More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
His tail shifted in a current that he had never felt before. It was like someone placed a cool blanket over his shoulders, wrapping him a little tighter, and he had to wonder if this was a goddess of the sea. If she was telling him, this was... right. That after all this time of fighting, he had finally been given something soft.
He wanted to return with blood all over his claws, dripping from his teeth as he presented her with a kill that would show her just how badly he wanted her. No. Needed her. He needed every ounce of her attention. He was greedy for the feeling of her eyes sliding along his skin. And he would lay his body flat on the sands and pray to his gods for years, if that’s what it took to feel her touch him again.
In her dream, she walked through the streets and knew that everyone didn’t want her there. They wanted a figurehead like her mother. They’d wanted the pretty little bird, caught in her cage, a creature who sang when they told her to.
Because I want to keep you for myself. Because if I keep you, feed you, bring you everything you ever dreamt of, maybe you’ll give me a chance. Because no one has made me want them as much as I want you.
But now? Now he knew what it was to stand in the light of her smile and bask in the glow of her joy. He would trade the entire sea for a few moments with her.
“It is a special word. We save it only for a rare pearl that we find only once in our life. It means a beauty that is more than skin deep. It refers to a soul that radiates inside a person, so much so that you can see it on the outside as well.”
When I touch you, your soul is so familiar to me. It is like I have known you in a hundred lifetimes before this, and some part of me that I’ve forgotten wishes to bury itself inside you. It tells me to cling to the curve of your waist, to clutch at the feeling in my chest that lingers when you are near. My soul wishes to keep you and never let you go.”
Now he knew he wasn’t the only one with claws. Because with one word, she could break him. Snap him into a thousand pieces and shatter his soul into shards that dusted the sands of his home. He’d given her that power. He had handed her the leash to his heart and now he couldn’t take it back.
“If we do not see each other again, my kalon, I wish for you to know that I have never been more honored than to have a woman like you at my side.” He swallowed hard again, his eyes still flicking over hers. “I do not know how your people say this.” Oh, this sweet, wonderful man who had no idea how much he had wriggled his way into her heart. She reached up and framed his face with both of her hands, staring into those black eyes that showed so much more than he knew how to say. “We say I love you.”
Tell me what this word means.” “It’s not about the word itself. It’s about the feeling in here.” She moved one of her hands to his chest. “It means that living without you feels wrong. That to be parted from your side makes me miss you more than I miss breathing fresh air. And that I will always think of you, no matter how far I am from you.” “This feels right,” he said.
“Know as you dive into danger that I love you, my kalon. I will hold you in my heart until you return to my side.”
“I will find my way back to you,” she whispered against his lips, almost desperately. “I will come home, Daios.” “Home,” he replied, that deep voice radiating through her entire body. “That is what you have given me, kalon. Wherever you are, I am home.”
He loved that about her. He loved how she was a soft place for his tormented heart to rest, but he did not know what it would mean for her while she was not safe in his arms. “Just because she is soft does not mean she is easily broken,”
He could feel their goddess in the way the ocean moved with him. He could feel it the moment that the sea knew he was going to save the only woman who had ever meant anything to him. His mate. His heart. His soul.
“I wish I could tell you how much I love you. How your light has brought more wonder and joy to my life than I have ever felt in it. I have been a warrior my entire life, and before you, that was all I was. You make me want to put my weapons down and find out what it really means to live.”
He kissed her like he was a starving man. Trying his best to press into her very soul all the things that he’d been afraid to say in the past week. He wanted her. He needed her. She was everything to him, and he would give up the entire world if that made her happy. He would give up the sea itself to see her smile.
