Page 66 of Bound to the Dorm Elf
Skylar’s hand finds my wrist — light at first, then firmer, as if she’s testing whether I’ll pull away. I don’t.
“Good,” she says quietly. “Because I don’t want you to go back.”
The words cut through me sharper than Razarak’s blade ever could. I don’t tell her that. I don’t tell her that I’ve been trying not to think about what it means to feel… anchored here. Tethered to her in ways I was never tethered to Protheka.
Instead, I let my gaze drift past her to the water, where the moonlight shatters in the ripples near shore. “You’ve made this place dangerous for me,” I say, but there’s no venom in it. Only truth.
She smirks faintly, though I can hear the edge under it. “You were already dangerous before I showed up in your life.”
A fair point. But danger is different when it’s chosen.
The cold finally drives us to sit, the sand crunching under my boots. She settles beside me, close enough that her shoulder presses against mine. The silence that follows isn’t heavy — not like the one after the fight. This one has weight, yes, but it’s the kind you carry willingly.
The lake is quiet except for the faint lap of water against the shore. I can smell her shampoo, faint even over the frost-slick wind. She hasn’t let go of my wrist, and I haven’t asked her to.
When I finally speak again, it’s not the words I expected to say. “If I’d chosen differently tonight… you wouldn’t be here now.”
“I know,” she answers, voice soft but certain. “And I know you’ll tell me it wasn’t for me, that it was some tactical decision, or?—”
“Itwasfor you,” I interrupt, the admission rough in my throat. “Tactical or not. You live. That’s the calculation.”
She studies me for a long moment, the kind of silence that feels like it sees right through you. Then she leans in just enough that I can feel her breath against my jaw.
“You’re terrible at pretending you don’t care,” she murmurs.
I let out a short, low laugh — the first since before the portal tore open the sky. “And you’re terrible at staying out of danger.”
We sit like that until the cold seeps through even my tolerance for it. But when we finally stand, I notice I’m still holding her hand. And I don’t let go until the lights of campus are in sight again.
The words leave her lips like they’re carved into stone — no hesitation, no space for me to twist them into something safer.
“I’m not letting you face any of this alone again.”
It shouldn’t hit me the way it does. Shouldn’t dig under my skin and find the places I’ve kept sealed since before exile, before I learned that trust was just a sharper kind of blade. But it does.
Something in my chest loosens — not with the ease of a latch undone, but with the grind of rusted metal that hasn’t moved in years. I can feel it. The shift. The danger of it.
Her eyes don’t flinch from mine. She’s still a little pale, still carrying the adrenaline from the fight, but her stance is steady. I’ve seen seasoned warriors with less resolve.
“You don’t understand what you’re saying,” I murmur, though the words are more reflex than warning.
She tilts her head, just enough to tell me she’s not backing down. “I do. More than you think.”
I let out a slow breath, feel the frost curl. My hand moves before my thoughts catch up — slipping to her waist, drawing her toward me until I can feel the warmth of her body cut through the night’s bite.
For a moment, I just look at her. The faint red of wind-burned cheeks, the way a stray lock of hair has caught on her lower lip. The shadows from the lake catch in her eyes, dark and restless like deep water.
I lower my forehead to hers, the contact small but grounding. My eyes close, not in weakness, but in something far stranger — something I’d never allow in front of anyone else.
“You’re making it harder,” I say quietly.
“For what?”
“To keep this… controlled.”
Her breath catches, and I feel the brush of it against my mouth. “Maybe it’s not supposed to be.”
That’s all it takes. I angle my head and close the distance, catching her lips with mine.
