Chapter 15
Thavros
The healers looked her over and assured me she was fine, but I was anxious to get her alone.
The look on her face told me she was exhausted.
But there was something else there, something darker.
I brewed the tea exactly as the healer had instructed, careful to steep it just long enough to draw out the calming herbs without making it too bitter.
My hands moved with practiced precision, but my mind was far from steady.
She sat on the edge of the bed, watching me with wide, wary eyes. There was a new tension in her tonight—tighter, quieter than pain. It looked like fear, and it made something primal in me ache.
When I handed her the mug, she didn’t immediately drink. Just held it, fingers trembling around the handle. “Will it help?”
“With sleep,” I said softly. “And with grounding. It might give your mind a chance to rest.”
She nodded once and took a slow sip. I waited, observing her—not just for signs of pain, but for the fading magic.
Tonight had been intense, and I would have given anything to have been there to stop her from being thrown in that cell.
But I still wasn't sure whether she would wake up in the morning as a statue or as the flesh-and-blood woman who now lay in my bed.
I turned, making my way back to the table next to the door, where all the supplies the healer had brought up were. Maybe I'd missed something, maybe there was something more I could do for her.
“I don’t want you to go,” she said quietly, setting the mug down with a barely audible clink. "Please, I don't want you to leave."
I froze. Then crossed the room in two strides, kneeling in front of her so we were eye to eye. “Then I won’t. Not tonight. Not ever. Not as long as you want me here.”
She nodded again, more firmly this time, and I took her hand in mine. Her skin was so warm now. No longer a wisp of spirit—she was here, real, and trembling in front of me.
“You’re safe,” I said. “And you’re not alone.”
She climbed beneath the covers, slow and stiff from the bruises of Khuldruk's guards. I drew the blankets up around her and dimmed the lanterns, retreating to the chair beside the bed.
I told myself I’d just watch until she drifted off.
But even in the shadows, I couldn’t stop looking at her, waiting. Would this woman slip back into stone again? What happened tonight to change it? Was it perhaps the magic of Yule?
I watched the rise and fall of her breath. The curve of her cheek, so recently wet with tears. The softness of her body against my bedding—mine. All of it mine. That thought burned behind my ribs with a fire I couldn’t explain.
She looked like she belonged here, not just in the room, but in my life.
And that scared me more than I cared to admit.
She stirred, eyes popping open to find me. “Just making sure you’re still here.” But the way she smoothed her hand over her arm told me she might just be scared she might turn back to stone, too.
As she settled back down, I pulled a soft fur blanket up over her shoulders. "Please rest, Seraphina."
As I said her name, a small smile spread across her face. I knew her name. How did such a small thing seem so monumental? "I will not leave you. You have my word."
"I like it when you say my name," she said, looking up at me with some warmth returning to her eyes.
"And I like saying it. Now, please, sleep."
I pulled a chair next to the bed and sat next to her as she drifted off to sleep. The image of her in that cell was burned behind my eyes. The sight of her crumpled, scared, and bleeding was enough to make me burn the world down.
I knew why they did it, but the need to make someone pay for hurting her- hurting what's mine- put a raging fire in the pit of my stomach.
I was still a mess of emotions, waiting for her to turn to stone, wanting to decimate the orcs who hurt her.
But as I watched the glow of the fire dance across her soft features, the raging fire turned to embers. She was here. She was safe. And she was mine.
Mine. That word kept replaying in my mind.
Nothing had ever felt as true as that. There was a small part of me that was beginning to wonder if she was my mate.
Orcs should know. Perhaps it was the magic of the stone claiming her, or that I had never expected to ever find a mate, that had hidden the bond.
Or maybe I was just out of my head in love with a stone goddess.
Yet, there was a small glimmer of hope that she might one day be mine.
As her breathing slowed and she drifted off to sleep, my own eyelids began to feel heavy.
A sharp cry sliced through the darkness. My eyes snapped open, hand already reaching for a weapon I hadn’t brought into the bedroom. But there was no enemy, just Seraphina, thrashing beneath the blankets, her breath coming in quick, shallow gasps.
I was at her side in an instant, crouching next to the bed.
“Seraphina,” I said, voice low but firm. “You’re safe. It’s me. Just a nightmare.”
She jolted upright, eyes wide and glassy. For a moment, I wasn’t sure she saw me at all.
Her lips moved, barely a whisper. “Thavros?”
“I’m here.”
Tears welled, spilling down her cheeks as she reached for me with trembling hands. “Don’t go.”
Something in my chest cracked. “I won’t. Never, if you don’t want me to.”
She shifted aside beneath the blanket, leaving space. “Please. I need you.”
Every part of me wanted to ask if she was sure. If this was what she truly wanted or just a fear of speaking. But the words wouldn’t come. She was looking at me like I was her anchor in a storm, and that storm had already done its damage.
I shed my outer tunic and crawled into the bed behind her. She immediately curled into my chest, her back pressed to my front, her hair brushing under my chin. I wrapped my arm around her, careful not to touch any lingering bruises.
“I’ve got you,” I murmured.
She gave a soft, hiccupped sigh and, slowly, her body began to relax.
But I didn’t sleep.
Not for a long time.
I held her, feeling the curve of her hip against my palm, the gentle rhythm of her breath. She was so soft, so warm. So utterly real.
And I couldn’t shake the fear that when I woke up again, she’d be stone.