Torvik scooted closer to Kara, his small palms padding silently against the stone.The child’s gray skin had lost the sickly black threading that had crawled out from the wound on his leg, and his too-large amber eyes looked brighter now, soft and curious, though there was still a fragility to him that pulled at Nick’s protective instincts like a hook.
“You glow,” Torvik told Kara, his tone serious as if he was reporting something incredibly important.
Kara’s whole face softened.“Only when I’m showing off.”
The boy nodded, accepting this as fundamental natural law.“Can you show off again?”
“Not right now, sweetheart.”Kara glanced across at Nick, and for the first time since the healing, the humor in her eyes thinned out.“I need to rest a little.”
Nick was across the space before anyone could move to stop him, not that anyone tried.The troll matrons parted for him in a slow, grudging tide, several of them giving him the narrow-eyed, sidelong scrutiny of females not entirely convinced he was qualified to stand near his own mate.
He crouched at Kara’s knees and laid both hands on them, one on each, his thumbs settling against the familiar shape of her like he was anchoring himself there.“How much did it take out of you?”he asked, voice low.
She laid her hands over his, “I’m okay.”
His wolf snarled in response to the words, which it had heard before and did not believe.
Kara sighed.“I’m tired.Not dying.There’s a difference.”
“You should have let me know how much it hurt and took out of you.”He frowned as he realized something.“You somehow blocked it from me.I don’t like it when you block me.”
She rolled her eyes.“I was a little busy not letting the troll child die, Nick.I wasn’t blocking you on purpose.”
His jaw tightened.He turned his head and found Torvik still pressed against Kara’s side, watching him without an ounce of fear, the way only very small creatures and very dangerous ones could.
“You scared her,” Torvik said.
Nick blinked.“What?”
Kara made a small, dismayed sound.“Oh, wow.”
The boy frowned, working through his words with the careful effort of a child pulling together truth from fragments.“You roared loud.Her heart jumped.”
Nick looked back at Kara, and the world around them quieted in his hearing.“I scared you?”
“No.”Her answer came too fast.
His eyes narrowed.
She glanced away, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear in the small, telling movement she always made when she was about to admit something she didn’t want to.“Maybe a little.But not because I thoughtyou’dhurtme.Never that.”Her voice dropped, soft enough that the troll matrons couldn’t hear her over their own breathing.“Because I knewyouwere terrified.”Her words became silent to the rest of the room as she used their bond to communicate.“I know what you’ve been through, what we’ve been through.I don’t like feeling those feelings coming from you.We’ve walked through hell and made it out so many times.Not only did we make it out, we came out of it with the most precious gift ever, something I never thought we’d have.And she’s been blessed by the Great Luna.She’s not going to give us a mini warrior only to take her away before she’s even had a chance to make a difference in this world.I love you, Nick.And just like you want to protect me, I want to protect you.I want to make sure that you feel the safety that you make me feel.So, yes, I was scared, because seeing fear in your eyes for me, for us, is scary to me.”
That truth landed harder than he wanted it to.It hit somewhere just under his sternum, and stayed there.He reached up and cupped the side of her face, brushing his thumb along her cheekbone, slowly, because his hand wanted to shake and he was not going to let it.“You were in pain.”
“I know.”
“And I couldn’t get to you.”
“I know,” she whispered.
The bond between them pulsed, warm and aching, and he stopped trying to keep his end of it shielded because there was no point.He let her feel it.The fear.The rage.The love so deep that it lived in his bones, a constant living force that always pushed him towards her.The helplessness that had nearly broken something inside him when she’d staggered under that unseen force.
She leaned into his touch and closed her eyes for a heartbeat.“I’m okay.”
“You keep saying that like it fixes what happened.”How could he get her to understand that one of the few things that could destroy him would be seeing her in agony?Nick wanted her life to be peaceful.He wanted to give her all the things she deserved, including a life where something strange under the troll realm wasn’t trying to get to his mate.Perhaps he should care more that the troll child obviously needed help.But all Nick could see was his Kara.She was his constant.His world.And he’d burn the rest of it to the ground, walk in the ash with a smile on his face if it kept her safe.
A faint smile tugged at her mouth.“It usually annoys you enough to distract you.”
“Not this time.”
