We collapse together, breathing hard, skin slick with sweat despite the cool air. His weight presses me into the blankets. I can notice his heart racing against my ribs, gradually slowing as reality reassembles around us.
The magic peaks and crashes, every bell in the forge ringing in one final massive chord before falling silent.
We collapse together, breathing hard, skin slick with sweat despite the cool air.
Slowly, reality reassembles around us.
The forge is quiet now except for our breathing and the distant celebration still carrying from the tavern. Khaivor's weight presses me into the blankets. I feel his heart racing against my ribs, gradually slowing.
He lifts his head,looking at me with something raw and unguarded in his expression.
"I didn't hurt you?"
"No." I brush damp hair back from his face. "You didn't hurt me."
"The magic?—"
"Was beautiful." I cut in sharply.
He stares at me like I've said something incomprehensible.
I cup his face in both hands. "You're allowed to want things, Khaivor. You're allowed to have them."
His eyes close. When he speaks, his voice is barely audible. "I have never felt peace anywhere. Not in decades. Not since I was young enough to believe the world was kind." He opens his eyes again, holding my gaze. "But here. With you. In this forge that smells like smoke and metal and you. This is the only place that has ever felt like I could stop running."
The confession settles deep beside the realization I've been avoiding all week.
I'm in love with him.
Completely. Irrevocably. In love with this careful, broken, impossibly gentle being.
"Then stop running," I whisper.
"What if?—"
"Stay." I pull him down to me again. "Just stay."
He kisses me instead of answering.
We stay tangled together while the forge grows cold around us.
Everything I want is right here.
8
KHAIVOR
Iwake to warmth before I wake to thought.
For a long moment I don’t move. She sleeps beside me, her breath slow and even against my shoulder, her hair loose across the pillow like dark silk spilled by accident.
Morning light slips through the shutters in thin gold ribbons, painting the room in soft amber bands that make everything feel hushed and impossibly gentle.
My instincts arrive late.
Normally I wake alert, measuring distance and danger before my eyes fully open. Those habits try to rise now, but they feel slow and misplaced, as though they no longer belong in this room.
Because there is nothing here that feels like danger.
