Page 63 of King Elijah (The Zemiran Chronicles 2)

“You probably did the same with your own father,” she said. “Played along until you could fight back.”

She glanced at him, watching his expression change.

The more time Janelle spent with Elijah, the more she realized they had a lot in common—both being raised under the thumb of a powerful, evil man. They had been indoctrinated by dangerous ideologies and stripped of the freedoms that other children took for granted. And they both had to fight and still fought, to untangle the poison planted in their minds.

“But you do this for your brother’s safety,” he said, and at first, she thought it was a compliment. “It’s not noble, Janelle. It’s stupid.”

She grimaced at his tone; his words hurt. The pain and fear swelled suddenly, as it sometimes did, like a sharp punch to the chest. She felt a tear form at the corner of her eye, but she blinked it away. Elijah would never see her acting as weak as she truly felt sometimes.

“The children of Hagmar are too valuable to Kieran,” she said. “Most likely, he’ll keep us both,” she continued. “Especially now that Aiden is going right to them.”

Elijah said nothing in response. He was lying much closer to her than Janelle realized, and the urge to reach out and touch him was back with a vengeance.

Janelle could share a bed with her enemy. She could plunge a knife into his heart, end his life, and possibly have hers ended in return. Every fiber of her upbringing told her that vengeance mattered more than all the rest. But, as she lay near him, quiet and content as she let his warmth sink into her skin, Janelle’s desire to harm him faded to nothingness. A new passion took its place, as unwelcome as the last. She didn’t know what to do with it. It was like a floodgate of new emotions broke open inside her heart, and Janelle truly saw Elijah for the first time.

Flicking her gaze up, she took in the deep blue eyes that watched her, the lean frame strung with muscle, and his steady, controlled breaths. He was waiting for her to make a choice. Every inch of him, every beautiful inch, was tense and ready, honed in entirely on her. Those consistent breaths felt like a rare treasure to her now. She couldn’t believe she once considered ending them.

Janelle closed her eyes, letting herself sink into the sights and smells surrounding her. A chilly breeze blew in through a small crack in the window, the same draft that rustled the leaves gently, lulling her to a profound sense of peace. Her intuition was so sure now of what Elijah meant to her. She had no idea how she missed it before when she first attacked him.

Elijah sat up and rested his back against the headboard. She moved to sit beside him, her lower back settling into the pillow, their shoulders comfortably and uncomfortably touching.

The world felt still and silent around them as she leaned forward, pulling her arms around her knees and staring down at the throw blanket pooled at her feet. The only sound in the room was the rustling leaves from the trees and the howling of the winter wolves from the forest behind the inn.

“Elijah—” Janelle started but couldn’t finish. His fingers were suddenly on her skin, featherlight touches that made her burn with want and need. She blocked it out or tried, but passion shuddered through her when his fingers found the scars on her back and traced over the patterns with an achingly soft touch. Janelle lowered her head and enjoyed the contact more than she should have. She hugged her knees closer, curling up under his touch, feeling small and delicate but in the most exhilarating way. It was such a foreign feeling that she could barely comprehend its novelty, and words completely escaped her.

She could count on one hand the number of people who had touched her with gentle affection in her life. It never bothered her to be left alone. She was fierce. There was no need to pull warmth from the people around her to keep herself fulfilled. But, strange as the feeling was, it was also delicious. Everything internal and physical shifted. She wasn’t a warrior beside him.She was a woman who wanted to be touched. To be touched by him.

Janelle took a deep, shuddering breath as she let herself acclimate to the touch as he kept his fingers on her back, continuing to trace her scars.

“Who did this to you?” Elijah’s voice was soft, almost less than a whisper, but at the same time, more than a growl. So much more that she fell into its ferocity.

She glanced over her shoulder at him. Elijah sat with his jaw clenched in barely restrained anger. It sent a buzzing curl of pleasure through her spine because he wanted to punish the person who’d done it to her. It was written in his dark, steely gaze, in his slow, unflinching breaths. He was protective, and the thrill of it washed through her. Her body wanted to grab onto the sensation with both hands and never let go, which confused her rational mind.

“What?” she asked. Her tongue felt thick as she pushed out the word. Her body was already adrift in the pleasure of Elijah’s touch.

“These,” he said. His voice was distant. He continued to look at her, drinking in every inch of the scarred flesh with rapture. It was as if the world were falling away around them as they walked through the same soft dream.

“Oh. Um. They’re from Kieran’s punishments,” she said, eventually. The words came easily because they were a truth Janelle had lived with. A life of pain and bloody wounds was all she knew. Her body’s reaction didn’t cause a waver in her voice because years of wearing her scars had left her well-practiced in discussing them, letting none of that pain and fear into her voice. However, Elijah was coming up against the memories for the first time. His face hardened again as she continued. “Five lashings for every time I disobeyed him. That was always the rule.”

Janelle endured the pain of her decisions, and it was often. She defied Kieran repeatedly. She couldn’t stop herself from rebelling, and she didn’t want to. It was her way of taking a small piece of control away from that man. Those scars represented her strength and resilience, and she had no regrets about earning them.

Janelle closed her eyes, sinking back into his fingertips as they left tingling trails over her skin, as if he could remove the markings with his soft touch, with the warmth of his breath against the scars and the more delicate flesh of her back.

But Janelle had never been built for gentleness. Every square inch of her was created to fight, run, kill, decimate, and destroy. She didn’t have the right foundations to process the warm, syrupy contentment that Elijah was trying to pour into her. She’d lived a hard, brittle life, and the sudden softness felt like it was eating at her from the inside out. It was terrifying.

“I know they’re hideous, Elijah,” she said. The softness of her voice was as surprising as the deliciousness of his fingertip, but the words were sharp. “You don’t have to touch them.”

His fingers stopped suddenly, hovering over the ridge of her spine. She could feel the heat emanating, seeping into her even though Elijah was no longer touching her skin.

“Hideous?” he said, his scoff not much more than a semi-hard puff that blew the short hairs at the nape of her neck. “No, Janelle. These are not hideous. They’re beautiful.” He left a trail of warm air kissing across her shoulders as he spoke, sending a thrum of urgency through her. “These scars are a testament to your strength. How you survive what so many others couldn’t have. That monster may have intended them to be your mark of shame, but all I see is you.”

Janelle’s lips parted, chest rising and falling quickly as a well of emotion rose behind her eyes. Her mind fought to want him, fought needing his touch. She shivered and her very flesh ached to go back to being numb, cold, and hard. Allowing herself to sink into his words, to want him so badly, was a blight against the strength he’d only just complimented. The emotion his words exposed was too big for her to grasp, so she leaned away from it. Janelle’s worth was always on the battlefield. The idea that someone saw her—truly saw her—beyond the sword . . . it was incomprehensible.

Janelle had talked herself in circles trying to get around it, but it was too late. She could admit it now; her heart had given up the fight long ago. Since she met Elijah, every ounce of hatred she felt for him had been conflicted with the pull of attraction that was just as strong. His gentle touch had burned his devotion into her skin—a brand deeper than any of Kieran’s scars—and she felt like he had somehow claimed her.

What was worse was how intensely she wanted to be claimed. It echoed through her mind and heart—her entire body.

“Mmm, that feels good, Elijah,” she confessed. The words rolled out of her without a thought, and his name felt natural on her tongue. She finally let the pleasure of his touch sink in.

---