Between Tides Thunder(36)

And I’m weak, Tides, I’m weak. My resolve crumbles.

I cradle his face in my palm. His eyes flutter shut. He covers my hand with his own, pressing it tighter to his skin, graceful fingers trailing over mine. The way he touches me—soft, almost trembling—feels like worship, like he’s terrified I’ll vanish. For one fragile heartbeat, I let myself believe this could be real.

But then his body tenses.

He peels my hand from his cheek, lifting it into the moonlight.

The moment shatters with the gleam of black diamond.

He drops my hand like it burned him, and the heated space between us turns glacial. A veil falls over Zev’s eyes, and any softness I may have imagined evaporates.

He pulls away. It hurts more than it should. It shouldn’t hurt at all.

“I think you’re ready for the dance.” Another pang in my chest.

We prepare for sleep in silence, but Zev settles down on the other side of the blanket. Away from me.

“It’s warm enough now that we can sleep apart,” he says with his back turned. It pierces my heart like an ice shard.

I lie there, feeling more alone since we left Tundrayn.

“Is your brother a good man?” I whisper into the dark.

A beat passes.

“No.” His voice is hollow. “But neither am I.”





CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO




WE’LL REACH THE ARBINJI base tomorrow. Leaves crunch underfoot as I walk, and my legs ache, but for once, I ignore the dull soreness. I don’t want to waste my reserves healing them. I need to be prepared in case we encounter more rebels—or if the Arbinji soldiers don’t greet me as warmly as Zev expects.

Zev.

My eyes find his silhouette, walking ahead of me. Since the night we danced beneath the moonlight, he’s been closed off and distant.

I can’t blame him.

It’s cinched around me, too, this tether between us, but I suspect it has a tighter hold on him. He’s wise to guard his heart. I need to do the same.

My purpose is my armor, and I can’t let whatever this is—what I feel for him—be the crack that shatters it. Peace for Tundrayn must come first. We’ve suffered too much. My fingers clamp around my mother’s teardrop pendant.

I’ve suffered too much.

When we stop to eat and rest, Zev won’t meet my eyes. His silence shouldn’t bother me, but it does. I should let him be, but I can’t cage my words or the annoyance that coats them. I don’t know if I’m more annoyed with him or myself for caring.

“Are you going to ignore me the rest of the way?”

He looses a deep sigh, his mouth twisting with displeasure.

“Look, the other night. The dance. It—” The words die on my tongue. It didn’t mean anything, I almost said, but it’s a lie.

And he deserves more than that.

“We can still be friends?” I offer instead. His shoulders stiffen. “After the wedding. We’ll be … family.”

That’s why he’s upset, isn’t it?

Because I’m going to marry his brother.

In my heart, I know he doesn’t want me to.

Tides, I don’t want to.

But I must.

I didn’t risk everything, leave my home and my people behind, only to fail them now.

“I need to tell you something,” he says, his voice low, eyes riveted to the ground. “And you’ll hate me for it.”

“Bold of you to assume I don’t already hate you.” I smile brightly, but my teasing words don’t have the effect I hoped.

He doesn’t smile back.

Instead, he takes a deep breath and shatters my heart.

“Your friends. Sura and Tumaas. I killed them.”

I blink.

For a minute, I just stare at him, mouth parted.

Then, the ground shifts beneath my feet. No—it’s my legs buckling. My knees hit the cold earth. Nausea churns in my stomach like the roiling sea. My powers flicker inside me, wanting to hurt, wanting to heal.

I killed them.

I killed them.

I killed them.

His words bludgeon my conscience, rattling in my skull.

I don’t know why I’m shocked. I’ve already blamed him for the death of every Tundrayni in the war—the faceless, infamous Dark Commander, bringer of storms and blood and death.

But now that I’ve grown to care for him, to hear him say the words—I killed them—it’s as if he’s rent my soul in half. And the way he’s looking at me now, anguished gray eyes shadowed with remorse, somehow makes it hurt worse.

He’s not the cold, ruthless killer I always imagined.

He’s known loss, too.

My eyes fall to his hands—steady, strong, careful—and imagine them wreathed in lightning, raised against my friends.

Soft-hearted Tumaas.

Radiant, kind Sura.

I want to lash out. I want to scream.

But I do neither.

“How?” My voice is a low rasp.

He swallows hard. “It was after the battle where Lev was killed. I remained at his side until he died, and … Mayah, it broke me. I had never felt such fury. I never did again until…” He inhales shakily as if gathering strength. “I—I went alone. Followed that battalion back to their camp. And I obliterated it.”