“J-J-Jaren?” Kiva stuttered around her frantic, panting breaths. The room was dark, barely enough moonlight drifting in to make out his concerned features.
“I’ve got you,” he told her, rubbing soothing patterns on her back.
Kiva was quaking so badly that she cuddled into Jaren’s bare torso and burrowed her face in the crook of his neck, forgetting that she should be pushing him away and instead clinging to him like a child.
From the doorway to her bedroom came Tipp’s hushed voice. “Is she a-all right?”
“She’ll be fine,” Jaren answered quietly. “You did the right thing, coming to get me. Why don’t you go and wake Ori, have a sneaky hot cocoa, then go back to sleep. You can talk to her in the morning.”
Kiva sensed Tipp’s hesitation, but then she heard the door shut as he left her room.
Still clinging to Jaren, Kiva couldn’t bring herself to let go, her body continuing to tremble. She didn’t even care that they were alone, tangled together on her bed, with him only half dressed. All she knew was that she felt safe in his arms. They were all that was holding her together.
He was all that was holding her together.
“I have them, too, you know,” Jaren whispered, his fingers combing through her hair. “The dreams. Ever since Zalindov.”
She burrowed deeper into him, recalling the sounds of distress she’d heard muted through the walls at the winter palace.
Against his neck she asked, barely a breath of sound, “What do you dream about?”
She knew she should put some distance between them.
But she didn’t move.
Just this once, she told herself.
Just this once, she would allow herself to forget who he was — who she was — and rest in the comfort of his embrace.
“I dream of darkness, I dream of death,” Jaren answered slowly. “I dream of you falling from that tower and me not catching you in time. I dream of you walking into the crematorium and never coming back out. I dream of — of —” He swallowed. “I dream of finding you at the bottom of the quarry, not breathing.” He shuddered against her. “I dream of you dying, over and over, while I just stand there, watching.”
His words prompted flashes of Kiva’s own nightmare.
Falling.
Burning.
Drowning.
But also the soul-destroying darkness of the Abyss. And —
“I saw you getting whipped.”
The words left her without her permission.
Jaren turned as still as a statue.
After the day she’d had, everything she’d heard, everything she’d felt — and was currently feeling — Kiva’s guard was completely torn away. Because of that, she couldn’t keep from continuing, “It was my fault. You — You saved me, and he — he hurt you.” Her throat caught, making a jagged, painful sound.
“Sweetheart,” Jaren murmured, kissing her temple.
She melted into him. She couldn’t help it.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, the apology coming from deep within her. “I never said it to you before. I should have said it to you before.”
“You have nothing to be sorry about.”
“I didn’t say thank you, either,” Kiva went on, not hearing him. She was still half asleep, her words tumbling from her lips without thought. “You saved my life, and I never said thank you. I — I was so angry that you’d lied to me, but you still — you still saved me. I’m alive because of you.” Her voice became hoarse. “What kind of person doesn’t say thank you?”
A comforting stroke of Jaren’s fingers. “I’m sure you thanked me.”
“I didn’t,” she argued, gripping him tighter. “I didn’t.”
“All right, then you’re saying it now,” Jaren said, his tone pacifying.
“I should have said it sooner.”
“You’re saying it now,” Jaren repeated.
Kiva fell silent, emotion simmering within her. Her nightmare had left her raw. She was feeling so much — too much. Everything she’d been trying to bury for six weeks, for ten years, was rising to the surface.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered again, the words breaking.
“You already said that, beautiful,” Jaren whispered back, gathering her closer.
But this time, Kiva wasn’t apologizing for what had already happened.
She was apologizing for what lay ahead.
And as Jaren continued to hold her, promising he would stay until she fell back to sleep, she knew she was in more danger than ever before.