“I still know that I should hate you for what you’ve had me do. I should hate you for being a distraction. I should hate you for everything you are. All those voices—the voices of everyone I knew and all who taught me—still live in me.”
“And yet?” I give sound to the words left hovering after his sentiment.
“And yet…” he echoes, so faint that I wonder if I imagine it. “Yet, I find myself more ensnared by you each day. I find my upbringing easier to fight, ignore, or outright forget. I find that even being frustrated with you is a thorny bramble that only pulls me closer to you.” His one arm snakes around my waist, jerking me toward him. Our bodies are completely flush. His front melts into mine. “Floriane, you are fire, and chaos, and infinite possibility. You’ve brought not just a heat and heartbeat to these halls but to my bones. I don’t want to move forward without you at my side, so long as you will have me, so long as you want to explore us.”
“Us?” I manage to ask. The words are slowing the world. The time between each beat of his heart, strong under my fingers, grows longer. This is what I’ve been wanting and missing: him. His closeness. Nearness.
“Despite all odds, despite my wants and fears and every scrap of better judgment, despite knowing that I do not deserve you after all I’ve done to you and your loved ones, I fear I might be falling in love with you.”
Love.
How I wanted to be loved. I spent years imagining this moment—where a man swept me into his arms and claimed he wanted me. Not for the prestige of the forge maiden. Not for the clout my family brought in Hunter’s Hamlet, or the safety of being surrounded by silver. But for me.
Me.
And here it is. That dream realized. In the shape of the man who’s both taken and given me everything.
“What about your people?” I manage to say, thinking of where we last left things. Of the hurtful words we still need to sort through.
“The world will say I shouldn’t. But I care less and less for what the world thinks. I choose you.” He continues to stare down at me with that same intensity as before. The same that I know he’s turning inward.
“What will happen to us after this is over?” I come back to that question that hangs around us like an uncomfortable chaperone.
His grip tightens as if someone has already told him to let me go. “If this curse can be broken, then we could find a way to live as any two lovers would. So long as you want to remain with me.”
Lovers. Living. Life after the curse and the long night that I’ve been trapped in alongside him since my birth.
There was never an end to it outside of my wildest dreams. In my waking hours, there has only ever been sustaining and persevering despite all odds. What would I even want my life to look like on the other side?
“I fell asleep in a different time, dreaming of a future. I woke disheartened and forlorn. But the future I dared hope for is you,” he murmurs, the tip of his nose touching mine. His eyes are aflame as he tries to strike me down with his gaze alone. “Tell me what you want, Floriane. I’m sorry I took the choice from you once; I never will ever again, I swear it. Say the word and I am gone, say the word and I am yours. Do you choose me?”
My heart is hammering so hard that my ribs rattle. My head aches. “I want—”
Lavenzia interrupts me as she rounds the corner, hastily announcing, “He’s awake.”
