Chapter 36 #2
There she was, bent over, gasping. Real. I didn’t hesitate, didn’t think, just grabbed her, kissed her, and felt that golden light flood back into the hollow space inside me.
I was never letting her go.
She kissed me back with equal desperation, and finally, finally, the world righted itself.
I nearly took her right there, in that ruined temple.
She seemed more than willing. But Finn’s presence registered behind me, and I forced myself to release her mouth, though I couldn’t stop touching her completely.
My hands settled on her waist, spanning that impossibly small distance.
“This isn’t over,” I warned her.
She looked up at me, eyes glazed in desire, lips swollen from my kiss. Good. “No,” she said softly, her hand cupping my cheek. “It’s just beginning.”
When Finn appeared, she pulled away from me and I let her go. Barely. Watching her hug him was tolerable, but when he kissed the top of her head, something primal snarled in my chest. Mine. The word pounded through me with every heartbeat, like a creature clamoring to be released.
She glanced back at me, a question in her eyes, and I was beside her before she could blink, arm around her waist. I didn’t care what Finn thought. She was mine and I had to touch her, confirm she was real and solid and here.
I climbed the stairs at her side, her eyes finding mine and warming with a small smile that chased away the last recesses of my panic.
Then the smile faded, and she began to crumble.
I caught her before she hit the ground, cradling her in my arms. She was so still. If not for the slight rise and fall of her chest I would have thought…
“Andrei,” Finn said frantically, voicing my own thought.
I didn’t respond, just gathered her against my chest and teleported, somehow, directly to the healing wing, my heart pounding wildly.
I carried her through the healing wing, bellowing Andrei’s name, feeling her heartbeat against my chest. Too fast. Too erratic. When Andrei appeared and gestured to a bed, I reluctantly laid her down, fighting the urge to keep her cocooned in my arms.
“She is in stasis,” Andrei told me. “Her body shut down to protect itself. Her soul doesn’t know where to exist. The magic is trapping her between the realms.”
“What can I do?” I sat at her side, holding her hand. I hadn’t released her since catching her fall.
“Her soul needs an anchor here.” His look was appraising. “You said you couldn’t feel her when she was gone.”
I stared at her face. She was still—too still. Even in sleep, she moved more than this. Her face was pale, her chest barely rising and falling. She couldn’t leave me. Not now. Not ever.
“She’s always there.” I pressed my free hand to my chest. “A presence in here.” I finally spoke the secret that I’d kept all these months. “She’s my mate.”
There. I had given voice to the thought that had consumed me for so long. Thank the seven gods Finn hadn’t caught up yet.
“I wondered. The way you act with her…”
“What can I do?” My hand shook as I stroked her hair back from her face.
“Focus on the bond, lad. Pour everything you feel for her into that connection and anchor her to you. In this tentative state, that’s all we can do. Give her something to follow back.”
I shifted into the chair he brought, never releasing her hand, and did exactly as he said. I poured everything I felt down that whisper of a bond. Everything I’d held back. Everything I’d denied.
I didn’t know how long I sat there, sending my feelings into that bond.
Feeling the thread strengthen was the only thing that could quell my terror.
Freya came by several times, urging me to take a break and let her spell me.
But there was no way I was leaving my princess.
Ever. Finn sat in a chair on her other side, quietly shifting through books and occasionally making the scratching sound with his quill.
He didn’t try talking to me, even through our connection.
I think he knew better. Something had shifted irrevocably between us while she had been gone.
But now was not the time to sort through that.
I had no idea how much time had passed, how long we had been there, when her eyes fluttered beneath the eyelids.
“Princess?” I whispered, unable to believe what I was seeing.
Her eyes opened.
Knee-wobbling relief swept through me as those beautiful turquoise eyes focused on me.
“I heard you. I think I heard everything you said. It brought me back to you,” I whispered to him, a few tears leaking out. He caught them before they rolled down my face, and kissed their tracks.
“When did you know we were mates?” I asked, my fingers threaded with his.
He kissed behind my ear. “I felt it the minute you looked at me for the first time. Then, when you stepped into my arms that first day, it flowed through me so strongly I was shocked you didn’t feel it. All I could think was ‘mine.’”
“I did feel it. Or felt my own something. Warm golden light, spreading throughout me. A golden thread searching for something. Someone.” I shook my head and laughed a little. “But there were so many things happening I dismissed it. I didn’t know what it was.”
“I knew,” he whispered, kissing my brow.
“I knew from the rightness that came when you were there. But I didn’t let myself accept it.
Because how could you be mine? And then you were gone.
I knew for certain I had fucked up. I’d had this precious thing in my life and it had just disappeared.
I hadn’t claimed you as mine. I hadn’t even told you. ”
“I’m sorry.”
He tilted my face toward his. “No more sorry. I know why you did it. And it brought us here. But I’ll be damned if I’m letting you go now.”
I spun in his arms and climbed into his lap, straddling him. He groaned as he rubbed against me. And then my stomach betrayed me, growling.
Stopping his assault of kisses on my neck, he raised his head. “Was that you?”
I grinned sheepishly. “I may be a bit hungry.”
“We can’t have that.” He pushed the covers back and tried to settle me next to him, but I wrapped my legs around his waist and held on. “Princess,” he said in warning as my stomach growled again. I refused to move, so he picked me up. “I can’t have you fainting and going into stasis again.”
“Are you hungry?”
He eyed me. “Ravenous.” He dropped his head to take my nipple into his mouth.
My hand cupped the back of his head, fingers digging into his skull, holding him there.
He sucked long and hard before he shook his head free of my grasp and kissed me quickly.
He unlatched my feet from around his waist with one hand, the other arm still clasping me to him.
He groaned as I slowly shimmied down his body until my feet touched the floor.
“But I’ll have to wait. You need food.” He quickly pulled his pants on but forewent a shirt. “Get dressed. I’ll meet you downstairs.”
I admired the view from behind, the muscles bunching in his back, until he disappeared.
Sighing, I viewed my leathers. I really didn’t want to wear those right now.
Investigating the drawers turned up nothing so I turned to the wardrobe.
It was full of clothes, both men’s and women’s, and somehow everything was precisely our sizes.
I sorted through them until I found one that made me grin.
This was perfect. And I wasn’t going to question where this, or any of the clothes, came from. Just more magic associated with this cottage.
As I came down the stairs, I took time now to notice the interior of the cottage.
It was just as cozy on the inside as it had appeared on the outside.
The stairs ended in a main room with a couch and a fireplace, a kitchen just beyond it.
The warm honey tones of the wood gave everything a cheery glow.
I made my way slowly to the kitchen, sore from all the old places and some new ones.
He looked over at me from the pantry as I came in and froze. “Fuck.”
“What?” I asked innocently, running my hands over my hips.