Total pages in book: 362
Estimated words: 347293 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1736(@200wpm)___ 1389(@250wpm)___ 1158(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 347293 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1736(@200wpm)___ 1389(@250wpm)___ 1158(@300wpm)
I was a bit relieved to learn that I wasn’t a special case. “It would’ve been nice of them to explain what they were doing instead of knocking me unconscious.” I crossed my arms. “Because there’s nothing like waking up in some dark cave in the middle of the Abyss.”
“I doubt you were in the middle of the Abyss. You were likely on the outskirts,” he said, as if that made a difference. “I would’ve warned Ash that this could occur, but it happened so long ago that it slipped my mind.”
“You getting forgetful in your old age?”
Nektas chuckled. “I’m not considered old. More like…” He tilted his head. “Middle-aged.”
My brows shot up. “Really?”
The wind swirled across the balcony again, carrying with it the scent of rich, damp soil. Chin tipping back, he closed his eyes. “It feels good to have the fresh wind against my flesh.” He inhaled deeply, his lashes lifting. “All because of you.”
“Me?” I squeaked. “I really didn’t do anything.”
“All because of you and him.” He looked past me to the bedchamber. “This breeze I can feel? The life that has returned to the Shadowlands? My daughter touched a blade of grass today and will soon see clean water coursing through the lands.” His vivid blue gaze, luminous with eather, returned to mine. “That is what your strength of will and his love has given my child. That would not be possible without the two of you. You survived. He persisted.”
A knot clogged my throat. I turned my stare to the stars as I worked it free. “We didn’t know it would work. All Ash wanted to do was save me.”
“If either of you had faltered, if you were not as brave as you are or willing to love without condition or expectation? If he hadn’t been so determined to save you or refused to believe that what he felt for you this whole time was love?” Nektas said. “You would’ve died, Liessa. And his pain would’ve turned the realms to ruin. That is not nothing. That is everything.” He fell silent for a moment. “You didn’t give up. Neither did he.”
Swallowing around that tangle of emotion, I ignored the prick of pain as my fang scraped the inside of my lip. “I didn’t want to die when he brought me to my lake. I…I stopped wanting that once I knew what it felt like to really live. Knowing that I’d finally be able to become something other than what my duty symbolized,” I admitted, my voice hoarse. “It wasn’t falling in love that changed that. It was that I could feel such an emotion when all I’d ever really felt was either anger or nothing at all. It was the realization that I could become someone—” The breath I exhaled was ragged. “Someone who mattered.”
Nektas listened quietly as I continued, curling my fingers around my hair. “But I was prepared to die. I’d accepted it. I didn’t give up. I gave in.”
“So did Ash. You both gave in.”
I thought about that. “I suppose that’s one way of looking at it.”
“It is the only way.” Nektas watched me closely. “I don’t think it’s possible for anyone to be as uncomfortable when being praised as you are. Accept the praise. You have earned it.”
I let out a short laugh. “Yes, sir.” I peeked over at him. His bemused smile tugged at my lips, and it made me think of something. “Did you know? That Ash and I were heartmates?”
“There was no way for me to know that,” he said, lowering himself from the railing in one fluid step. “But I knew he felt more than what he believed was possible when he had his kardia removed.” Starlight glanced off his broad cheek. “I saw that in the way he spoke about you. How he cared for you. So, I began to suspect such, even with mates of the heart being so rare. Or perhaps I hoped for that since I didn’t want to lose either of you.”
It took me several moments to speak around the rising knot of emotion. “You know, you didn’t even ask if I passed the riders’ test.”
“I don’t need to ask.” Angling his body toward mine, he propped his hip against the railing. “I know you did. You are worthy, Liessa.”
“I’m beginning to think you’re just trying to make me uncomfortable now,” I muttered.
“I would never.”
“Uh-huh.” Something occurred to me. “Do you remember what Eythos’s abilities of intuition were like?”
“I do.” He turned toward me as the wind tossed his hair across his chest again. “I assume the ability is also developing in you?”
I nodded.
“What do you want to know?”
“Everything.” I laughed, loosening my grip on the railing. “But mostly, I wanted to know if you knew how it works. Because it’s like…one second, I feel this strange sensation and just know something. And the next, I have no idea, especially if it has anything to do with me.”