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And she has hit every one of them in these past few weeks while I’ve chained her up and punished her when she refused to even defend herself.
“This isn’t pity, Zaina,” I say a bit too sharply, more out of anger at myself than her. “Maybe you were right before, when you said I didn’t always see you. But I’m trying to.”
“And what is it you think you see?” Her voice is cautious, like she’s bracing herself for a blow, even now.
I think of all the things I pieced together in the past few weeks, things I finally allowed myself to acknowledge after she left the training room.
“Did you know that the dragon was protecting you in its wings?”
She shakes her head mutely, her eyebrows furrowing like she wonders where I’m going with this.
“Legend has it that the dragon only protects those who are pure of heart.”
“There is nothing pure about me,” she says in a voice barely above a whisper.
“That’s what you see,” I respond. “But you asked me whatIsee. I see a woman who was given very few choices in life and still managed to use what little freedom she had to protect the people she loved the most.”
Because even if I don’t know exactly what happened the night she left, I know she sent the rose back and a note to warn me. I know she walked a tenuous line to keep both her sisters and my people -- me, safe, and nearly died doing it. I know that, because I knowher.
Her breath hitches in her throat, and I go on.
“I see someone who endured slavery and torture and abuse, day in and day out for eighteen years for the sake of her sisters. Then you came here, where you had no cause to believe your treatment would be any better.”
And my treatment of her might have been better than what she had been used to, technically speaking, but shame pools inside me when I picture her the day she arrived. She left her house of horrors to endure an eight-day carriage ride with a man, who, according to Leif, was a lecherous sociopath. Then she got to me, a furious, reluctant groom who was instantly critical of her.
Even the way she held herself with such brittle pride while she walked into the dining room where she thought we would be publicly consummating looks different now.
I had laughed, at the time. I thought it was funny, because what self-respecting woman would consent to that? But then, when had Zaina ever consented to anything that happened to her?
You could have chosen to trust me,I told her.
She was right, though. What reason had I possibly given her to do that?
“When I look at you, Zaina, I see someone who has every reason to hate the world around her, but still manages to find love for her sisters, for her chalyx, for the servants around her.” My eyes burn into hers. “Even for the husband she never wanted.”
She swallows. “In fairness, you never wanted me, either.”
“I didn’t want a wife,” I correct her. “But I want you.”
Something like hope blooms in her eyes, but it fades just as quickly. “What about Madame?”
“I don’t have all the answers right now,” I admit. “But maybe this time, we could figure something out together.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Zaina
Iam silent on the short walk to Einar’s rooms.
In the last hour, I have managed to set fire to years of training and caution. I have thrown down my sword and shield and stripped down to my skin in the middle of a raging battlefield.
And yet...
I want you.Einar’s words resound in my head, echoing down to my core.
Not an assault on the fragile pieces of myself I have left exposed and unprotected. Not judgment. Just a hand on my back, guiding me forward in this dark, unfamiliar territory.
“I’d like to clean up.” My voice sounds foreign to my own ears, soft and unsure.
