Chapter 29
It took a few hours before Ilona regained enough strength to move on her own.
Nymiria stayed at her side, assisting her with whatever she needed.
Aziel excused himself from the cabin nearly an hour before Nymiria did, their eyes lingering on one another longer than usual.
She walked back to the palace with the young witches at her side, all of them asking her questions about her godhood that Nymiria still wasn’t too confident answering.
It would come with time, she supposed. One day, she would get used to having followers—become acclimated to the fact that she wasn’t as worthless as she once believed she was.
Over the course of her twenty-six years, Nymiria had come to learn the exact shape and size of her hands. Looking at them now, they appeared to be hands that did not belong to her. These hands that’d killed, these hands that’d hurt and maimed, that could grow flowers and procure food from thin air…
Had saved a life.
Not just one, but two.
And while she’d never experienced something so physically exhausting before, she’d also never known this sort of relief.
She was not a monster. She was not a plague, nor was she a curse.
Nymiria pushed the door open to the sleeping chambers, peering around the room in search of him.
Despite finding the room empty, she continued forward, following her senses to the washroom.
Her steps were light and careful, her hands in knots in front of her.
When she saw him, her whole body went still, save for that small organ in her chest that pounded so loudly that it was all that she could hear.
With how strongly she felt it, it seemed as if she had two heartbeats instead of one.
He was clean now. And telling by the clarity of the water, Nymiria assumed that he’d repeated the process quite a few times.
Aziel was hunched over his knees in the tub with his arms folded around his bent legs, his head resting against them.
He didn’t move, even as she drew closer to him, he stayed in that position.
And though the display in front of her was enough to draw a gasp from her lungs, she tampered down the urge, swallowing when she saw his mutilated back.
It looked so much worse than she remembered.
Perhaps she’d only focused on the runes when she’d seen it last or perhaps he’d hidden them with a glamour of some sort—afraid of what she might think if she saw every small detail.
There was hardly an inch of skin that wasn’t blemished with some sort of scarring.
Burns, lashes, cuts… he’d experienced it all.
The scars were not just on his back. They covered him. Every single limb.
Nymiria moved forward again, prepared to leave the moment he asked her to, but when the moment never came, she finally knelt by the tub and took the still-dry washcloth from the metal tray beside the spigot.
She dunked it under the water, saturating the cloth before she brought it up to his shoulders and squeezed the water out onto his skin.
Aziel didn’t move. Even as she poured soap onto the cloth and began washing his skin, he remained in that position.
“Are you alright?” She whispered. A nod was all she received in response.
There were things about him that she knew without having to ask.
She knew that he felt vulnerable. She knew that he felt shame—not just because of the scars he’d never shown, but because of what she saw of his power.
He believed that she would change her mind again, now that she’d seen everything.
It wasn't until she rested her hand onto his arm that he finally looked up at her. She knew the look in his eyes, like he was waiting for repulsion. But even when she looked at the claw-like marks that ran from his ear to his jaw, she felt nothing of the sort.
“Why did you hide them?” She whispered.
The scars.
Aziel seemed as if he wanted to turn away from her, his hands curling into fists. “Was it foolish that I once convinced myself that if people saw that I had no scars, it meant that I was far more of a threat? I wanted to give the impression that I was untouchable.”
Nymiria brought her hand up to his chin, her fingers brushing over the stubble along his jaw, stopping when her thumb graced the edge of his scar.
“I don’t want you to hide yourself from me.
” She smiled, releasing him to resume her work.
“It would be rather hypocritical of you. After all you’ve said about accepting myself, I would expect you to do the very same.
” He let out a breathy laugh, shaking his head as she began working on his shoulders.
When she glanced up at him, she could see small, puncture-like scars along his chin. “Any other glamours I should know of?”
He shook his head in response. “No, I believe the scars were my final trick.” He said quietly. “It is exhausting, isn’t it? Hiding the things about you—hoping that, if you can’t see them, they won’t seem so real.”
She fought the impulse to touch the scar on her stomach, the traitor mark that’d been branded into her flesh. Instead, she merely smiled. “I didn’t realize how tired glamours made me until I stopped using them to hide things.” She confessed. “I have you to thank for that.”
“Me?” His brow arched, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “And here I was thinking that you became so brave all on your own.”
She lifted one shoulder and shuffled around the tub, taking his other arm into her hand.
She started with his fingers, slowly working her way up until she reached a crescent-shaped brand on his bicep that matched the ones she’d seen on all of the other male courtesans in Yaar.
“Perhaps the bravery had always been there, residing somewhere inside of me.” She looked up into his eyes, not even remotely startled when she found him staring back at her.
“I have no doubt in my mind that I just needed someone to bring it to life again. Whether or not you want to believe it, I think you’ve healed me in ways that even I can’t begin to explain. ”
“As broken as I am?” He asked.
The look in his eyes shifted, darkening to something that made her body burn. Nymiria drew in a ragged breath, wetting her lips nervously before she spoke again. “Maybe your broken pieces are just the right shape and size to fill the gaps in between mine.”
No matter how many times he’d shown his speed and strength, it was always a surprise to her when he used it.
Before Nymiria could blink, he’d lifted her from the floor and was placing her on top of the vanity.
His body was still dripping with water, his hands dampening the fabric of her thin, white cotton gown.
He was situated between her spread thighs, his forehead pressed against hers.
“You have made me weak.” He breathed against her, one hand coming up to tangle in the hair on the back of her head, tilting her face towards his.
“A weakness I believed I’d never feel again. ”
Nymiria could feel the branches on his chest twisting underneath her fingers, writhing like living things under her touch. She could feel the beating of his heart within its boned cage, hard and fast, as if he were absolutely terrified.
“Even the darkest parts of my soul come to life in your presence. This heart is ruined, Moonflower, but it is yours and yours, alone.” He pressed her hand harder against his chest, those branches seeming to part to make room for her.
“Everything I have done, everything that I have survived was done with you in mind. I have built this life for you. The only reason my heart beats is because of you. And,” he paused, his hand falling away from hers, only to rest upon her hip.
“You have filled every gap in my soul, too.”
“Show me,” Nymiria whispered, eyes moving from where her hand rested against his chest to his eyes.
“Show me that this is real.” His hands moved from her hips to her bottom, gripping it tight as he pulled her closer to him.
Her arousal pulsed the moment her sex pressed against his own, already standing proudly between them.
“Do you know how long I’ve loved you?” He asked.
The sound of those words were still overwhelming, but they did not insight fear in her nearly as much as they had before.
Her heart, that peculiar little creature inside her chest, was a skittish and broken thing.
Perhaps it always would be. But instead of terror, Nymiria felt safe.
Knowing she would have to return to Everand and finish all of this once and for all, she felt the strongest urge to bask in this moment, to allow their hearts a moment of reprieve before terror began anew.
Her hands dragged over Aziel’s sides, fingers trailing over raised flesh and jagged lines. “Tell me.” She said softly.
“I came to you each day until your trial in Yaar. At first, I believed that it was just out of feeling responsible for you. But the first time that you smiled at me, Moonflower, it nearly brought me to my knees.” His thumb brushed over her lower lip, drawing a hot breath from her.
“I had nothing to offer you when I was a boy, but I wanted to provide you with a sense of safety that neither of us ever had. I wanted to give you security. I wanted to—I wanted to give you a home.”