said, “When I saw you in the hovercraft, I have never felt such fear. Though it was two separate kinds of fear. One for you and one for myself.”
Her brow furrowed.
“For you because it is dangerous. I learned how to pilot the xrellexax during warrior training. For ten rotations, I mastered it. It is deceptively difficult to pilot them. If anything had happened to you—”
He stopped before he finished, his eyes closing. Erin held her breath, feeling a little ashamed now.
“But you are unharmed,” he said, looking back at her. “By your own skill and perhaps the Fates’ protection also. For that, I am endlessly thankful.”
She wanted to tell him that she’d barely traveled anywhere on the hovercraft. Only up and then down the tunnel shaft, and she’d taken a small circle around the opening. But now she understood his fear—it had been ignorant of her to believe she could have navigated the hovercraft back to the Golden City with little training or knowledge of how to operate it. It had been foolish and Jaxor had been frightened just thinking of everything that could have gone wrong.
Obviously, he would know what could have gone wrong. She didn’t.
“I’m sorry,” she said, running her other hand into his short hair, curling her fingers around the strands. “You’re right, it was foolish of me. It was reckless. I could have gotten hurt.”
He shivered, but she had a feeling it had nothing to do with her touch and everything to do with the lingering fear he felt.
“And the second fear, the one that was perhaps more selfish, was that I would never see you again. That you would leave me and not look back,” he admitted gruffly. “That I had wasted my time with you, a gift from the Fates themselves. That you took my life with you, my purpose.”
“Your purpose?” she whispered, hearing the soft anguish in his voice.
“To protect you, to cherish you, to love you,” he said and her breath hitched, longing bursting through her at his words. Because she wanted those things, didn’t she? Hadn’t she always desired to be loved and to love in return?
“Wouldn’t that be my purpose too?” she whispered quietly, her heart thudding.
“Rebax?”
“To protect you and cherish you and love you too? To be equal partners in that?”
He closed his eyes at her words and a lump lodged in her throat. When he finally spoke, it was to say, “I never imagined, in a thousand rotations, that the Fates would tie me to another.”
“Why not?” she asked.
“Because of all my mistakes. Because I had turned my back on my family, on my people, on the Fates,” he told her, his voice ragged. “This life was supposed to be my punishment.”
He didn’t believe that he deserved a life partner. That was what he was telling her. That he had isolated himself here, in this place, as a kind of penance.
“Jaxor,” she whispered, touching his jaw.
“I want you,” he rasped. “I want this with you. But I fear that I do not know how to be what you need. Not anymore.”
“Don’t think like that then,” she told him. “Maybe you’re exactly what I want and what I need, as you are now.”
“You want me angry?” he asked quietly. “Because you have seen my temper perhaps more than anyone in the past ten rotations.”
“I like your temper sometimes,” she said softly, truthfully. “Sometimes I like when we fight. I like when we don’t fight too. I like when you smile and I like when you’re a little broody.”
He frowned, his brows furrowing.
“My point is that you’re not perfect and I don’t expect you to be, or want you to be. Not for me. Because I’m far from perfect too.” He opened his mouth, like he was going to argue with her, which made her lips quirk and made her kiss him before he could. It silenced him long enough for her to whisper against his lips, “I like you right now, as you are right now. Okay?”
When he pulled back to look at her, he exhaled a long breath and kissed her again. It was his acceptance.
“This is all new. For both of us,” she said softly. “For now, let’s just take it one day at a time and see what happens.”
Jaxor’s arms tightened around her briefly. “No more going to the hovercraft?” he asked, as if he needed to be completely sure. He obviously still worried about the dangers.
Erin nodded. “I promise I won’t. As long as you’re