Page 64

Say You’ll Remember Me

Reven leans against the doorway, looking like he’s trying to appear casual, but the taut lines of his body are anything but.

I suck in a sharp breath. How much did he hear?

His jaw tightens when I don’t immediately answer.

Is it possible he remembers my history with Cain? He was here when Cain followed me to the palace and asked me to be his heartmate. If bits and pieces of the past are leaking through, the night he abducted me would be a pretty big one for several reasons.

“We’re starting a new chapter,” I decide on. Vague, but safe. I watch him, though, hoping to see some spark of recognition.

Nothing.

Nerves dance across my skin. Okay, no memories, I guess. Is he jealous? We’ve shared things, done things, and even without his memory, we’re drawn to each other. I mean something to him despite having lost our past.

He stalks across the room to crouch in front of where I sit. “Are you…happy about where you and Cain are now?”

There’s an intensity in his expression that feels familiar. An intensity that never fails to make my belly quiver when directed at me. I can confirm it still works. “Yes,” I manage. “It’s time to live our own lives. As friends.”

“Good. I’m glad.”

What does that mean?

He tips his head, studying me. “You look terrible,” he says, then grimaces.

And just like that, the tension evaporates. A smile tugs at my lips. “I’m guessing that sounded better in your head?”

“I’m not sure that comforting is ever going to be a strength of mine,” he says in wry tones.

I glance away. “Yeah, well, that makes two of us.”

We’re both quiet for long enough that awkwardness starts to creep in. Reven clears his throat but doesn’t speak.

Two conversations like this in less than half an hour? The goddesses are laughing at me today.

“Why do I get the feeling there’s something you want to say or ask or…” I wave at him. “I don’t know. Something.”

Brilliant. I’m a brilliant conversationalist. Between me and Tabra, clearly the viziers should make sure I’m the one who talks to people. I’m so great at it.

Reven hesitates another beat, then says, “It’s not something we need to deal with right now. You need to sleep.”

“Well, now I won’t be able to sleep because I’ll be worrying about it.”

He sort of grunts at that.

“Is it the memories?” I ask.

He glances away and says nothing.

I smile for him, hoping I’m hiding my fear that he may never find me in those memories. I have traveled the road of hope so many times and it just keeps leading me to dead ends. I don’t want to risk that again. “I trust you.”

I hope he knows what I mean. That I trust him—memories or no—to do what’s right. For him. For me.

He blinks, obviously not expecting that, which makes me smile. A real one, an honest one.

“I’m not the me you truly trust yet,” he says.

“Wrong. Even without remembering me, you’re still you. I trust you. I realized the other day that you and I are two halves of a whole—light and dark—we balance. Right now, I’m the dark, and you’re my light.”

“Hells, Meren,” he mutters. But the spark in his eyes is anything but frustrated, so warm it reaches out and warms me, too. “What am I going to do with you?”

“Let’s talk about that after we win the war,” I try to tease.

Only he doesn’t smile back. Instead, he groans a little.

“Meren,” he whispers my name, his expression filling with an emotion that I haven’t seen since…goddess above, since Eidolon took him.

I swallow around the sudden ache in my throat. “What?”

He leans over me, hand coming up to cup my cheek, his thumb brushing over my lips.

My breath catches. “Don’t.”

His touch stills against my lips. “Don’t what?”

“Look at me like that, touch me like that unless you mean it.”

“I mean it.”

My heart wants to take wing, but the rest of me isn’t ready to believe it. “What?”

“I was going to wait,” he says, eyes as dark as a stormy ocean. “For the right time. But you saying we’ll figure us out after we win…” He shakes his head. “I don’t want to risk missing our chance if it’s our last.”

Which means what? I can’t reach for his love if he’s just going to take it away again. It would hurt too much. “Do you remember us?”

After a pause, he gives his head a slow shake.

“Then—”

“It’s coming back in random chunks. I don’t have it all, yet. But I have enough…”

Enough.

I stare at him. Hope pulls at me like sand shifting under my feet, no matter how hard I mentally stomp it back down. I’ve had so many things given to me only to be taken away that maybe I’m only looking for the lies, for the bad, for the catch. I have to stop doing that.

Trust him.

This is Reven. Even when he kidnapped me, it was both to protect Tabra and to help his people. He would never harm me if he could help it. He may not remember bonding yet, but…

“I don’t know what to say.”

Disappointment tints the regret that passes over his features. “I’m sorry.”

I shake my head. “Don’t say that. None of this has been your fault.”

“ All of it has been my fault. If I’d held back and waited for this to be over before I tried to have a relationship with you…”

“You did,” I tell him.

He frowns.

“After I escaped from Eidolon, you tried to put distance between us to protect me. It was…worse.” So much worse. In fact, why am I holding back now? “I just don’t want to wake up tomorrow and find some other reason we can’t be us. I don’t think I can take it.”

He drops his forehead to mine, eyes closed. “I shouldn’t have given in and made love to you that night—”

I put a hand over his mouth. “I knew what that was. I don’t regret it. But I can’t lose you again.”

