Page 146 of Swordheart
“Yes,” she said grudgingly.
He kissed her forehead.
After a minute she said, “You probably don’t need to leave the great god’s service just yet.”
“So you were at least a little pleased, then?”
“I was… um. Very much so. As I’m sure you know!”
“I suspected. Also hoped.”
“Iamembarrassed,” she said, determined to have it all out, “because you are obviously so much better at this than I am. And I don’t know how to do… well, any of that. All my experience was not moving for two minutes every few days.”
Sarkis winced.
“It’s true.”
“There are two things,” he said finally.
“Oh?”
“The first is that this is a skill like any other, and you are certainly not too old to learn, if that is what would please you.”
“And the other thing?”
He slid his hand down under the sheet and set his lips against her neck. “And the other is that your countrymen have clearly failed you in this matter, and on behalf of the great god and men everywhere,pleaseallow me to make it up to you.”
CHAPTER 47
It took some time to dress afterward. The tendency to look at each other and smile foolishly slowed things down. Eventually, though, Sarkis’s stomach growled like a bear and they both went down to breakfast.
“I have spent too long out of the sword,” he said. “I am starving.”
“Well, hopefully my dreadful aunt left some food in the house. If not, we’ll go rummage something up.”
There was not a great deal, in truth—mostly bread and cheese and the remains of last night’s dinner. Zale was already awake, making notes on their ledger. The priest looked up at the pair, a smile tugging at their lips, and Sarkis suspected that they were quite aware of what had happened the night before.
Well, Halla had not been entirely silent. Probably he hadn’t been, either. Or perhaps it was the single love bite he hadn’t quite been able to resist leaving on the side of her neck, or that they sat too closely together to be anything but recent lovers.
He regretted nothing.
No, that wasn’t true. He regretted that he had not done it sooner. Why had he wasted so much time?
Because you wanted her to have a choice. Because you needed to tell her what the sword says.
The bread in his mouth was suddenly as heavy and tasteless as clay.
The sword.
She still didn’t know.
Halla looked over at him, her water-gray eyes alight, and suddenly Sarkis could not take another moment of deception.
I have to tell her. I have to tell her now, before there’s any more between us. If I don’t, if she finds out—when she finds out—it might poison everything. I have to tell her now, before it goes any further.
He was afraid that if he didn’t tell her now, he would soon do something utterly mad. Fall to his knees and beg her to marry him, perhaps. He had nothing to offer, less than nothing, but that mad part of his mind was crying out that she was his, that they belonged together…
He stood abruptly, catching her hand. “Is the scholar here yet?”
