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I cried because his voice was everything. It reached inside my soul, rewriting my definition of perfection. It strangled my erratically beating heart and coated my mind with its harshness. That sound. It could burn the world to ash with its power, and it terrified me how it erased the wariness of men that servitude had engrained in my being.
His voice might have been rough and dangerous, but his smile? It was the sun. It shone with blinding beauty, and I blinked, afraid to look at the inviting curve of his lips.
I was untouched, untainted, unmarred. Even my thoughts were pure, but staring at his smile was an unadulterated sin.
The room was dark, but his expression was the sun, bathing the winter air with its warmth.
His face obliterated my heart. His eyes destroyed my spirit, and in an instant, the thief re-wrote my future. He stole my life and twisted it to his will.
“Kaid.” I tasted his name, and it was more delicious than the ripest fruit on a summer’s day.
I knew his words would alter me to my marrow.
“I’ve never seen anyone as beautiful as you. I mean this in the most respectful way, but you are divinely lovely. I’m almost ashamed to share the same air as you.”
I was a holy relic, the sacrificial lamb,
I was Hreinasta’s from birth, and it took a thief with a voice like a demon to show me how alone and starved I was.
In such a brief acquaintance, this breathtaking man had carved a jagged hole in my heart and buried himself inside it.
“I don’t want to take anything from you.” Conviction fortified his voice. “I want to give everything to you.
“I’ll help you live an entire lifetime in the coming seasons,” he whispered. “I’ll make them the best days of your life.”
“I am not empty, not yet. I’m still me, still a human. Everyone else cut me out of their life. My parents. My siblings. Even the other vessels, because they’re jealous of my station. I’m a thing to everyone but you.”
“I have scars from those who tried, but as the cycles passed, less and less could wound me, but your tears? They hurt worst of all. Out of everyone in my life, you have the power to hurt me the most.”
“Why?” His words alarmed me. “Because I finally found a soul that sings to mine, a friend unlike anyone I’ve ever met, and I made you cry. I can’t take you away from here. I cannot touch you, and in a cycle, I’ll lose you.”
“I’ll even return when you’re old and grey and Hreinasta abandons you for another. It may take a while, but I’ll always come for you.”
Why was it wrong to know what his touch felt like? Why was it a sin to witness the smile that engulfed my being?
He made me whole and happy and beautiful. He made me Sellah. Kaid was the only person who let my true self bleed to the surface.
I can’t sit here and wait for you to leave me. Every time I look at you, I see the end of the greatest thing in my life. You’re my best friend, my confidant, my heart. I love you, Sellah.
“Every night I spend with you, I love you more,” he continued. “I’m filled with broken and jagged edges, but your softness and warmth fit perfectly between those sharp pieces. You make me whole. You’re what my life was missing, and the longer I stay at your side, the more I love you. Varas may be the god I’ve pledged to, but you’re who I want to swear my future to. You’re the altar I pray at, the deity I worship, and I would sacrifice my life for you, but you don’t belong to me. You never have, and you never will. You’ve belonged to Hreinasta since birth, and I can’t watch the person I
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I’d touched him. I had touched Kaid, and it was beautiful.
One deliberate touch, and I’d chosen. He was what I wanted to pledge my life to. I was trapped in this temple, my future not my own, but my love was mine to give, and I offered it to him. I gave it to him with all of my heart.
“You are my goddess.” His low admission rumbled through his ribs, vibrating against my skin. “You are what I pray to, what I worship, what I adore.”
“I love you, Sellah,” he whispered into my hair. “You own me. All of me. Forever.”
“I don’t love you,” he growled as he angled his hips to hit the spot that unleashed the stars. “This isn’t love. Love is too simple a word for what I feel. The world could end. Ages could pass. The gods could die, and I would still adore you. You’ve been braided so deeply into my heart that I no longer exist without you.”
“I will love you until my death,” Kaid promised. “And then I’ll love you from the grave until I’m dust. When your consciousness returns after she abandons your vessel decades from now, I’ll be here waiting for you.”
“My thief, I want a future with you, for you have stolen my body, mind, and heart.”
“I’ll want you even in death, Sellah. There’s no afterlife, but that doesn’t matter. I’ll love you until I’m dead in the dirt, then I’ll love you until my body is nothing but bones. And when my bones fade to dust coating the earth, I’ll still want you.”
