Page 68 of May: Bloom & Bane

I crawl to her, wanting nothing more than to be in her arms. I collapse against her, my whole body shaking as I bury my face into her neck.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper, over and over again. “I’m so sorry.”

“Stop,” she murmurs, running her fingers through my hair. “You have nothing to apologize for, Sage.”

“I couldn’t even finish what I started.”

“Then we don’t finish it tonight,” she says firmly.

I stare into her jade-green eyes.

“You’re not angry?”

“Angry?” She cups my face, wiping away the tears. “Sage, you just told me that if you seal the bond, you’ll lose me. Why would I be angry that you’re trying to keep me safe?”

“Because I want you,” I choke out. “I want to be inside you. I want to seal the bond and make you ním in every way possible. And I can’t.”

“I know,” she whispers. “I can feel it.”

She takes my hand and presses it over her chest where her heart is still beating wildly.

“I’m already neeth, Sage. We don’t need the bond sealed to know we belong to each other.”

“But what if—” My voice cracks. “What if we never can? What if the warning never goes away?”

“Then we’ll figure that out when we get there,” she murmurs, “together. But right now I’m just grateful you listened to the warning. Because I don’t want to lose you either.”

I pull her close, inhaling the floral scent of her hair.

“Í amar thé,” I whisper. “I love you so much it terrifies me.”

“I love you too,” she whispers back.

The canvas is cold beneath me when I wake up. My wing is folded at an angle that’s going to make itself known for days. Eden is still sleeping, her copper hair spread across my chest. She said she loved me like it was the simplest truth she had ever spoken, and I have never heard anything that frightened me more.

The morning light is pale, barely peeking through the window. Nook is silent, content in the way it gets when Eden is relaxed. I flex my wings, trying to work out the cramps when I sense something in the meadow. Ashán stirs first to life. I sit up slowly, careful not to wake her. I search through the window, but there’s nothing out there.

—EDEN

I’ve been awake for an hour, maybe longer. Sage is still sleeping behind me, his large hand spread across my stomach.

His breathing is slow and even against my hair.

I should wake him, but the thing at the edge of the meadow has been pulling at me since he came back to bed earlier.

Hunger bleeds into me. It’s the kind of hunger that’s been living in someone’s bones for so long they’ve forgotten what being full feels like.

It pulls at something in my chest, the specific ache I get when something is suffering.

Sage stirs behind me, pulling me closer.

“Vash’míren,” he whispers. (Good morning) His sleepy voice is doing terrible things to my sore body. He presses a lingering kiss to the nape of my neck. “Let’s stay in bed together all day.”

I hum, arching back into his heat, but the pull from the meadow tugs at my ribs again.

He props himself up on an elbow, his wings rustling stiffly. “I need to wash the gold from my skin before I start growing a forest in our bedsheets,” he mumbles with a sleepy chuckle. He stands, offering me a hand, his eyes soft and heavy-lidded. “Come with me. I promise I’ll make it worth it.”

I look up at him, my heart aching at the sheer love in his expression. “I’ll be up in a minute. I just need to stretch. Canvases are not comfortable at all.”