Muse of Nightmares (Strange the Dreamer, #2)

by Laini Taylor

“Well then,” breathed Sarai, wanting to believe it, “I wish to find them, wherever they are, so that I can feel all the aches and all the pleasure that are the privilege of the living. In the meantime, you’ll just have to keep on sharing yours.”

She stretched against him, feline, and Lazlo took her in his arms, his ghost girl, goddess, muse of wonder, and assured her that he took his responsibility very seriously.

Eril-Fane found himself shy—the great Godslayer blushing like the boy who had given his sparring partner a bracelet for her sixteenth birthday and danced with her, his big hands trembling on her waist.

“I wish...” he said, his gaze holding hers taut, his eyes wide with sweet, boyish fear. “To marry you,” he finished in a whisper, and he took something out of his pocket. He hadn’t forgotten his own dying wish. He’d thought of it just as much as she had over these past few weeks. You learn what you want when you think you can’t have it, and Eril-Fane wanted his wife. He held a ring in his fingers.

“We’re already married,” said Azareen, trembling, because a storm had kicked up in her mind and those were the first words to spill out. “I want to start again,” said Eril-Fane. He looked hopeful and worried, as though there was the smallest chance of her saying no. “Will you start all over again? With me?”

Eighteen years. It had been longer since they’d last made love than they’d even been alive before the first time. They took their time. They had forgotten so much. Slowly, it all came back.

Fate must have been feeling sympathetic for all the time they’d lost. They made a son that night, though it would be some weeks before they knew it, and months before they met him and named him Lazlo—and