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He could provide you with a life of ease if you could live with that,” she said. I bit my tongue as she spoke. I could survive with it, but could I live? Would it be considered living?
Rage blinded me. It took everything I had to not barge in there and grab him by the throat, just to choke off whatever nonsense he was about to spew. “You will learn to love me, in time, and I am a patient man. I will be waiting for that day.” Red hot fury enveloped me as smoke drifted from my palms. She is mine. My mate.
“You wicked little thing,” he purred, heat pounding behind his eyes.
I just want to…live, not merely survive. Live.
I didn’t know what was worse—the fact that I’d claimed her before she knew what it meant or that I’d known her true identity and hadn’t told her. You’re no better than your father, a voice whispered in the back of my mind. I knew it was true. I had shackled her to me, just as he had my mother.
But that night, she chose to be with me, and after a lifetime of being hated, forgotten, and alone, in that moment, I had wanted it so badly. I wanted her. A life. A mate. To be chosen. Wanted. I wanted to be wanted. I wanted her to want me.
I didn’t claim her in ownership. I claimed her as my one, devoted myself to one. With that mark, my body and soul were bound to her. I would never be with anyone else, emotionally or physically. It would be her or no one, until my last breath, and she didn’t want me.
It hurt to know how desperately I didn’t want to become someone—something—and yet, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t outrun the monster nipping at my heels.
Orphans. We’re orphans, both raised by men who wished us dead.
“You can be angry. Hell, you should be, but you’ll be angry here. With me. Take it out on me. Take out every ugly, suffocating emotion on me, because I am not letting you go out there to shoulder this alone.” He brought his hands to my cheeks. “You are not alone, Ara.”
“It’s okay, pretty girl. You can take it,” he purred, knotting his hand in my hair.
“So perfect,” he whispered, kissing the pulsing hollow at the base of my neck.
“I never thought I’d see anything past my small village if I’m being honest, but the books allowed me to journey far, far away, to live a thousand different, exciting lives.”
“This”—his thumb slid down across the mark—“is a symbol of… surrender. I know you believe that it was my claim upon you, but it wasn’t. It never was. I bound my body and soul to you, little storm.”
You are entirely the opposite of everything that I am, and I would gladly wear your shackles if it meant I could have you.”
“May the Goddess be with them.” “May she strike down any who wishes them harm. May she bathe them in triumph,”
She consumed me, and I would gladly burn in her fire for eternity.
“Without you, little storm, I would still be lost in a world of darkness,”
“I would’ve waited forever,”
