Chapter Nineteen
Taryn
I barely slept. Every time I started to drift off, something pulled me back from the edge of unconsciousness again.
The remembered warmth of his chest.
The press of our lips.
The look on his face after.
And then the sharpness of his rejection.
The way his tail had curled around my thigh like it had a mind of its own and then vanished as if he regretted it.
When I gave up pretending I had any chance of sleeping, the room was still dark.
Not truly dark, nothing on Morrakan seemed to be.
There was no sunlight for the crystals in the ceiling to redirect, but the curtain of glowing leaves behind my head cast a soft lavender wash over the stone walls.
It was enough to make out the broad shape of Rhydek’s body as he pushed up from the bed.
The mattress shifted as his weight left it, and cool air brushed the strip of skin between my top and the silk blanket tangled around my hips.
His form loomed for a moment, back to me, as he rolled his shoulders as if something ached.
Faint blotches of bruises still crossed his ribs and shoulder from the beating he’d taken as “training”, making his skin black where they lingered.
In the dim lavender light, the old scars on his back looked deep, the brighter lines of his kethra glowing between them.
My throat tightened. There was a lot about him I didn’t understand, but I wished I did.
I stayed still beneath the blankets, watching through my lashes as he bent to gather his belt and uniform. He moved with the same impossible silence he always did. Something so large had no business being as quiet as he was when there was no outside noise to mask any he made.
My eyes raked across his flesh, cheeks heating at the memories flooding me. What I had done the previous night hit hard enough to make me bite my lip to stifle a groan.
I had kissed him.
Like an idiot.
No, that wasn’t fair. It had made sense in the moment.
He had done something thoughtful, taking me to the kennels because he’d listened when I told him I had worked with military dogs, and I’d wanted to show him that I understood.
That I appreciated it.
And maybe hormones had gotten the better of me.
On Earth, a kiss didn’t mean forever. It didn’t even mean love. Sometimes it was a thank you, or comfort, or a brief rush of something you didn’t want to put into words.
Here, apparently, it meant humiliation.
Or maybe that was just special to Rhydek. His mouth said one thing, but his eyes said another, and it was hard to resist the signals his body gave when mine longed for his touch.
As if he sensed the shift in my breathing, his head turned. Golden eyes landed on me, studying me in the darkness.
Sighing, I pushed myself up on one elbow, giving up the pretense that I was asleep.
“Off to work?”
It was a stupid thing to ask. Of course he was. He had risen before me each morning since we arrived, slipping out of bed like a thief, always before I was awake. He hadn’t managed it this time only because I’d never slept.
His gaze held mine a beat too long before he dipped his head once.
“I’m going to train with the warriors.”
His voice was rough, the sound scraping over me in a way that made awareness uncoil low in my belly despite the awkwardness still hanging between us.
“Guess you have to maintain your figure.”
I doubted he understood the phrase, but his brow and lips twitched enough for me to think he got the meaning, and my cheeks warmed again. I had been subtle about looking at him, but he also acted as if it was completely normal to strut around nude.
For a moment I thought he was going to turn away without saying anything else, but his eyes stayed locked on me.
“You can remain here until I return, or you can come with me.”
I blinked. I hadn’t expected to be given the option to come. Not a command or an order phrased as a suggestion, a choice.
I pushed myself all the way upright, tucking one leg beneath me.
“To watch you train?”
His chin dipped again.
I tried not to let my face show what I was thinking. Watching a bunch of giant alien warriors beat each other while sweating under a sheet so I didn’t inhale sand sounded about as entertaining as staring at the wall all day.
But being left alone in the silent home that didn’t feel like mine again sounded worse.
I kept telling myself I only needed time to adjust. That it was normal to feel unsettled on a different planet, with a different culture, and no purpose beyond a symbolic tie between our people.
I knew what would happen if I was left alone too long with nothing useful to do. My thoughts would spiral and narrow down to a single ugly truth.
If no one needed me, I didn’t know who I was.
“I’ll come.”
Something flashed across his face. It almost seemed like relief, but I could have been projecting because I didn’t want it to be regret.
He dipped his head again.
“Dress for the surface while I ready what you will need.”
