Between Tides & Thunder

I will take his cruelty, his disdain. I’ll bathe in his contempt until I’m covered in every drop of his wrath. I’ll embrace his rage, wrap it around myself like a cloak, until it’s the only thing that warms me. I’ll swallow his resentment, bite after seething bite, until it’s the only thing that fuels me. I’ll take anything he gives me, as long as I can be his again.

A gentle finger tilts my face, tears wiped away by the rough pad of his thumb.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs, his eyes anguished in the dark. “For how I treated you last time.” His throat bobs. “You didn’t deserve that.”

“I’m sorry, too,” I rasp. “For everything. Zev, I—I miss you so much. I miss the way you teased me. Cared for me. Held me. I miss the light in your eyes when you saw me from across a room. Tides, your smile that was just for me.” I’m sobbing now, hands clutching his shoulders. “This was never supposed to happen. I was to marry your brother. I would’ve despised him. Been eager to kill him. I would’ve found the tu

Zev doesn’t say a word. Just keeps staring at me, his expression unreadable, his thumb absently tracing a circle on my shoulder.

“Why were you with him, then?” he finally asks. His voice has gone cold. His hand stills.

Fuck.

“He didn’t know my feelings had changed. I tried to stop him, avoid … touching him, but I-I didn’t try hard enough. I couldn’t admit to myself how I felt about you then, let alone to someone else. What you saw—that was my goodbye to him. He just didn’t know it. I swear by the Tides, I was going to tell you everything when you returned.”

He regards me for a moment before a deep, pained sigh escapes him. He scrubs his hand over his face, shifting onto his back.

“Say something,” I plead. “Is there a path forward for us?” I grab his hand and splay it over my heart, hoping he’ll feel his name in its frantic beat.

He doesn’t draw his hand back, and hope breathes air into my lungs. I rise up on my elbow, tracing each white scar across his chest with the tip of my finger.

He lets me. When I rest my cheek over his heart, he lets me do that, too. I’m completely surrounded by him, and for the first time since I woke shackled in his carriage, my soul finds contentment.

My eyes have nearly drifted shut when he speaks.

“I gave you everything I had, Mayah,” he whispers hoarsely. “I have nothing left.”

I swallow thickly. “Then … then why are you here?”

He sighs, turning his face away as if wondering the same thing.

“I can’t seem to stay away.” A muscle ticks in his jaw. “But I can never trust you again. When I close my eyes, I see you with him. In his arms. On your knees, grief and rage swirling in your eyes. For him. When I thought you were mine.” He swallows hard. “I’ll keep being cruel to you. Pulling you close, then pushing you away. Like I did in the tent.” His voice cracks. “You deserve to be happy, Mayah. Just not with me.”

A tear drops onto his chest, then another.

Zev lets me weep against him until I have nothing left inside me. It’s a strange feeling to lose something, even as it's wrapped tightly around you.