Page 91 of These Immortal Truths
His thumb brushes over her ring, turning the band over her finger. “You are everything I never knew to hope for.”
He heals faster than any mortal, the bruises fading within days instead of weeks, but he carries the fatigue like a chain. Sometimes she catches him nodding off between short pauses in conversation. A week later and he still doesn’t have the strength to travel, and Anna finds herself spending more and more time foraging for what she can until one morning he hands her a small wad of papered money.
“There’s a town two hours walk west of here,” he says. “Buy some supplies and hire help to bring them.”
Anna frowns, uncomfortable with the idea of leaving him alone for so long, but she suspects food is as vital to his recovery as rest. She takes the money and follows Khiran’s directions until she stumbles upon a small town. The locals give her odd looks, and Anna has the sense that she’s paying far more than current value, but money is the least of her concerns.
She hires a farm hand to load the goods onto his horse. It takes some convincing—Anna learns that most of the locals seem to eye the forest with suspicion. She doesn’t know the language, but from their choppy bits of English (and the trouble she had finding someone willing to brave them) Anna suspects they believe it to be cursed.
She’s sure Khiran has absolutely everything to do with it, and she’s eager to hear the story upon her return.
The journey feels longer returning than going. Anna blames the awkward silence and long stares of her temporary travel companion. By the time they emerge from the treeline and into the meadow, the sun has already begun its descent. When they turn the corner around the copse of trees, she spies Khiran sitting on the front steps.
Waiting for her.
“What will come next?” she asks, a whispered question in the dark. The bed is big enough for them to both fit comfortably, though sometimes their elbows and knees knock when they shift. She turns her head, studies his profile in the moonlight. “When you’re better?”
His eyes open, but he doesn’t turn to face her. “I’ll take you back across the ocean. The travel will feel horrible, but you’ll be safer on that side of the world.”
“And with us?”
His silence is deafening.
She sits up, forcing herself into his line of sight. “Khiran?”
“There won’t be an us, Anna. There can’t be.”
“There has been an us for eight centuries,” she argues. “Why would that change now?”
His lips twist into a grimace. “He’ll be keeping closer tabs on me. Once he notices I’m traveling again, he’s certain to pay attention.”
“And if you didn’t? If you stayed in one place?”
His eyes soften with a regret so sharp it cuts. “Then he would know I’ve found something worth staying for.”
Anna shakes her head, loose curls brushing over her shoulder. “I don’t understand. Is he this controlling with everyone?”
“He believes himself above everyone, so in a true narcissist fashion—yes. Absolutely.” He winces. “Though I admit my rather … rebellious start hasn’t done me any favors in that regard.”
Somehow, the thought of him spending his youth causing trouble comes as absolutely no surprise. “Is that why you can’t interfere?”
He nods. “My punishment for believing myself greater than I am,” he says, the words coated in a bitterness so old it’s stale. An echo from someone else’s mouth.
Loosely, she laces their fingers—watches as her thumb traces the lines in his palm. “I’m not afraid of him.”
His hand flexes against her own, tightening until his knuckles go white and she finally looks up at him. “You should be,” he says, andeven though it’s no louder than a whisper, she feels it like a gunshot. The echoes of it reverberate in her chest. “Anna, youneedto be.”
The breath sits in her lungs, a still, hollow ache, as she searches his face. His eyes are wide, imploring. She can map out and memorize every fleck of blue and green in his irises. Her hand rises, pushing a dark curl away from his face before settling on his cheek. Her gaze dips, grazing his parted lips. How long has it been since she’s kissed him? How long since she’s let herself drown in his embrace?
She meets his eyes, wills her words reach his heart despite how softly they fall from her lips. “Fear is for mortals.” She tilts her chin, their breath mingling. “You taught me that, remember?”
The grimace he wears is painful. His nose brushes hers, foreheads touching. “This is different. Anna, please—”
She closes the distance, lips capturing whatever words he would have uttered. Rejecting them before they could be born from his parted mouth. Slowly, reverently, he moves against her like a sigh. Soft and measured, trying to draw out each movement to its fullest.
He tastes like pasts and futures, like whispered memories and lucid dreams. He feels like cominghome.
Anna shifts, straddling his lap. The urge to press herself against him, to sink into him until the weight of it robs the breath from their lungs, makes her breath stutter. But she won’t risk causing injury to the fragile, partially-healed ribs along his torso. Instead, she hovers over him, kisses him until she’s certain she would float away if not for the hands gripping her thighs.