I arched a brow but decided to keep my lips closed. He knew his planet, and he’d done enough to prove he was at least trying to provide what I needed.
His gaze dropped, lingering on the silk wrapped around my breasts before travelling over my exposed belly.
Heat spread across my chest and my stomach twisted, but I resisted the urge to pull the blanket up.
Hiding my body was a Human thing I needed to leave behind, and with the new urges stirring within me, I wanted him to do more than look, but hiding would give the opposite impression.
A muscle in his jaw bunched before he turned away and crossed to one of the storage compartments built into the wall. He opened it, pulling out a folded bundle of pink fabric before turning back to me with a smooth expression.
“Your thavren,” he said, placing it on the bed beside me. “I will help you wrap it once you are dressed.”
I reached out and brushed my fingers over the fabric, nose scrunching at the feel of it.
Besides being bombarded with a stronger sense of smell since the injection, I’d noticed I had developed issues with the feel of certain materials, and the thavren wasn’t pleasant.
Still, I understood the necessity of it.
“Thanks.”
He stepped back, closer to the door.
“I’ll get you a korhven.”
I tipped my head, my brows drawn. He must have realized I didn’t know the word and explained without me asking.
“For water.”
I tried to commit the word to memory as I shifted to the edge of the mattress.
“You don’t have to do everything for me.”
The words were automatic and slipped out before I could stop them. I enjoyed it when Rhydek showed his caring side unexpectedly, I just wasn’t used to having someone thinking of my needs. I’d always been responsible for myself.
Rhydek’s expression didn’t change as he responded.
“Yes, I do.”
He said it like I’d asked whether the sun rose, the conviction in his voice obvious. The question was, did he only feel that way because he looked at me as another responsibility?
My throat tightened and I bowed my head as the hiss of the door let me know he’d taken the chance to escape. The tension between us had grown, awkwardness tangled with it, and I knew it was my fault.
I should have been embarrassed all over again, but what I was, was tired.
Tired of the worry.
Tired of not knowing where I stood.
Tired of feeling things I couldn’t act on and couldn’t even truly blame on hormones.
I changed into one of the soft pants I had picked up in the market with a light shirt, pulling my hair up into my usual bun. I tried to wind the thavren around my head the best I could, but unwrapped it twice before giving up and letting it drape around my shoulders.
By the time I stepped into the main room Rhydek was waiting near the door, fully prepared and composed as if he wasn’t the reason I’d spent the night unraveling over a chaste kiss and his rejection.
His gaze swept over me before focusing on the cloth hanging from my shoulders.
Before I could react he had crossed the room and his hands were at my chest, but he only grabbed the edges of the fabric.
Pulling it up over my head, he tucked the veil with quick, practiced motions, the backs of his knuckles brushing my neck.
My pulse jumped at the feel of his rough skin, hot enough to sear, in such a vulnerable area.
I had no doubt he was capable of killing me with his bare hands if he had reason to, and that he would do it in a blink.
It should have scared me, driven a wider wedge between us, but all it did as he carefully tugged the fabric over my nose and made sure it didn’t block my view, was dampen my panties.
His nostrils flared, his kethra brightening as they shifted towards yellow, but he stepped back as if he’d caught himself too close to something venomous.
“Good?”
I swallowed, trying to steer my thoughts to where they should have been.
“Good.”
With a nod he opened the door and strode into the corridor. According to Earth standards, propriety was letting the woman go first, but I understood how in a warrior culture that would be reversed. The male would exit first to be sure there was no danger.
I didn’t analyze the fact that what some would have called caveman behavior didn’t bother me. This was how his people were, and this was where I now lived.
The tunnels were quieter due to the early hour, though not empty. A few Morraki moved with the purposeful strides I was beginning to associate with someone carrying out duties, and none looked at me more than once.
Perhaps the veil helped hide my strangeness.
Or perhaps they were used to seeing odder things than a Human female following the Torashkar through the tunnels before dawn.
Or, maybe, they’d simply learned not to stare when Rhydek was nearby.
We climbed the stairs in relative silence, although the rush of the wind was always present. I knew we were almost at the arch when it grew to a quiet roar, tendrils of it whipping down to tug at my veil.