He kisses my fingertips. “You won’t. I promise.”

“You can’t promise that.” Doesn’t he see that’s impossible to ensure?

He reaches up to twist a lock of my hair around one finger, forehead still to mine. “Then I promise that you won’t lose my love again.”

Cracks appear in the dam I’ve built around my heart. That’s it. That’s what hurt the most, and what I fear the most. Our new bond may be severed, but our original bond should still ensure that if I lose him, we’ll find each other again. But him losing his memories meant I lost his love.

“I remember , Meren,” he whispers. “I remember falling in love with you. The feeling of it. My mind may have forgotten, but my heart didn’t. Even when I was mistrustful, I couldn’t leave you.”

“That wasn’t love—”

He cups my cheek, lifting his head so I can see the intent in his eyes. “Even without all my memories, those feelings have grown, a little at a time—respect led to trust, protectiveness followed, then jealousy and possessiveness, which weren’t so fun.” He scowls a little at that.

“When were you jealous?” I ask.

“A thousand little ways that I tried to never show you. Not until I figured out my own feelings.” He brushes his thumb over my cheek. “Attraction turned to need but also to tenderness. All of that came back to me before my memories.” His smile is slow. “It’s not the bond. It’s you. Us.”

I’m staring into eyes so sure, so full of promise that I want to believe in the us he’s talking about.

Reven makes a sound deep in his throat somewhere between a groan and a growl and presses his lips to mine, soft and sweet and yet edged with desperation. “No matter what happens in this or any other life,” he breathes against me, “even if I lose the memories a thousand times, I will always fall for you, Mereneith Evangeline. If you have faith in anything, have faith in that.”

The sob that wells up and bursts from me comes out of nowhere, but it breaks through my emotional dam and I can’t hold back the flood. I throw my arms around him, bury my face in his neck, and let go of all those fears.

And Reven holds me. He just holds me.

When I don’t ease up, he runs a hand over my hair in soothing strokes and starts to talk. “I remember the first time I saw you in the streets of Enora, even though I didn’t know it was you,” he murmurs, his voice winding around me. “I asked who you were, and you told me you were no one.”

“I was no one.” Part of me feels like I still am.

“No.” The word comes out sharp, harsh. “I didn’t like hearing it then any more than I do now. You will never be no one to me.”

Maybe I died somewhere along the way without knowing it, and now I’m in the heavens? Is Allusian playing with me?

“I could feel it even then. You felt…different…just to be with. There was this pull.”

“I felt it, too.”

He huffs a laugh. “I distinctly remember you chucking a knife at my head in the woods in Wildernyss. And all the smart-ass commentary that poured from lips I was thinking about kissing way too much.”

I snuggle into him. “You thought you got the timid princess.”

“Thank Nova I didn’t.” His grip tightens. “I remember taking you to the Shadowood where you proceeded to fit in with my people like you were the last piece to a puzzle.”

His words are gaining speed, and my heart is racing right along with him.

“I remember being caged with you when the Tyndran soldiers caught us and trying not to go up in flames and claim you then and there. I remember escaping and thinking I was going to lose you when you impaled yourself on your own glass spike.”

Instead of soothing, now there’s a tightness in his voice, like he’s feeling that all over again.

“But you didn’t lose me,” I whisper, curling my hand into his shirt. “You saved me.”

“Saved you…” He takes a big breath. “And then claimed you.”

The relief and joy and release of all that hurt reacts to the darker tone lower in his voice, sending shivers dancing up my spine and warmth rushing through my veins. The tears still burn, but the reason has changed, happiness almost making it harder to hold them back.

I wiggle back a little to be able to see his face. Twin flags of red over his cheekbones tell me I’m not the only one feeling this.

“I thought I was the one who claimed you ,” I tease.

He sort of huffs a laugh and groans at the same time. “Meren?”

I know what he’s asking.

This urgency to channel all these feelings into something joyous instead of doubtful. Something that will connect us again, even stronger than before.

“Do you want to wait?” he asks in a strained voice. “So much has happened and there’s so much we still have to do. And I don’t remember everything. Maybe now isn’t the time.”

When will it ever be the time? The entire world might come tumbling down around us any second. We should hold onto any happiness we can find for as long as we can. “I’ve learned that sometimes now is the only time.”

He’s holding himself like he’s not sure what the best thing to do is. Maybe he’s the one who needs time.

I stretch up to place a soft kiss against his lips, delighting in the fact that I can do even this much. “We can wait, if that’s what you need. Just being able to hold you is—”

Reven suddenly rolls me, hovering over me. “That’s not what I need.”

The kiss he gives me is everything I’ve been waiting for. He may not remember everything, but he remembers enough, and I can feel that. I feel it in the way he touches me. Not claiming, like he did the night we bonded. And not like that night after we took the palace back. This is different. He’s still exploring, still feeling out my responses, but the emotion is there.

He loves me. He remembers he loves me. But he also fell in love with me all over again.

His taste slides over my tongue and through my blood. Everything about me centers and settles with the absolute rightness of us together. Not just physically, but us.

Just us.