She stayed quiet, giving him space to continue at his own pace.
“Kessa was… gentle. Patient.” A small smile ghosted across his features. “She loved growing things. Our home was filled with plants from every region of Ciresia, each one carefully tended and coaxed to thrive.”
“She sounds wonderful.”
“She was. And when our daughter Lira was born, Kessa taught her about plants and patience and finding joy in small moments. Not always easy when she had inherited my stubbornness as well.” His smile faded. “Lira was five when the Red Death came, and I wasn’t with her in the end. The Council had summoned all of our warriors to the capitol, trying desperately to find a solution. But there was none, and their efforts meant I was not with my family at the end.”
Her throat tightened at the pain in his voice.
“I came home and they were gone and I was alone in a house filled with dead plants because no one had watered them and I could not—I could not?—”
She moved without thinking, pulling him into an embrace that probably looked absurd given their size difference. But he folded around her anyway, his face pressed against her shoulder while his body shook with grief too long suppressed.
She held him while he mourned. Stroked her hands over his back and murmured wordless comfort and let him break apart in thesafety of her arms. Eventually the shaking subsided. Selik pulled back, scrubbing at his face with visible embarrassment.
“Forgive me. I did not mean to?—”
“Stop.” She cupped his face between her hands, forcing him to meet her eyes. “You don’t apologize for grief. Not to me. Not ever.”
“It has been years. I should be past this by now.”
“There’s no timeline for mourning someone you loved. The grief changes shape, but it doesn’t just disappear because enough time has passed.” She stroked her thumbs over his cheekbones, feeling the subtle texture of his skin. “And you’ve been carrying this alone for too long.”
He leaned into her touch like a man starving for contact. “After they died, I left Ciresia. I hated the Council for calling me away when they needed me, and I could not bear to remain in that house, surrounded by reminders of everything I had lost. I joined the Patrol because it gave me a purpose that did not require emotional vulnerability.”
“Did it help?”
“It gave me something to do. Somewhere to direct the rage and helplessness that had nowhere else to go.” His hands came up to cover hers where they still framed his face. “But it did not heal anything. Just… postponed the sorrow until I was strong enough to face it.”
“And now?”
“Now you and the children have reminded me that life continues even after loss. That building something new does not dishonor what came before.”
Tears pricked her own eyes. She understood that guilt too well, the feeling that moving forward somehow betrayed the memory of those who’d been left behind.
“After my husband died, I grieved. But I also felt guilty because our marriage had been more about companionship than romance, and I kept wondering if there was something wrong with me that I couldn’t feel more devastated.”
“Grief is not a competition. Different relationships inspire different responses.”
“I know. Intellectually, I know that. But it didn’t stop me from feeling like I’d failed him somehow.” She picked at the hem of her tunic, not meeting his eyes. “And then there was Anya. She was twelve when David died, angry at the world and especially angry at me for being there when he was not.”
“She seems to have softened toward you now.”
“Trauma has a way of clarifying priorities. When you’re fighting to survive, petty resentments don’t seem as important.” She managed a weak smile. “Not that I’m grateful for the abduction exactly, but at least something good came from it. Anya and I have built something real now instead of just going through the motions.”
“The groundwork was already there,” he said gently. “She was grateful you were there for her, even if she couldn’t express it.”
He reached out and pulled her against his side, tucking her into the shelter of his larger body. She went willingly, pressing her face against his chest and breathing in his scent—something clean and spicy that she’d come to associate with safety.
“We are both carrying scars from losses that changed us in fundamental ways. But perhaps we fit together better as a result.”
“Is that what this is? Broken pieces finding new configurations?”
“Among other things.” His hand stroked over her hair, the gesture so tender it made her heart ache. “I meant what I said before. What I feel for you is not an obligation or an attempt to reclaim the past through someone new. It is want, s’kara. It is need. Pure and terrifying and absolutely real.”
She pulled back enough to look up at him. His eyes held hers with an intensity that stole her breath. The connection that had been there since the moment they met and the hunger that had been building ever since, growing stronger with every shared meal and quiet conversation and brief touch.
“I want you too.” She reached up and traced the line of his jaw, fascinated by the nubbed texture of his skin. So different from human smoothness, but so intriguing. “I want this. Whatever we can build together, even if it’s messy and complicated and doesn’t follow any traditional patterns.”
