two vicious Norse seaxes pinned her so deliciously to their marital bed. Tallis made her remember what it was to be strong. If she could fight and win against such a man, in a contest of bodies, hearts and wills, then she could take on all comers.
She elbowed upward, connecting with his ribs. “A little air, please.”
Rather than roll away, Tallis shoved his arms beneath her body, hugging her while holding her fast against the mattress. He kissed her nape, licked, suckled the sore skin. She shivered, knowing with bone-deep certainty that in the future, he would only need to touch her there—and she’d be ready for him. Such a sensitive place. So much primitive symbolism.
“You were right,” he said, the words rumbling from his chest into her back. “You kept pace. Fuck for fuck.”
She elbowed him again as he laughed. “I wasn’t that crude.”
“You acted like it.”
He used those sure arms to roll them both over. She tucked against his side and sighed. Did all brides feel this way on their wedding night?
Looking up at Tallis’s sharp jaw and the untamed mass of his sweat-damp hair, she had her answer. No. No other bride had felt this way, because they hadn’t been with her man.
Her husband?
Yes, that felt right. In her heart. Forget the human trappings of ceremonies. This was the Pendray way. They were married.
A tiny, almost silent voice in a tucked-away corner of her heart wanted the Indranan way, too. She didn’t need to know everything in his mind, but she wanted a taste of how he processed thought, how he saw color, how he heard sound. A married Indranan couple would share those little intimacies. She would never know them about Tallis. No matter how exhilarating their commitment had been, part of her remained restless.
She loved him. She trusted him. But she didn’t
“I don’t make idle promises,” she said, working to push those misgivings aside.
“I’m learning that.”
Stroking his stomach, she kissed his throat just below his stubbled jaw. “I love you.”
“I’ve said that before,” he said carefully, “but not to you.”
She elbowed up so she could look at him face to face. Her breasts pooled across his upper chest. Soft to hard. Heart to heart. “To her? Whoever she is?”
“Like a kid professing his love for an actress.” He waved one hand haplessly toward their entwined bodies. “How was I supposed to know?”
“Know . . .” Kavya tilted her head. That heart to heart was hammering now, tense and breathless—just shy of scared. “Know what?”
His blue eyes had never been clearer or more earnest. “What love is supposed to feel like. It feels like us, Kavya. I love you.”
Swallowing was impossible. So was knowing anything but the miracle of his words. She flung her arms around his head in history’s most haphazard hug. He rolled her again, both of them laughing and whispering words Kavya had never thought she’d hear. Love, commitment, the rightness of being together and the unconventional choice they’d made.
“But I’m not going to rest until you’re safe,” Tallis said. “There’s too much of me wrapped up in you. We won’t make choices born of fear. And I need to know who infected my brain all these years. I love you, but we’re not there yet. I can’t . . . settle. Do you feel that in me?”
Balancing her elbows on either side of his throat, she placed her palms flat against his cheeks. She’d done that from the first. It remained the surest way of reading him. “I can’t say I feel it so much as know it. You’re an honorable man, beneath all you’ve done. What you’ve done was in service of a higher, noble goal, no matter her slithering techniques.”
“Maybe. But then I think of the other people I’ve harmed, not just my niece. The other Dragon Kings I’ve killed. Some ends have been worth the means. Others . . . I don’t know whose ends they benefited. The greater good, or the person behind the voices and dreams?” The jaw muscles bunched beneath her palms. “I can’t live like that.”
“
He placed his hands over hers and squeezed her fingers. “My Kavya.”
“Yes.” She kissed him full on the mouth, giving him the emotion bubbling and fizzing through her body, infusing her heart with such clarity. “Yours.”
She lay against him, with her head cradled in that special spot where his shoulder hollowed in its sloping reach for his chest. Closing her eyes was . . . easy. With Tallis, she could sleep. It was another beautiful gift that she’d never thought possible for her. She was once-blessed. Never cursed. Together they would find a way to solve both of their problems and make a future with each other.
The last thing she heard in the quiet mist before sleep was the low, gentle rumble of Tallis’s soft snores—an audible reminder that she was exactly where she needed to be, where lassitude was welcome rather than something to be warded off at all cost.
Boneless.
Melting.
Dreaming.
She bolted upright and screamed again. The seaxes. She needed them. Run. Where was she?
Strong arms clasped her upper arms. “Kavya, stop. Stop!”
The voice was deep and dear, but she couldn’t obey. She twisted and kicked. She saw only black, then red, then a familiar face dripping with blood.
“Chandrani!”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-NINE
Tallis’s blood seized, frozen like a river during an Arctic winter.
“She should’ve been back with her family,” he said. “You made sure of it. That’s what brought Pashkah down on us in Bhuntar.”
“I did.” Kavya’s voice was stripped. She vibrated beneath his hands, ready to hit him or run—either seemed likely. “But . . . I saw her beaten. She was stripped almost bare. Black Guardsmen had her.”
“Where? Back in the Panjal?”
For the first time since screaming them both to wakefulness, Kavya calmed somewhat. She turned. Her beautiful face was haunted by shadows, with sunken cheeks. Her focus was divided between Castle Clannarah and a distant place. She blinked, looked down at where he gripped her arms. “Tallis?”
“Yes. I’m here.”
“Where she is . . . I don’t know. But there was no snow. There was a—” She shook her head. “There was a tall . . . rock? It was covered in gray moss. I smelled salt.”
“We need more than that, goddess. Think hard. Go deeper. I know you can.” He pushed the hair back from her temples and held her head in his hands, cradling the place where she stored so many amazing gifts, the least
