Chapter 15 Kaiven #2
Her brows rise faintly. “Comforting.”
“It should be. I am telling you mistakes do not end you.”
That takes some of the edge from her face.
I go on. “There are things you must learn quickly. Weather signs. Which beasts are dangerous. Which children belong to which women if they come to you. How the camp moves when the alarm is called. What spaces are yours. What spaces are mine alone. What Oshara may instruct. What she may not.”
“You have a lot of rules.”
“We live.”
That pulls a breath of something almost like humor from her again. “You make survival sound like an argument.”
“It is.”
For a second, a real small smile appears. It changes her whole face. Rounder. Younger. Softer in a way that should not strike me as hard as it does because I have already had her in my bed and marked her with my scent and watched her sleep under my furs.
That tiny smile hits me harder than any of it.
I have to look away once toward the camp below just to regain the clean line of my thoughts. When I look back, she has noticed.
Let her know she affects me somewhat. Not enough to frighten. Enough to matter.
Her attention shifts then to the markings at my throat, where the morning light catches the ink beneath my skin. She hesitates, then asks, “Your tattoos. Yesterday you said you would explain them.”
I go still for one long beat.
That is not a question many people ask me directly. Not anymore. The horde knows. Outsiders either fear asking or do not earn the answer. Keandra has earned little yet in terms of time. But she is my wife. My mate. And she asked, which means she noticed. That matters too.
I step closer, not enough to press her back, only enough that I can touch the edge of the tattoo at my neck if needed to name it properly.
“This one is for Vek Talan. My ground. My king’s line.”
Dark ink curls from the side of my neck down beneath the collar. Not decorative lines. Stronger than that. Older.
She studies it openly now, more curious than frightened.
I touch another mark lower, partly hidden beneath the open front of my shirt.
“This, for the first blood I took in battle as a grown warrior.”
Her eyes flick up to my face and then back down. I do not hide the rest.
“This line for my father. This is for my brother.” I touch another, then another. “Lost. Both.”
Her face changes at once. Not pity. Thank the gods. Something quieter. Recognition of grief without trying to step into it and make it hers.
Good.
I continue, because now that I have begun, I may as well finish properly.
“These on the arms are victories. Hunts. Borders held. Raids broken. This here,” I tap a darker piece of ink over my ribs, “was given when I became king.”
“And the neck?” she asks.
“King’s line. Mate line when complete.”
The words come out before I decide whether to say them.
She goes still.
For a moment, neither of us speaks.
Then, very softly, “Because of me?”
I hold her gaze. “Yes.”
The wind moves her hair slightly across her cheek. She does not brush it away. I see the exact second the truth reaches her that my claim on her is not only scent and bed and law. It is written into my future skin already. Into the way my body will carry her place.
It unsettles her. It affects her too.
Good.
She asks the next question more carefully. “Do all the marks mean something like that?”
“Yes.”
“So none of them are just for show.”
“No.”
That seems to matter to her more than I would have guessed. She came from a world where too many things were pretend. She is learning that in my world, harsh things are often simply named harsh, and meaningful things are not performed without cost.
She reaches up before thinking, then stops with her hand half-lifted. My whole body notices. Her eyes widen slightly, perhaps because she notices that I noticed.
“May I?” she asks.
The question goes through me like a blade. May I. No one asks me that with my own body. Not like this. Not in quiet.
I make myself answer only with a nod.
Very slowly, Keandra touches the edge of the marking at my throat. Her fingers are light. Warm. Human-soft in exactly the way that has been undoing me since the capital. The contact is brief. Barely there. But it is enough to pull every part of my attention into that one place.
I do not move.
Another discipline.
Her fingertips trace only the smallest line before she lowers her hand again, perhaps afraid she has taken too much.
“It feels...” She searches for the word. “Part of you.”
“It is.”
The answer comes rougher than the rest. We both hear it.
A flush touches her face. She looks away first this time, out toward the camp where women are now hanging freshly washed cloth from a line and a group of children are chasing one another too close to the beast pens until an older boy shouts them off.
I let the moment breathe.
I could take the opening now. Close the distance further. Put my hand on the back of her neck. Draw her closer and make this lesson into something else.
I do not. Not because I do not want to. Because not everything should be taken when want appears.
So instead, I give her the last truth she needs for today.
“You do not have to understand all of this now.”
Her eyes come back to me.
“You only need to listen. Learn. Eat. Rest. Watch. The rest comes.”
Keandra holds my gaze for a long moment. Then she nods slowly. Not submission. Not complete trust. Something better for now. Willingness.
That, in a female brought to me by fear and hunger and stars, may be the first real gift she has chosen to give. It strikes me harder than I let show.