I still won’t look at him. I don’t want to see his expression.
“Didn’t the sword tell you everything about me?” he asks.
“Only some things. I’m asking if there’s anything else. Now that you know what’s at stake and everything we’re running from and protecting. Is there anything I should know?”
“No. We’re good, Ziva.”
I let out a breath of air, finally allowing myself a look at his face. I expect to be met with a haughty expression.
Instead, Kellyn is looking at me like he’s never seen me before.
As though he likes everything that he sees.
He takes my hands in his, just holds them in between us. Before I can decide whether I want to pull away, Kellyn rubs his fingers over my knuckles as he says, “I heard their secrets. All the men and women I killed with that sword. One was cheating on his wife. Another was thinking of defecting from Kymora’s service; she just couldn’t decide where to hide, considering a life in the mountains. One was stealing money from his fellow soldiers. One of the women fancied another soldier in the ranks. Almost all of them were afraid of death. I heard it. Their fears. It was horrible. It was too much, so much that it made me sick.
“I’d never held it before,” he continues. “The sword is … heavy.”
“It’s weighted with my secrets. They’re what give it power.”
Suddenly, the contact between our hands is making me anxious. I carefully pull away, and as soon as I do, I regret it.
His presence goes from being welcome to unwanted, back and forth, like my mind doesn’t know what to make of him. My body doesn’t know how to react to him. One moment, I like that I’m touching him. The next, I wish he were far away.
My life is a world of opposites. One instant I’m safe in my forge; the next I’m on the run for my life. One second I’m fine, and then I’m lost to despair and panic.
I can’t control any of it.
And I hate that.
I am more than my fears and weaknesses, but so much of the time, they’re all I can think about.
“Could I have some time to myself?” I ask him.
“Of course.”
It’s only after he’s gone that I realize he didn’t make one comment on the fact that I find him handsome. That I wanted to touch him. He simply took my hands, as though he only wished to give me what I wanted.
* * *
Petrik groans every time he moves. “My knees hurt. My feet hurt. My backside. My back. My neck. How is that possible?”
Today was his first time riding in his own saddle, and when we dismount, Petrik lands on his feet—but they quickly give way, and he collapses into the dirt.
Temra comes to his rescue, putting her hands beneath his arms and scooting him out of the way, while Kellyn and I take care of his horse.
“You need to take your feet out of the stirrups and give them time for the blood to rush back in before dismounting,” she says to him. “For next time.”
“I’m never getting on a horse again!” he whines.
“We still have a long ways to go.”
Something akin to a whimper comes out of his mouth.
We unsaddle the horses and give them long leads so they can roam for grass and have easy access to the nearby river.
Temra unpacks the bedrolls. Petrik unwraps the food. I check the horses’ hooves for rocks, and Kellyn sets up the tents we stole from Kymora’s soldiers. There were enough for each of us to have our own, but I asked Temra if we could continue to share.
I sense eyes on me as I bend over and lift my mare’s front right hoof. Kellyn has been trying to meet my gaze since our last private conversation. When we touched. When I admitted the truth about the sword’s origins.
But I don’t return the look, and I’ve avoided being alone with him.
In fact, I’ve been terrified of even the possibility of it.
Because since that—that touching, my mind has wandered to other things.
When I feel his eyes leave me, I risk my own casual glance in his direction. I stare at the long muscles in his arms, the way his biceps move as he maneuvers the tent poles into place.
And I think about what it might feel like to curl my fingers around one of his arms.
He’s so big. I’m used to being taller than most men, but Kellyn has inches on me. How far would he need to bend down to—
I startle at the thought.
To kiss me.
At first the thought is terrifying, but the more I try to imagine it, he and I so close, my curiosity piques.
What would it feel like to have another set of lips touch mine? Not just any lips. But his? Would that grin smooth out long enough to become caught up in a kiss? Or would he smile through the whole thing, considering it a victory?