Page 75 of Unfinished

“Here, look. These are R’kash’s logs starting from the day you arrived. Promise me you’ll read them. I can’t make you change your mind, but please give him a chance.”

Jesthi patted her shoulder before he strode away. Should she toss the thing out over the pool like a frisbee, or should she read the logs? Sienna rubbed her face before she looked down at the device and saw the first entry staring back at her.

She’s fascinating. I love hearing her talk. I could’ve stayed forever in those hills with her by my side, Veesha playing in the distance. I’m frightened. Already my body tells me what my mind suspects—the men believe the hand of the Lady is at work, and if I let myself consider it, I think it must be true. I can’t imagine that if it had been anyone else who’d stepped off that ship I wouldn’t have done as I’d planned. I would’ve explained my priests’ actions, apologized, and it would’ve been over, but it was her. She’s not like anyone else. I read her words and now I have a voice to put to them and can’t get them out of my mind. No one has ever shared so much with me. People come and they go, but they never see me as anything more than my station. From the first moment, she has looked at me and forced me to show her what’s beneath it all. I can’t believe that she will be satisfied, yet I can’t stop my hope from growing.

She shouldn’t let a few sad words fool her. He’d still lied. He’d had the chance to tell her once he’d gotten to know her, and he’d still kept it a secret. Her finger hovered over the tablet. If it worked like R’kash’s tablet, she could just swipe and she’d see the next entry. Did she want to keep reading? Would any explanation matter?

My venom for her builds freely now. I have to relieve it at least once, often twice daily. I often wonder if there’s any past where I would’ve been the one to write to her, where I could live without the pressing guilt of our deception and just know what it’s like to love her without worries. Sadly, I don’t think there was any other way. I would never have dared. She’s unlike any woman I’ve known. The others barely touched me. They took what they wanted as their due and left me lying spent and empty in my quarters, just a tool for their needs. When I taste her, it’s not just an act to prepare her for mating, quickly done and then forgotten. Her honey stays on my tongue long after we’re both sated, and she looks at me with wonder. She lets me worship her body, and she touches me in return. The things she has done to me—I don’t even have words to express how she makes me feel.

I watched her with Veesha today. She’s better with her than I am. I still feel stiff and stupid, like I never know what words to give to a child. I would die to protect her. I would do anything to show my k’vasha how much she means to me, but I can’t manage to make myself pleasant and comfortable like Faseeth. I brought him here. It’s my fault she can compare the two of us and find me lacking, but for all that, I wouldn’t ever send him away. I hope she’ll know one day when she’s older that I have loved her since the day she was left at Evathi, that I’ve seen that morning as the day my life took on a greater meaning. I want Sienna to stay. Bringing her to the temple felt similarly momentous. When she accepted my arm and I led her through Evathi’s doors, there was no roar of thunder or clap of lightning, but I felt it all the same—she will change me and shift me, make me greater than I once was. I could live for her like I do for Veesha. I could give her all of me if only she’ll let me.

Sienna set the tablet on her lap and braced her hands over her forehead, taking in a shaky breath. They were just words. Just words that made her eyes ache. They didn’t change how betrayed she’d felt when he told her his priests had read all of those messages where she’d poured out her innermost thoughts. Tasha would tell her…Sienna dropped her arms and looked out at thej’kaviplant closest to her. She didn’t know what Tasha would say. Not if she had the whole story. She looked back down at the tablet and swiped again and again. Then she went back and counted the entries. There was one for every day since she’d come to Evathi. She sighed, and then she read the last one.

Veesha and the men are delighted with Sienna’s Christmas. She’s brought such happiness to Evathi. I have never felt so joyful either. I think that what she feels for me is real, that what we have exists beyond the feelings she developed from the messages. I feel as if I’ve shown her who I am, that she’s had time to choose me. Whether or not she ever accepts my claiming bite, I am her mate. She may refuse to be mine when I tell her the truth of our meeting after her Christmas, but that will never change that I belong to her—in body, heart, and soul. I don’t know what will happen to me if she leaves. Will my venom finally stop flowing if her scent isn’t there to tempt me? Will this lightness that brightens my days dim to nothing? Will I be the same as I once was, a man only living with his eyes half open to the beauty in this life? My love for her is like Evathi herself—strong amid the shifting winds and the weight of time. It will exist regardless of what she decides, and it will endure long after if she should leave. She has marked me and claimed me, even if she never intended to do so, and now I am hers to do with what she will. I only pray to the Lady I can find the right words. I need her to understand.

