Chapter 13 Falla
FALLA
I've lost my mind.
That's the only explanation for why I can't stop staring at Ressa while she creates rainbows in the morning light, her face transformed by genuine delight.
The professional distance I'm supposed to maintain—the careful boundaries I've constructed between healer and patient—crumble into dust every time she laughs.
She deserves endless rainbows. The thought lodges in my chest with uncomfortable intensity. She deserves every beautiful thing after what she survived.
"Show me how to make it bigger," she says, turning toward me with that same bright expression. No trace of the anxiety that usually shadows her features. No careful guardedness. Just open, unfiltered happiness.
It does dangerous things to my composure.
"Wider arc," I manage, keeping my voice steady through sheer force of will. "And use more water. The mist needs to spread further."
She tries again, adjusting her stance. The rainbow expands slightly but wavers when the spray pattern shifts.
"Here." I move closer, reaching around her to guide the angle of the water skin in her hands. "Keep the pressure steady and sweep from left to right."
The position puts me directly behind her, close enough that I catch the scent of soap and something uniquely her—warmth and resilience and life persisting despite everything. My hands cover hers, helping control the water skin's movement.
She doesn't tense. Doesn't pull away or freeze in panic.
Instead she leans back slightly, her shoulder blades brushing my chest, and sweeps the water in the arc I demonstrated. A larger rainbow blooms in the mist, colors vibrant and sustained.
"Perfect," I say, though my voice is rough.
She's warm against me. Trusting. The realization crashes through my carefully maintained control because Ressa doesn't trust easily—doesn't allow people in her space, doesn't lean into touch, doesn't let her guard down.
But she's doing all of that right now. With me.
I should step back. Create professional distance. Remember that I'm her healer and she's my patient and there are boundaries that exist for good reasons.
I don't move.
"We could add crystals," I hear myself say instead, maintaining the position like I'm not acutely aware of every point where we're touching. "Refract the light further. Make the colors more intense."
"You have crystals?"
"Clear quartz. I use them for certain healing applications." The explanation comes automatic even though my attention stays fixed on the way she fits against me. "Light focused through crystal can help with meditation and pain management."
"That's fascinating." She turns her head slightly, looking up at me. "You'll have to tell me more about your healing methods sometime."
The angle puts her face inches from mine.
Close enough that I notice details I've catalogued before but never let myself truly see—the delicate structure of her cheekbones, the way her brown eyes catch light and turn almost amber, the slight upward curve of her mouth that transforms her entire expression.
Beautiful doesn't begin to cover it.
I force myself to step back before I do something catastrophically stupid. "I'll get the crystals."
The supplies sit in my healing bag a few yards away. I retrieve several clear quartz pieces, along with a reflective metal disc I sometimes use for light therapy. When I return, Ressa's created another rainbow, her movements more confident now that she understands the technique.
"Try this." I position the largest crystal in the spray's path, angling it to catch both water droplets and sunlight.
The rainbow fractures through the crystal, colors multiplying and intensifying into something spectacular—prisms dancing through mist, light splitting into impossible variations of red and gold and violet.
Ressa gasps. "That's incredible!"
"Physics," I remind her, but my own voice carries wonder I can't quite suppress. The effect is stunning when done right.
"Beautiful physics." She reaches for another crystal. "Show me how to position it."
We work together, adding crystals at different angles and watching how the light changes. She moves closer each time, unconsciously seeking proximity, and I let her. Tell myself I'm just helping with crystal placement, that the way our hands brush when passing quartz pieces is coincidental.
I'm lying to myself and I know it.
But she's smiling. Actually smiling—not the careful, controlled expression she wears around other orcs but genuine joy lighting her features. And I'd do almost anything to keep that expression on her face.
"Here." I position her hand holding a crystal at precisely the right angle. "See how the rainbow splits when the light hits the edge?"
She tilts the quartz slightly and the colors explode outward, creating overlapping arcs that shimmer in the spray. "It's like magic."
"Just light refraction."
"You keep saying that." She laughs, soft and delighted. "But it feels magical anyway."
The sound wraps around my chest and squeezes. I can't remember the last time I heard her laugh like that—unguarded and free, no trace of the trauma constantly lurking beneath her surface composure.
She's so close now. Standing directly in front of me while we both hold crystals angled to catch the mist spray. Her back brushes my chest when she shifts position, and I register every movement with hyperawareness that has nothing to do with healer assessment.
"If I angle this one lower—" she adjusts the crystal and gasps when the rainbow doubles, colors reflecting off both the water droplets and the quartz surface. "Oh!"
"Perfect," I manage, though what I mean has nothing to do with light refraction.
She turns to look up at me, grinning with unfiltered happiness, and something in my chest just..
. breaks. Shatters completely. All the professional distance and careful boundaries and rational reasons why I shouldn't feel this way disintegrate when faced with Ressa looking at me like I hung the actual sky instead of just helping her create rainbows.
