Her hands press harder to me, her voice fierce even in its softness. “You were young, angry, forced into something you didn’t ask for. Those weren’t your promises. They were your father’s. Hers. Not yours. And yes, I’m sorry for Maureen and for her family. Death is tragic no matter the how. But you cannot believe you made her tie that anchor. That was her choice. Not yours. Never yours, my sweet Kael.”
For years I have lived with that weight pressing against my ribs, that conviction that it was my hands that dragged her under. I whisper it into the hollow between us: “For years I’ve felt like it was my hands that did it. Not by intent, but by consequence. I thought I could fix it, and I failed.”
The silence after my words is heavy, like pebbles dropped into a still pool. And then another truth claws free, bitter and hard.
“Idris,” I snarl. “He must have found Maureen’s mother. Used her grief. Fed the bitterness. Promised revenge to any who would listen. That old woman—you saw her, Telya. He used her pain as a weapon against you. Againstus.And I swear by all the old gods, by the tides and by the storm, I will make him suffer for that offense.”
Her hands frame my face now, her voice a balm. “It’s okay. Shh. The past can’t touch what we are, what we have. Not now.”
And then she folds into me, wholly, completely—Phoebe pours herself into the frantic beating of my chest, her trust a weight I do not deserve and yet crave more than breath. The room fills with her scent, citrus and warmth mixing with sea and mint. It smells of her. It smells of truth, however ugly, however complicated.
“You should have told me sooner,” she murmurs, soft but sure.
The words strike true, blunt as a hammer. But they are not accusation—they are longing. A plea that I might have trusted her with the darkness sooner, that she might have borne it with me.
I lift her chin with a thumb, careful as if she were glass, and meet her luminous gaze.
“You are right,” I admit, my voice breaking on the tide of it. “I should have told you. I wanted to shield you from the darker stories of my blood, but I see now that secrecy is its own cruelty.”
Her name spills from me like a benediction, like a prayer that might save my soul. “Phoebe. Do you really forgive me?”
And in that moment, as I wait for her answer, I am more afraid than I have ever been on any battlefield.
“I forgive you,” she says, without hesitation.
And it fixes me. it heals me. Even as she speaks it I know she means it. I can feel it in the zareth we share.
“But from now on,” she says, sitting astride my hips now, “we talk about everything. All of it. No more secrets.”
I smile then—real, genuine, and I feel her light filling all the dark spaces inside of me—warming me.
This woman doesn’t just brighten my life—she illuminates the entirety of Nightfall.
I pull her close, anchoring her to me, to the present.
“No more secrets,” I agree.
“Tomorrow I shall have my guards hunt for signs of Maureen’s mother. I will learn what Idris promised her, how he did it, and I swear you will be safe, my love. But right now, we should rest. Dawn will demand our strength, and there are things to mend.”
I press a kiss to her brow, slow and steady, a vow made flesh.
“Yes, we should rest,” she says. But the wicked curve of her grin undoes me.
She shifts, teasing, her body sliding against mine with deliberate provocation, coasting her slick sex along my hardened staff.
Heat rips through me.
My control splinters.
“I suppose we can sleep after,” I murmur, and crush my mouth to hers.
Her laugh is a whisper against my lips.
“Good idea.”
I slide into her slowly, desperately.
“You feel so good, Telya. So perfect. That’s it, ride me. Show me how I make you feel.”
