYTHAR’S FORTRESS IN THE GREEN REACH
I walk back and forth in front of the window in Rythar’s room.
An attendant carries in a large tray of food and retreats. I ignore it.
Rythar watches me pace until my stomach growls. I grit my teeth and try to ignore it, but Rythar's attention sharpens.
“You are hungry,” he says, already moving, pulling me to the tray of food.
“Eat,” he commands. The word comes out sharp.
I want nothing from him. No favors that he can coax me into repaying later.
But he mistakes my refusal for wariness of the alien food. He picks up a slice of something lightly colored with a toasted outside. “Bread,” he says. “Most enjoy it.” He eats the slice in two large bites, then keeps naming more as he eats them.
As he devours more of the food, I stalk to the table and snatch a slice of bread, tearing into it with more anger than appetite. The first bite is chewy, almost sweet.
After Rythar sees me eating, he stops sampling everything and begins eating one thing at a time. Like he sampled everything to prove to me that it was safe.
I go for a slice of fruit next, biting down into the soft, sweet flesh. The anger isn't about the food. It's about the pattern I'm starting to see in him, and the fact that I don't want to see it.
After another slice, I stop and watch him. My anxiety gnaws at me, making it difficult to eat more.
He eats quickly. He must be starving after his sickness. He picks up the remaining slices of bread, still chewing while never taking his eyes off me.
He breaks the silence. “You need more food.”
“No, I don't,” I protest, but he raises a hand, and the argument dies in my throat.
“You have gone too long without food. This was an oversight,” he says, voice gone flat. “It will not happen again.”
The words catch me off guard. He’s not quite apologizing—he's correcting a failure. His own failure. Anger I know how to handle. This is something else.
After he’s satisfied that I don’t want more food right now, he points to the doorway on the far side of the room. It’s a slab of stone that blends into the wall. "You must have all your needs met. Bathe,” he commands. “Afterwards, you will eat more with me. Properly. As my mate should.”
All my needs. He hasn’t asked me what I want. He’s assumed. I bristle, blood pounding in my ears. "And you're going to stand there and watch me bathe?"
His lips twitch into a smirk. “I will wait outside. I could join you if you'd prefer.”
My cheeks burn as embarrassment sears through me. "No, I'm fine on my own."
He stands and crosses the room, where he waves his hand over a section of the wall. A flat panel appears next to the door, and he presses his hand to it. The door then recedes into the wall, revealing a chamber beyond.
The air is warm and steamy, rolling out in waves. It seems fed by the same type of spring as the pool in the mating chamber. It looks gloriously pleasant. I’m eager to get thoroughly clean.
I step inside and glance back at him. He stays at the threshold, watching me for a moment, then closes the door. His jaw tightens before it seals.
He’s not banishing me. He’s banishing himself. And it’s a relief, because if he touches me again, I don’t know if I’ll tell him to stop.
The bathing chamber is nothing like the utilitarian showers on New Terra.
Here, the entire space is carved from stone.
To my left is a spacious shower area with multiple water jets, large enough for several people.
At the center sits a deep basin where water pours from the mouth of a sculpted beast—fangs bared, tongue extended to guide the flow into the pool.
Shelves cut into the wall hold various bottles and cloths, along with unfamiliar tools. On a platform nearby lies a stack of plush towels and a small bundle of clothing that’s made for someone my height.
He planned this. Or he ordered it planned.
I discard my dress onto the floor, never wanting to wear it again. I hesitate. This world has stripped my defenses fast. On New Terra, nakedness was insignificant. But here, it feels different.
My mind goes back to Rythar’s naked body. The memory is carved into me. His size. The heat. The way he stood there like the room belonged to him.
That’s because the entire biome belongs to him.
A shiver runs down my spine. “What am I doing?” I murmur to myself.
After what I’ve been through with Rythar already, after caring for him all night and more, being so close to him, eating and sleeping…
I can’t get him out of my mind. I imagine him not as a gentle lover, but as a force.
His hands pinning me, guiding me, bracing me against the stone.
His mouth at my throat, lingering the way it did before.
The possibility of it presses in on me—being bent, spread, held open by someone who understands my body better than I do.
My mind knows what that could cost me, but my body doesn’t care.
"Focus," I tell myself firmly, trying to push away the thoughts. Somewhere beyond the stone, he is still there. The thickening steam swirls around me, and water condenses on my skin and traces slow paths down my body.
What if him being alien weren’t a problem? Do I want this type of commitment to anyone? To Rythar?
I've always been independent, I remind myself. But my thoughts wander back to his promises to care for me. If we conceive a child, who would raise the baby? On New Terra, marriage was a remote possibility. If a couple conceived, they might be allowed to raise the child as mother and father. It became rare. Most couples never conceived at all, and plenty of people weren’t sure of their father.
Conception was supposed to be medically tracked, but in practice there were unsanctioned quickies.
So mothers kept their babies close for twelve months, then the children were raised collectively, by whatever women were lucky enough to have them.
My grandmother headed a child collective, but she had raised my mother the old way.
I never knew anyone else who was raised the old way.
My mother disappeared one day. My grandmother was moved after several collectives merged into one.
Not enough children to keep them all open.
In Rythar's jungle, there are no child collectives.
Just me, and him, and whatever he decides a child means.
Would he raise it with me, the old way? Would he want to?
Or would the baby be his? A Xythean heir, a piece of the Green Reach, something I produced and then handed over?
I don't know which answer scares me more.
My thoughts slip back to his desire in the mating chamber. Would giving in to him feel like surrender? Or like something closing around me?
The thought is terrifying, thrilling, and far too inevitable.
I shake my head, trying to clear the haze of desire.
Lust is a distraction I can’t afford. But even as I push those thoughts aside, I know the truth.
This new awareness isn’t going anywhere.
And underneath it, the question I've been circling finally surfaces, sharp and specific—if I have his child, is the child mine, or is the child his?
Not legally. Not by Xythean custom. In his mind.
In the only place that will matter when the baby is actually here.
I need to know the answer before I let him near me again.
I slide into the tub. It’s hotter than I expect, but the burn fades fast, replaced by a deep loosening of muscle and thought. My legs float to the surface. It’s pure luxury after war-torn New Terra. I close my eyes and try to remember how to breathe.
I finish cleaning myself with the oils and soft brushes provided.
My skin tingles, every inch hypersensitive.
I wrap myself in a towel and move to the bundle of unfamiliar clothes.
The underclothes are a soft mesh, cool against my skin.
The outer robe is dark green, belted at the waist, loose enough to hide some of my shape but thin enough that I feel the draft through it.
I stare at myself in the mirrored surface of the water, hair wet and clinging to my neck, the mark on my finger still visible, still dark.
When I step back into the bedroom, Rythar is waiting.
He’s changed, too. His hair is wet, tied back, and the scars on his face glisten.
He’s put on a fresh tunic, deep blue. He looks at me, and for a split second, relief passes over his face.
Then it’s gone. As if he’d braced for me to be angry with him.
He slowly extends his hand to me.
“Come,” he says.
I hesitate, wondering if he will grab me or bark orders. He just waits, hand extended.
I reach for it, wondering what my future would look like with Rythar. The question sits under my tongue, waiting.