Page 80 of Ties of Starlight

Nyrunn had been right. She’d known somewhere deep down, but she just wouldn’t let herself face the truth about Bror.

But if she really wanted to bury him and see Nyrunn for who he really was, she had to accept the truth about Bror’s words and actions so she could see Nyrunn’s were nothing like his.

If she was going to live this life while she had it, she needed to be honest about all her past ones as well. She wanted someone to know them, messy and horrible and painful though they all were—Nyrunn knew she was a murderer and still he had not shied away.

The next day of travel went like the others. Idonea and Nyrunn had no privacy during the day to speak openly,so they were to be entertained by Asa and Frode’s bickering, growing less heated and more playful by the day.

When they arrived at their next camp, Idonea slipped away this time, leaving Nyrunn to collect their food again as she ducked into their tent. She threw a little starlight up before sitting on the bed with her bag. She dumped all the journals onto it, leaving Bror’s account in her bag.

She flipped them open but was unable to really organize them chronologically since her memories of each life were scattered throughout and she didn’t have journals from any life before her third. The tent rustled and Nyrunn came in, sparing her from having to make any decisions on the subject.

He approached the bed with plates in hand and asked, “What are you doing?”

Idonea just set the journal in her hands down, open to a page that mentioned a memory of her fourth life remembering the death of her third. She took a deep breath and gestured to them. “These are all my journals. All my memories.”

Nyrunn approached slowly. “Are you… looking for something?”

Idonea laughed. “What do you think I’d be looking for?”

“A way to break the curse.”

Idonea’s blood ran cold. Was he still thinking about that?

He’d better not be. She’d already told him what would break it, and that was the only way she would ever break it. When she got it right.

“No.” Idonea looked back at the open pages. She picked up the journal from her fourth life again and closed it, tucking it to her lap. “I… I didn’t get these all out for me. I… I wanted you to… If you want to, of course…”

Nyrunn took a seat beside her, setting the plates to theside. His hand rested on her knee and she tightened her grip on her fourth life’s journal. “You want me to read them?”

She nodded. “I thought… maybe they’ll help. It’s… I know I’m not easy to understand and it’s a strange predicament we’re in, and this is probably the closest thing I can give you to help you understand.”

Idonea wanted to be known.

She didn’t want to be a ghost passing through this life until her next. She wanted to wake up in her next life and know she had given this life and this marriage all she could. Nyrunn didn’t deserve anything less.

Maybe… Maybe she wouldn’t feel so alone even when he was gone and she was back because at least in this life he’d known her, dark and messy and fragmented all at once.

Nyrunn’s hand covered hers and her breath caught in her throat. “I would be immensely honored.”

That feeling on the other side of the bond swelled again. What was it?

She started to shift, but Nyrunn’s palm brushing her cheek had her freezing. “I would be even more honored if you would read one of them to me, love.”

She choked on the word. “Love?”

His thumb swiped over her cheek and his grin was pained and soft all at once. “I’m hardly going to keep calling you ‘little lily’ now that I know how you’ve been hearing it this whole time.”

“You didn’t know,” she whispered, but she didn’t pull away.

“You didn’t tell me.”

“I didn’t think it would make a difference. I know better now.”

“Good. Now… read to me, love. I want to hear it. I want to hear everything.”

Idonea reached for the journal from her third life. That one would be safe, as safe as any journal of hers was.

As she opened it, Nyrunn settled in, lounging on the bed behind her and wrapping one arm around her waist to lean her against him. She looked over her shoulder. “You do know all of these journals are going to involve Olaug intensively.”

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