The Knife
COLSAR
Colsar had been sitting there for some time, staring at the far wall with no real sense of how long it had been since Asharin walked away.
He had known this moment might come, that when given the choice, she might choose a fresh start for herself.
He could not blame her. Even if she loved him, perhaps love was not enough to outweigh everything else she had now.
Her crown, her family, her power, her second chance at life.
This pain was different from the one that had hollowed him out when he believed her dead.
This one he could carry if it were her decision.
If she were happy on the other side of it.
A sound at the tunnel mouth broke the silence. He looked up, heart lurching, as Asharin stepped through. Another voice followed hers, female and low.
“I am not qualified, truly—”
“But you are.”
Asharin appeared first. Just seeing her made his chest tighten so intensely it almost stopped his breath. Behind her came Fiersa. Colsar recognized her at once.
“You’re Iavis’s sister,” he said.
“Yes,” Fiersa answered with a small smile.
Normally he would wonder why the fuck she was here, in his chamber uninvited, but his mind could only focus on Asharin.
She walked to him slowly, her hands trembling as she held out a black box. “Open it. Pick out the jewelry that suits me best.”
He did not know what sort of strange test this was but obliged all the same.
He lifted the lid. Inside lay rows of jewelry—sapphires, emeralds, diamonds—none of them right for her. None of them looked like something she would wear.
“I do not know,” he said. “None of these—”
She stepped closer, close enough that he could feel the warmth of her. “Exactly. None of them suit me.”
Her voice stayed calm even though her hands still shook.
“The jewelry I want most from you is already around my neck.” She pulled the blue diamond ring she wore on a chain around her neck out of her dress.
“I want to be yours. I want to be your wife. I do not want anything else in this new life I have been given.”
He closed his eyes, determined to stay calm. Determined to let her finish talking.
She paused. “But I only want it if you want that too.”
A single tear slipped down his cheek before he could stop it. He wiped it away and glanced at Fiersa before turning back to Asharin. “Why is she here?”
“You implied the marriage wasn’t valid,” Asharin said. “To fix it, we need a witness. And she is the only being in Morrath I can think of that can cross the wards.”
Fiersa nodded. “Exactly.”
Asharin took the knife from the table and drew it across his palm in one clean line. “In Morrath the marriage is sealed with a blood exchange, apparently.” She lifted his hand to her mouth and licked across the cut slowly, never breaking eye contact.
Heat surged through him so fast his breath caught. The sight of her tongue moving over his skin, the warm, wet drag of it, sent a rush straight down his body. He was hard in an instant, the sudden tightness in his pants almost painful.
He reached for the knife with his other hand, cut her palm even though it made something twist in his chest to hurt her, and slowly lifted her hand to his mouth. The taste was sweet and perfect, copper and warmth and her. He licked the cut clean, savoring it, unable to look anywhere but at her.
They stared at each other for what felt like an age, the air between them thick and charged.
Fiersa cleared her throat. “Signatures?” She passed them a quill and a small sheet of parchment.
Asharin signed first. Then Colsar did, his hand still trembling slightly from the blood on his tongue.
“You may go,” Asharin said calmly.
Fiersa had barely stepped out of the chamber when Colsar moved. A low growl tore from him, his canines flashing in a way they rarely did. He rolled her onto her back on the bed, his body covering hers as his mouth found hers with desperate hunger.
“I chose you,” she said between kisses, breathless. “And I will in every lifetime, in every scenario or place or time. Do not ever do that to me again.”
He pulled back just enough to see her face. “Which part?”
“Watch me touch myself,” she whispered. “Watch me stare at you with want and longing and not touch me back.”
He started to speak, but she pressed her hand over his mouth and leaned in close to his ear.
“Fix it.”
That was all he needed. He rolled her fully onto her back, his hand already sliding up beneath the nightdress, and told her in a low, rough voice, “Let’s try again.”