The Ashes & the Star-Cursed King (Crowns of Nyaxia, #2)

by Carissa Broadbent

everything. She took another small step, gaze never leaving mine. It was a throwing knife of a word, already drenched in her blood. “Why?” It struck me harder than it should have.

Oraya didn’t need to be saved. She just needed a soul beside her on the dark walk to her own potential. Someone to protect her until she was strong enough to save herself.

That’s all I’d ever been. A thing to be used at the convenience of others, or a risk to be mitigated. Not a force in her own right. Fuck that.

“You have nothing but me,” I said. “And yet, you’d let me go?” “I have nothing but you,” he murmured. “So I am letting you go.”

I’d had enough. My entire life, these people thought they could take everything from me. And the thought of ceding one more single second to them enraged me.

What else could it be, for someone to see that much of you? To see so much beauty in the parts of someone that they hate in themselves?

I’m already more afraid than I ever have been. Afraid of you and what you could do to me. Afraid of the world that could kill you so easily. Afraid of myself, gifted with another fragile heart that I know I cannot keep. But, my little serpent, it is the most wonderful fear.

But there was no such thing as love without fear. Love without vulnerability. Love without risk.

“I give you my heart,” I murmured against his skin. “I give you my heart. I give you my heart.”