for a long time,” Lokkaru said. She frowned, growing agitated and I felt my belly sink, knowing I didn’t have much time left. Her brow furrowed. “Though I cannot remember if she actually ever did.”
“What did she look like?” I asked quickly. “Maybe if you describe her, you can remember her more clearly.”
“She…she had dark hair and blue eyes. Like the heartstone’s eye.”
My breath left me.
“Nik,” she said, shaking her head. “She had red eyes. I—I don’t know why I thought they were blue.”
“You…” I licked my lips. “What about the heartstone?”
“Neffar?” she asked, looking at me. I realized I’d stopped walking, had turned towards her.
“You said something about a heartstone. Blue like the heartstone’s eye. What did you mean?”
“Nik, I did not say that,” she said, frowning, shaking her head.
My shoulders sagged, though my heart was still throbbing in my chest. But it was progress, wasn’t it? She’d actually mentioned something about the heartstone.
Blue like the heartstone’s eye?
I was disappointed. Yet, the selfish part of me was also relieved. I wanted to live this life, just a little while longer. I didn’t want it all to disappear just yet. And I knew that once we had a lead on the heartstone’s location, it would all disappear. He would disappear, like he’d never been.
“What would you like to do today?” I asked her quietly instead, trying to shake off the moment. I knew if I pressed too hard, her mind would scatter completely. “It’s a beautiful day. It’s growing warmer.”
“Then let us spend it outside. Fresh air heals, you know.”
I smiled. “I know.”
Just then I caught a glimpse of Davik and my breath hitched.
He was walking with his pujerak, their heads bent as they discussed something. I watched as the group of children—the one Bissa was running with—rounded the corner of a voliki sharply, one of them crashing into Davik’s strong legs.
The child fell but didn’t make a sound as he stared up at the Vorakkar in shock, his golden eyes wide.
Davik frowned down at the boy but his expression softened, ever so slightly. I watched as he crouched down in front of the Dakkari boy, as the other children in their group were hiding around another voliki, Bissa included, craning their necks around the corner to see what was happening.
I couldn’t hear what they said but Davik spoke to the child and he nodded. Davik gripped the child’s hand and pulled him up, turning him this way and that way, inspecting him for injury no doubt, before sending him on his way with a ruffle on his small head.
Sudden longing went through me. I remembered my dream, the dream Devina had wanted me to see. Of Devina wanting a good female for her brother. And right then, I wanted to be that female. I wanted him to be mine and the sudden ferocity of that thought frightened me because I didn’t know where it had come from.
Davik’s gaze flickered across the clearing and he saw me standing with Lokkaru. He stared, those familiar red eyes, the ones I’d woken up to, burning into me. He’d been busy last night with his pujerak. We hadn’t spoken since two nights ago—or rather, since the early hours of that morning when he’d moved inside me and made me shatter into a million pieces. It had, perhaps, been the best night of my life…except the dream had come afterwards.
I knew that he wanted to talk about that dream. And we would, I knew.
But right now, he merely stared, his expression softening even further, though I didn’t think he realized it.
I did.
And I wondered if this was how my mother felt when she’d begun to fall in love with my father. This terrible feeling of panic and warmth and turmoil and wonderfulness.
Just that thought, just knowing what was happening, made it all the more terrible. Because I could never have him. My daydream was just that…a dream. There was no future for us and I was a fool to think otherwise.
It was suddenly very warm and the longer Davik looked at me, the hotter I became.
When I took off the furs around my shoulders, revealing just my thin tunic underneath, I looked at Lokkaru and said, “Let’s go find some shade or I’ll burn up.”
We started forward but I felt Davik’s eyes on me, even as he and his pujerak resumed their strides, continuing on to wherever they’d been heading.