30

“Sienna.”

He hadn’t meant to say her name. She glanced up like a startledraskuiabout to run, and he cursed himself for ruining things all over again. He should never have blurted out the truth the way he had after Veesha’s rescue. He’d been so overwhelmed with gratitude for their safety, and he hadn’t thought. He’d bludgeoned her with the truth, and in turn, he’d smashed apart everything else they’d built together. She would never trust him now.

She was shifting her legs on the long bench facing the sacred pool, and she slid a small tablet off her lap. Had she been writing to the Mate Portal officials and recounting his deception? She was probably preparing to run from him even now. There had been a moment up on the rooftop where he’d thought he had a chance, that she might forgive him, but that was over now.

“R’kash,” she said, and she stood up, glancing down at the discarded tablet. “What are you doing here?”

“I won’t bother you,” he replied stiffly. “Jesthi told me you would need assistance. He refused to explain why I could be the only one to help. I will leave if you want me to go.”

She looked back at the tablet again, and he would’ve sworn a smile teased her lips before she hid it away again, flashing him an irritated glance. He shifted his weight, preparing to step back and give her the solitude she craved.

“Aren’t you going to say anything else? Are you going to give up just like that?”

He froze, his body feeling trembly and hot inside like nothing fit quite right, like all of his systems were in disorder. “Give up?”

“Yes, give up. If you love me so much like you say in all of those messages, aren’t you going to do something about it? Are you just going to let me walk out of here and say nothing?”

“Messages? What messages?”

She fixed another angry glare at the tablet on the bench. “The logs, the ones Jesthi showed me. Did you put him up to that?”

His hand went back, searching for some sort of support, but there was nothing there to stop him from swaying on his feet. “My logs? The temple logs?” His feathers rustled noisily as he tried to figure it all out. “Jesthi?”

“Yes, Jesthi. He brought me this tablet and made me promise to look.”

He lifted his head and met her eyes. “He showed you my private records.” He stood there silent for a moment and then he laughed. He laughed again, his hiss sounding pained. “That son of a keelis beast, that spawn of the creeping creatures. He showed you my logs,” he repeated firmly. “I suppose I deserve that. I won’t claim it’s the same as what you feel, but you were never meant to see those. Did you read them?”

She nodded her head. “Some of them. Not all—I haven’t had time, but I read enough.” Her normally joyful human laughter sounded as bereft as his own had moments ago. “I don’t know whether to laugh or to cry. Jesthi told me I could hit him or curse him if I wanted, but I don’t want to do either of those things. I might want to hug him. I don’t know how I feel, R’kash. I feel like I should still be angry, that I have a right to be furious, but then I think about it again, and I know that if you’d told me right away, I wouldn’t have stayed. I wouldn’t have known what it was like to wake up in your arms. I wouldn’t have been here to know Veesha, and I would’ve missed all of these wonderful moments with you. Last night on the rooftop I thought that I couldn’t ever be more content, that my life had finally reached some unspoken pinnacle, my happily-ever-after, but then it was like it all just crumbled to dust.”

“I’m sorry, myk’lallsa.”

“No,” she said, holding up a hand. “I don’t want you to be sorry right now. I want to know if everything you wrote was true.”

R’kash straightened his shoulders and lifted his head, making sure she looked back at him before he spoke. “Every word. I didn’t write those entries for anyone but myself. I never thought Jesthi would access my logs, but I won’t lie to you again now—I’m glad he did. I’m glad for everything he did. I’m grateful he found you, that he wrote to you well enough that you were tempted to come to Evathi. If reading those logs has any part in convincing you to stay here, then I’m grateful for that, too. Can you forgive me, Sienna? Everything I feel for you is true. I’ve never been good at pretending. I know you doubt it, but you know me, the real me. I’ll gladly spend the rest of my time on this plane proving it to you, if only you believe you can still love me in return.”

Sienna closed her eyes. Her chest lifted and lowered with her breaths, and her hands curled into small fists at her sides. He felt ill as he waited for her to move, to come to some decision, but he didn’t speak. He wouldn’t rush her.

When she rushed forward and wrapped her arms around him, she almost knocked him off his feet. His feathers flared and his rattle surged to life, even as he tried to decipher whether this was a last desperate hug goodbye or the beginning of something wondrous and even stronger than before.

She finally looked up. “I choose you, R’kash. I choose us.”

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