All my life, I never had that. I told myself that I had to be strong, that I had to support the others. The village, the castle, so many people, so many families, depended on me back home. To give them the reassurance they needed, I had learned to suppress my own feelings. I got to the point where I did not even realize I was doing it. Not until the pressure became unbearable, and I nearly broke myself into pieces.
After my fiance died, I lost myself to my pain, to my grief. I did not want to talk to anyone. I remembered shouting at my friend,refusing to see her for months. I even hated my brother because he stood by her through all of it.
My thoughts spiraled and I caught my lip between my teeth, feeling the panic rising up.
“It’s alright. It’s going to be alright,” Tynan kept repeating.
“But what if...?” I could not even finish my sentence.
“I’m with you. I’m always going to be with you.”
I looked up at him. There was so much quiet power behind his umber eyes. It made the dull ache in my heart slowly recede.
Tynan reached for my collar and quickly unbuttoned the front of my flying suit. But, I was just too emotionally drained to respond to his touches.
“Tynan, I don’t . . .” I protested.
His hands stilled for only a moment, then he continued slowly taking my clothes off. Without delaying any further, he pulled me toward the bed. Stupefied, I watched as he picked up my nightgown, and carefully put it over my head, sliding it down my body. Then he sat me down on the edge of the bed.
I closed my eyes while his hands carefully untangled my braid. His fingers moved lightly on the skin of my scalp, massaging the back of my head. Then he moved to my shoulders, rubbing my hardened muscles. The warmth of his touches spread through every inch of my body, releasing the tension that I have had for days.
Later, we lay together in bed, facing each other, and simply talked about everything we could think of. Tynan kept tracing his hand from my shoulder down to my forearm withoutattempting to take it any further. I told him everything that happened while he was unconscious. I shared every fear I had when every hour could have been our last. I confessed how guilty I felt about the marriage ceremony and how nervous I was to face him after.
“Are you mad about it?” I asked when I was done.
“I don’t think I told you before, but I hate celebrations.” He closed his eyes.
I remained silent, just watching him, a little disappointed in his reply. A lazy smile stretched the corners of his mouth and he pressed me closer.
His lips brushed my ear. “I would trade thousands of lifetimes just for one day with you. Before you, I wasn’t living, I didn’t even know what life was.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
FRID
The sun reached into the room long before I was ready to wake up. I opened my eyes, staring at the glass jar that was placed by the bed. The insects were nowhere to be seen. They probably preferred to sleep hidden in the thick leaves when the sun came out. I rolled over, checking on Victor, who was sleeping on his side with his back toward me. The thin sheet was bundled around his narrow waist. I sighed and moved my arm to shield my eyes. It took us a bit to settle down in bed last night. Especially after our big argument the day before. I told him to sleep on the stone floor if he was not comfortable sharing a bed with me, but he, not so politely, declined. For some reason, the fact that both of us were completely naked under the sheets put him on edge. My own undergarments, at least what was left of them, were drying in the pool room. I asked a servant girl if I could get new ones, and was told that the daughters of the goddess did not wear undergarments.
How was that possible? It wasn’t very hygienic.
A light knock sounded by the entrance and I carefully got up, wrapping a light blanket around my chest. Bare foot, I walked toward the flimsy curtain.
“Yes?” I asked.
“Your breakfast, sister. Mahin wants to see you,” the servant girl said.
“When?”
“You have ten minutes.”
That definitely did not seem like the treatment for guests. I glanced back at Victor and cleared my throat.
“I’ll be right out.”
I opened the thin screen that, in this place, was considered a door and picked up a tray. Plates piled with pieces of flatbread cut in lengthy triangles, and a shallow container offered a variety of fruits and vegetables, with a separate earthen bowl placed inside filled with a thick dark brown paste. I closed the partition, noticing that despite the unusual food, my stomach growled in anticipation.
While Victor was still sleeping, I devoured a good half of the plate, leaving most of the vegetables for him, washed up, and quickly dressed in my flying suit. My undergarments appeared completely dry and I was relieved that I would not have to put on my suit with damp underwear.
When I walked out of the room, the servant girl was still waiting in the hall and immediately took me to see Mahin. We walked through the curved halls to an area with elongated, oddly shaped, rooms decorated with plants. The air seemed even more moist in this place, and was filled with scents of freshsoil and blooms. The daughters grew their food in the caves, never having to leave the commune. Along the walls, a current of moving water traveled from room to room, transporting nutrients from one garden bed to the next. Most plants that we passed I had never even seen before. Some of them had bright orange splatters on their leaves and seed pods that nearly touched the ground. Others were dark green with sharp pointy sprouts. But, among them were shrubs of fruits and vegetables I was more familiar with.