I'm not sure how it happens.
One second we're standing close together with crystals and rainbows and her face tilted up toward mine. The next, my mouth is on hers and I'm kissing her like I've wanted to since approximately the third day of this ridiculous festival.
She tastes like morning tea and possibility. Her lips part slightly under mine, soft and warm and perfect in ways that make rational thought scatter like startled birds.
Then reality crashes back.
I pull away abruptly, my heart hammering against my ribs hard enough to hurt. What the fuck did I just do? She's my patient. She's traumatized by orcs. She's vulnerable and I just took advantage of—
Ressa's hand fists in my shirt and pulls me back down.
The crystal I was holding hits the ground somewhere nearby, forgotten. Her other hand comes up to cup my jaw, gentle but insistent, and she kisses me again.
This time it's slower. Softer. Deliberate instead of impulsive. Her mouth moves against mine with careful exploration, testing and tasting, her touch feather-light like she's mapping new territory.
My heart stutters. Stops. Restarts with uncomfortable force.
She's kissing me back. Not freezing or panicking or pulling away in fear. Actually kissing me—choosing this, choosing me, her body pressed close and her hands on my skin.
I slide my arms around her carefully, giving her every opportunity to change her mind or retreat. She melts into the embrace instead, her fingers threading into my hair while she deepens the kiss with quiet confidence.
Nothing in my life prepared me for this. For Ressa feeling right in my arms, for the way she fits against me like she was designed for this exact position. For the soft sound she makes when I tilt my head to change the angle.
She tastes like trust. Like courage and resilience and choosing vulnerability despite every reason she has to guard herself. Like she's letting me in past walls that were built for survival.
The magnitude of it terrifies me.
I break the kiss slowly, carefully, giving her time to adjust. Her eyes flutter open—brown shot through with amber in the morning light. Her breathing comes slightly quick but steady. No panic in her expression. No fear.
Just wonder.
"Falla," she whispers, my name soft on her lips.
"I shouldn't have—" The words stick in my throat because what shouldn't I have done? Kissed her? Wanted her? Fallen for her somewhere between reflex games and drunken confessions?
"Don't." Her hand tightens in my shirt. "Don't apologize for that."
"You're my patient." That's a lie at this point.
"I'm also a person who just kissed you back." Her expression holds steady, direct and unflinching. "Twice."
Fair point. But the professional ethics I've built my entire practice around scream that this crosses every boundary I'm supposed to maintain.
"Ressa—"
"I wanted to kiss you." The admission comes quiet but certain. "I've been thinking about it since yesterday. Maybe longer."
My heart does complicated acrobatics that have no place in healer anatomy. "You were drunk yesterday."
"I remember enough." Her cheeks flush but she doesn't look away. "I remember feeling safe with you. Trusting you. Wanting... this."
The confession steals my breath. I stand there with her in my arms while morning light creates rainbows in the mist we've forgotten, and I have no idea how to process what she's telling me.
She wants this. Wants me.
The impossibility of it crashes through every rational thought. Ressa, who can barely tolerate being around orcs, who flinches when males move too quickly near her, who carries trauma like armor—she's choosing to be vulnerable with me.
"I don't want to hurt you," I manage, the words rough and honest. "Or push you past what you're ready for. If this is too much—"
"You're not pushing." Her thumb brushes along my jaw, the touch impossibly gentle. "You've never pushed. That's why I trust you."
The words lodge somewhere behind my sternum and refuse to dislodge. She trusts me. After everything, despite everything, she's standing here in my arms telling me she trusts me.
I'm completely unprepared for how that feels.
"I'm still your healer," I point out, though my conviction wavers when she's looking at me like that.
"So stop being my healer." The suggestion comes matter-of-fact, like she's considered this already. "I'm mostly healed anyway. The physical injuries are resolved. If you're worried about crossing a line, then we'll take it away.
"Your mental healing—"
"Is my responsibility." Her expression softens but stays firm.
"You've helped me more than you know, Falla.
You got me out of that cabin. You helped me work through panic attacks.
You made me feel safe when I thought I'd never feel safe around orcs again.
" She pauses, her voice dropping quieter.
"But that doesn't mean I want you as my healer anymore. "
My heart hammers hard enough that I'm certain she can feel it. "What do you want?"
The question hangs between us, weighted with implications I'm terrified to examine too closely.
Ressa's hand slides from my jaw to the back of my neck, her touch sending electricity down my spine. "Right now? You. If you want that, too."
If I want it. Like there's any question. Like I haven't been fighting this pull since approximately day three when she teased me during reflex games and I realized I was completely fucked.
"I want it," I admit, the words rough with honesty I can't contain. "More than I should."
Her smile transforms her entire face. "Good."
Then she pulls me down and kisses me again.