I tucked a loose curl behind her ear. Kissed her face once—just beneath her eye, where the worry still lingered.
“Mmm.” I smiled faintly. “My little dove?”
She didn’t move. Didn’t turn away. So I gave her the truth.
“In the oldest tales, the dove was a sign of home.” My lips brushed the edge of her jaw, then the pulse at her neck. She exhaled, slow and uneven.
“They came to those drowning in blood and shadow. Reminded them there was still something worth returning to. Something sacred that survives the dark.”
Her pulse stuttered beneath my mouth.
“And when a dove chooses someone…” I pulled back just enough to meet her eyes. “It means the Nightmother hasn’t given up on them.”
She stilled at that. Just for a breath.
I kissed her lips, softly, so she could close her eyes and lean without fear.
“I never thought I’d be chosen after the choices I’ve made,” I whispered against her skin. The words surprised me as they left. “Not by the gods. Not by anyone. But when you came to those gates… you were the brightest thing I’d seen in centuries.”
I felt the way her heart shifted, felt it in the way she leaned closer, the way her hands curled at the base of my neck.
“You are peace I never earned. Light I never thought I’d touch.”
I kissed her again, longer this time, letting what I couldn’t say settle where words never could.
She stared at me, really looked, and the shimmer in her eyes said what her lips did not. “Malachi…” she breathed and reached for me.
Her fingers found the clasps of my shirt with practiced ease. One by one she undid them, sliding the fabric from my shoulders to bare the skin time and battle had mapped. I returned the favor, peeling the hem of her tunic free until it slipped over her head.
She rose and stood before me then, bare to the waist, firelight catching the curve of her spine and the pale mark at her throat. I fumbled at the laces at the waist of her leathers; she steadied herself against my shoulder and stepped out of them with controlled grace.
I stood. She knelt before me and undid mine—unafraid. Soon there was nothing between us but breath and the press of heat.
“You’re shaking,” she whispered.
“No,” I said, thumb tracing the ribs under her collarbone. “Just remembering how to want gently.”
I sat back on the edge of the bed. She climbed into my lap with the certainty of someone coming home. Her thighs braced myhips as she guided me in. A small sound—half gasp, half prayer—escaped her.
Recognition. Relief.
She moved once, then again. Our rhythm found an old, quiet logic that felt familiar as bone. Her hand curled at the back of my neck, lips brushing mine. “I feel—” she started, then fell silent, because there was no need to finish the sentence.
“I know,” I said, voice thick.
I held her hips as she rode the slow arc of release. Her breath broke in soft, staccato shivers as she moved. She came first, her body trembling against mine, head falling forward, voice catching in my mouth. I held her through it, felt the shiver in her limbs, the way her breath stuttered like she couldn’t believe the way we fit.
When the tide ebbed, I followed—deeper, lower—anchoring myself in the heat of her, in the steady weight of her. And still, she glowed. Like a sun rising just for me.
After, she folded into me, boneless and warm, face tucked into the crook of my neck. I wrapped my arms around her and held as if I could keep the world at bay.
And in that stillness, a truth settled in my chest like a blade laid flat. I’d been sent something more dangerous and more precious than I knew how to guard. I had been given a home I was not sure I could keep.
Aurelia
Sleep did not come easily. My chest was crowded with too many truths at once—Aeryn unraveling, Malachi holding me together, Kaelith waiting with promiseswrapped in chains. I had never felt pulled in so many directions, never carried so many pieces of myself that wanted different things. And Hayat… My dearest friend didn’t even know his own truth. What was I supposed to do with all of that?
How was I meant to be Queen and still be sister, still be lover, still be whole? How could I keep Malachi and save Aeryn without breaking myself?