Page 31 of Claimed By Stone
“You didn’t fail me,” she whispered. She cupped my face with her hands until I met her gaze. “You saved me.”
I had no words for the feeling that tore through me in that moment.
So, I didn’t speak.
I simply knelt in front of her, resting my forehead against her knees, holding onto her like a vow I’d carve into stone if it meant she’d never be afraid again.
There was a light knock at the door. I moved to answer it, ready to tell whoever it was to go away. I would not spend another moment away from her tonight. But when I opened the door, it was just one of our healers.
“Khuldruk sent me,” she said as she came in with an assortment of teas and salves. I let her come in, but she wasn’t staying long. I would tend to Seraphina myself.
Chapter 15
Thavros
The healers looked her over and assured me she was fine, but I was anxious to get her alone. The look on her face told me she was exhausted. But there was something else there, something darker. I brewed the tea exactly as the healer had instructed, careful to steep it just long enough to draw out the calming herbs without making it too bitter. My hands moved with practiced precision, but my mind was far from steady.
She sat on the edge of the bed, watching me with wide, wary eyes. There was a new tension in her tonight—tighter, quieter than pain. It looked like fear, and it made something primal in me ache.
When I handed her the mug, she didn’t immediately drink. Just held it, fingers trembling around the handle. “Will it help?”
“With sleep,” I said softly. “And with grounding. It might give your mind a chance to rest.”
She nodded once and took a slow sip. I waited, observing her—not just for signs of pain, but for the fading magic. Tonight had been intense, and I would have given anything to have been there to stop her from being thrown in that cell. But I still wasn't sure whether she would wake up in the morning as a statue or as the flesh-and-blood woman who now lay in my bed.
I turned, making my way back to the table next to the door, where all the supplies the healer had brought up were. Maybe I'd missed something, maybe there was something more I could do for her.
“I don’t want you to go,” she said quietly, setting the mug down with a barely audible clink. "Please, I don't want you to leave."
I froze. Then crossed the room in two strides, kneeling in front of her so we were eye to eye. “Then I won’t. Not tonight. Not ever. Not as long as you want me here.”
She nodded again, more firmly this time, and I took her hand in mine. Her skin was so warm now. No longer a wisp of spirit—she was here, real, and trembling in front of me.
“You’re safe,” I said. “And you’re not alone.”
She climbed beneath the covers, slow and stiff from the bruises of Khuldruk's guards. I drew the blankets up around her and dimmed the lanterns, retreating to the chair beside the bed.
I told myself I’d just watch until she drifted off.
But even in the shadows, I couldn’t stop looking at her, waiting. Would this woman slip back into stone again? What happened tonight to change it? Was it perhaps the magic of Yule?
I watched the rise and fall of her breath. The curve of her cheek, so recently wet with tears. The softness of her body against my bedding—mine. All of it mine. That thought burned behind my ribs with a fire I couldn’t explain.
She looked like she belonged here, not just in the room, but in my life.
And that scared me more than I cared to admit.
She stirred, eyes popping open to find me. “Just making sure you’re still here.” But the way she smoothed her hand over her arm told me she might just be scared she might turn back to stone, too.
As she settled back down, I pulled a soft fur blanket up over her shoulders. "Please rest, Seraphina."
As I said her name, a small smile spread across her face. I knew her name. How did such a small thing seem so monumental? "I will not leave you. You have my word."
"I like it when you say my name," she said, looking up at me with some warmth returning to her eyes.
"And I like saying it. Now, please, sleep."
I pulled a chair next to the bed and sat next to her as she drifted off to sleep. The image of her in that cell was burned behind my eyes. The sight of her crumpled, scared, and bleeding was enough to make me burn the world down.
