Chapter 28
Thavros
After speaking with Maluk, I made my way back to our chambers, anxious to find Seraphina.
The stress of planning this event was written all over her face today.
Although there was a little thought in the back of my mind telling me it was more than that.
I needed to hold her and get to the bottom of what was bothering her.
But when I entered our chambers, it was empty. Seraphina was not here. The worry coiled tighter as I tried to breathe.
Then I caught sight of a note, sitting neatly folded on our table, and my heart stopped.
It took everything I had to walk over to it. I picked it up, and it still smelled like her —wildflowers and old books. The smell usually filled me with deep peace, but right now I couldn’t help the dread that was weighing deep inside of me.
Her words hit like a blade to the gut:
Thavros,
You deserve a mate who was born to love you, not built to break you. I will not be the ruin of your people. I must leave.
I will never stop loving you,
Seraphina
I sank to my knees, gripping the note, my vision blurred with unshed tears.
What did this mean? I could not lose her. I would not lose her, not while there was still breath left in my body. She was mine.
Then the stillness broke, ripping a growl from deep inside me, feral and desperate.
I bolted from our chambers to find my mate. She was not leaving.
The corridors of the mountain stronghold blurred around me, torches and startled faces flickering past like ghosts. I barely registered the way the cold bit at my skin as I burst past the guards stationed near the entrance. Snow whipped through the air, sharp and blinding.
Gods, there she was.
Her cloak was pulled tight around her shoulders, her form small against the yawning mouth of the mountain. One more step, and she would’ve been lost to the dark. To me.
I roared her name. “Seraphina!”
She froze at the sound of my voice, but didn’t turn at first. I could see her shoulders shaking. Her hand curled around the stone arch as if it could hold her steady. Then slowly, she turned to face me, and her tear-streaked face undid me.
“You’re leaving?” I asked, my voice hoarse.
“I must,” she whispered. “It’s the only way.”
"No. I don't accept that."
The pleading look on her face almost undid me. "I have to. If I stay, I will bring ruin to you and your people. I cannot be your downfall. I could not bear it."
I went to her, falling before her. My knees hit the stone. I didn’t even feel the impact. "We will find a way. There must be another way. Please," I begged. "Don’t do this. Don’t walk away from me."
Her lip trembled. “If I stay, I’ll ruin you.”
I stood before her, arms spread wide, chest heaving, bearing my soul to her.
“Then ruin me,” I growled, the words torn from somewhere deep and wounded. “But be mine while you do it.”
Her sob split the air like a thunderclap. She dropped the cloak, stumbled toward me, and collapsed into my arms. My hands came around her instinctively, pulling her close, anchoring us both.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered against my chest, the words breaking on every breath. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t want to go—I just—”
“I know,” I murmured, wrapping her tighter. “You’re here now. You stayed. That’s all that matters.”
I held her like the world might try to take her again. And I would burn it down before I let it.
She kissed me then—desperate, searing, full of need and fear and love. I answered with everything in me, one arm around her back, the other tangled in her hair. Her fingers tore at the laces of my shirt as I backed her against the stone, the weight of our need finally too much to hold back.
“Take me,” she begged, voice wrecked. “Please, Thavros. I need you.”
I turned her, rucking up her dress, my mouth against her neck as she braced against the cold wall. “Mine,” I growled, the word becoming a mantra.
I traced my hand up the soft expanse of her thigh before dipping it into her slick cunt.
"Please, I need to feel you," she panted, rocking into me.
I sank into her with a groan, her name a curse and a prayer on my lips. Her body welcomed me, greedy and hot and trembling.
It was as if a frenzy took over me. I was desperate and pounding into her.
Her hand searched for purchase on the cold stone wall in front of us, but I had her. She was mine, and I would never let her go.
"You are mine to fill and fuck and care for," I said as I continued to thrust into her with punishing force.
"Yes," she cried out.
"Say it. Say you understand. You are mine."
"Yes, I am yours."
She sobbed my name as I thrust into her—brutal, desperate, not caring who might hear.
She met me thrust for thrust, taking all of me, giving over to me.
She shattered beneath me, crying out my name like a prayer torn from her soul. Every part of me screamed to sink in deeper, to knot her and bite down and make her mine for all time. The bond was howling in my blood, ancient and insistent.
But I couldn’t—not like this, not in grief’s shadow and with her still trembling in doubt. I pulled out, barely, just in time, groaning as I spilled across her thighs and the stone wall, one hand braced above her head, the other trembling against her waist.
“Not yet,” I rasped, chest heaving. “You deserve more than desperation. When I claim you, it will be with every breath in me.”
She turned, face flushed and streaked with tears, and pressed her palms to my cheeks. “I’m not leaving again,” she whispered. “I swear it, Thavros.”
My heart twisted. “And I swear,” I murmured, kissing the inside of her wrist, “I’ll find a way to have you and still protect our people. You are not our end, Seraphina. You’re our beginning.”
She folded into my chest, and I held her tightly, breathing her in, heart pounding with everything we almost lost.
I would fight fate itself if I had to.
Because this goddess was mine.