“You’ve existed in my mother’s drawings for most of my life, but you were never real to me before. I didn’t believe…” His eyes were wide and full of awe. “I had no idea what you would mean to me. I had no idea what I would do to keep you safe. When I close my eyes, you are all I fucking see, Saeris Fane. I could be dead in the ground five thousand years and the frosts could have taken my bones, and still no other male will ever have loved another female the way that I love you.”

