Page 109 of Heart of the Deep

That the other humans and their kraken mates had denned in the three neighboring rooms offered a bit of comfort.

The only comfort Dracchus sought, however, was in Larkin. She led him into the bathroom, removed her clothes, and pulled him into the shower. She maneuvered deftly in the tight space as she washed the remaining blood from his skin, mindful of every recently sealed wound.

Her hands caressed him, but her touch was not meant to arouse; she was letting him know she was there, reminding himhewas still there, too.

When they finished, she took her time in drying him off. He would have done it himself, but every movement elicited new pain, and the tight skin around his wounds threatened to tear if stretched too far.

Once she dried herself, she donned a shirt and took his hand. “Come to bed, Dracchus.”

He followed her gentle guidance. His body was exhausted, but his mind…

The pain was not enough to distract him from his thoughts anymore.

Dracchus eased himself down onto the bed carefully, movements stiff, and draped his forearm over his eyes. He needed to sleep. Needed to fall into that black embrace before everything else rushed to the surface. But it was not black behind his closed eyelids.

It was crimson.

He clenched his teeth against the raw memories, the faces, the blood.

They’d been monsters.

They’d been people.

Hispeople.

The bed dipped as Larkin climbed onto it. She settled herself closer to the headboard than him, slipping her arms around his head to cradle it against her chest. Her hands trailed lightly over his siphon, his temple, his cheek, and her lips brushed across his brow.

“You don’t have to be strong around me,” she whispered.

He wanted to reply that he would always be strong for her, but the words caught in his throat. Pressure built in his chest, pressure and overwhelming heat, and his body shuddered against it.

“I did not want this,” he rasped.

Her fingers continued their slow course over his skin, a constant sign that she was not just with him, she was with himin that moment.

“I wanted my people to come together,” he continued, each word hurting more than the last as it emerged. “To prosper. To find the same joy and peace the humans in The Watch seem to have. I tried…” He curled his trembling fingers, but the pain of his claws digging into his palms did nothing to steady him.

Larkin took his hand and applied gentle pressure to loosen his grip. She laced the ends of their fingers together and guided his arm down. Cupping his cheek with one hand, she turned his face toward hers.

He opened his eyes. Pulses of black and crimson floated in his vision, a result of how tightly he’d squeezed his eyelids shut, but they yielded slowly to Larkin’s face, which was framed by her damp, red-orange hair. She’d dimmed the lights, and the soft glow on her pale skin made her appear otherworldly.

“You are one man, Dracchus,” she said, stroking his cheek with her thumb. “You are not responsible for the choices of others. Change takes time, and even the best changes don’t come without resistance. You were given a bad situation, and you did the best you could with it. The fault isn’t yours.”

“They were our people. Whatever they’d done, they were our people. And this wound was dealt to all kraken. How do we take that back? How do we close it?”

“You can’t.”

He’d known that truth, deep inside, before she spoke it, but hearing it out loud increased the pressure within him tenfold. Were it not for Larkin, were it not for Sarina and the rest of his family, he might have longed for simpler times, for the days when his greatest concern was to ensure Jax was around for the next hunt, or who his next challenge would come from. But if this pain in his hearts was the price for the family that had grown around him, he would pay it again and again without hesitation.

Larkin slid down to curl against his side and wrapped her arm around his chest. Twining his tentacles with her legs, he slipped his arm around her shoulders. He needed to feel her, to hold onto her. His wounds ached, but he didn’t care; she would be his balm.

“Time is the only thing that can heal these wounds,” she said softly, her warm breath tickling his skin, “but you can help by being there. By carrying on, despite how much it hurts. Whenever you feel weak, I’ll be your strength.” She kissed him. “You’re only one man, but you’re not alone.”

Dracchus closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath. He focused on her solidness, on the heat of her body, on her scent slowly enveloping him.

The names and faces of the dead kraken drifted through his mind, but he didn’t fight them away. He allowed himself to feel the pain of each loss, holding Larkin a little tighter. In time, they faded — not forgotten, but finally ceding to his bone-deep weariness.

“My heart is yours, Dracchus,” Larkin whispered as sleep descended upon him. “So long as it beats, I will be by your side.”

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