My blankets are off in an instant. It’s only as I get up, naked from head to foot, that I truly feel my fatigue. I sway a little from it. My throat burns, my lungs rattle, the sword wounds on my arm, neck, and torso sting, and my legs want to fold under me.
I take a few shaky steps forward before the horseman comes over and scoops me up.
“I can walk,” I protest.
“Let me do this, wife,” he says, his lips close to my ear.
Reluctantly, I let him carry me across the room to the bath. He sets me in the water, which is scalding.
I melt into it.
Swear nothing has felt this good in a long time.
That’s not true though, is it? I’ve had many, many experiences with War that outshine this one. Just the thought has my cheeks flushing and my abdomen clenching.
I really could use a happy-to-be-alive orgasm right about now, despite my fatigue.
Leaning forward, I wrap my arms around my legs and turn my head so I can rest my cheek against my knees. My eyes flutter closed at the pleasant feel of it.
I hear War settle down beside the tub then dip something into the water. A moment later, I feel the press of wet cloth against my back.
My eyes open. “What are you doing?”
“Washing my wife.”
My back stiffens. We’re venturing into unfamiliar territory. There’s the sexual touches and the healing touches—those I’ve gotten used to. But allowing the horseman to bathe me is a new sort of intimacy.
Up until now, I’d fought this off. Maybe I’m just too tired or maybe it was the revelation that there is still so much unsaid and undone between me and War. Whatever the reason, I don’t fight it this time.
“Okay,” I say.
War doesn’t respond to that, but I feel him drag the cloth up and down my back, carefully tracing around the wound at the back of my neck. The washcloth slips into the water, turning the warm liquid a little redder.
Once he’s done with my back, he moves around to the front of the tub and begins to wash my arms, once again being careful to clean my sword wounds.
“I have been a fool,” he admits.
My eyes snap to his.
“You’re not going to fight in any more battles, Miriam,” he says. It’s not a question.
I pause at his words. No more battles?
How to spread the word then?
His eyes meet mine. “I won’t lose you,” he says vehemently.
My throat thickens.
“I can’t believe I ever allowed myself the luxury of thinking it couldn’t happen,” he adds, his gaze dropping back to my wounds. “Especially after you were attacked. I simply never thought He would allow—”
Just then a soldier enters the tent. “War—” he begins.
God Almighty! Is privacy dead?
I cover what I can of myself.
The horseman doesn’t look up from where he’s washing me. “Get out.”
“But you haven’t raised the dead—”
Awareness sharpens in War’s eyes. They lift from my skin, meeting mine once more. The horseman is a man of habit, and his most consistent habit is that at the end of every battle he raises his dead.
I think of those few birds I released. How paltry my efforts were in the face of the horseman’s undead.
War starts to stand, pulling away from me, his expression turning serious, calculating. I got the barest glimpse of this new man, one who has heart and compassion. I’m not ready to lose him so soon.
I catch War’s hand.
“Please don’t.” It comes out as a whisper. “Please War. All those people who survived—please don’t kill them.” I squeeze his hand tightly.
He stares down at me, searching my face.
Beyond him, the soldier shifts a bit impatiently at the entrance.
War has no reason to listen to me now. I have nothing new and compelling to tell him that I haven’t already tried to, and I have nothing else to offer him that I haven’t already offered.
But something about today has changed the horseman. I see it even now as he stares at me.
“It will make no difference in the end,” he says, his eyes so brilliantly alive.
I give him a meaningful look. “It will make a difference to me.”
This is how you get me to love you, I told him in Arish. I have a feeling he’s remembering those words right now.
The horseman stares at me some more, then says over my shoulder to the man waiting, “Call the men in. Tonight, the dead will not rise.”
The dead will not rise.
I can hear my heart thundering.
The soldier leaves, and we’re alone again.
I try to take in a deep breath, but I’m breathless.
I thought it was an easy promise to make, telling War that mercy was the key to my love. I hadn’t realized there was any truth to those words.
Not until this moment.
I stand, the water sloughing off of me. War gazes at my body, his eyes hungry. He’s still holding himself in check, but he was right earlier—he has limited willpower. And right now, I am going to break it.
I step out of the tub and into the horseman’s arms, plastering my wet body against his. Immediately, his hand comes around my waist, the washcloth falling, forgotten, to the ground.
He’s still kneeling, and for once I’m taller than him. His hands skim either side of my waist, and he dips his head, pressing a kiss to my stomach.
I run my fingers through the horseman’s hair and tilt his head back, forcing him to look at me. I spend only a moment glancing down at War’s lips—and then I kiss him.
The instant our mouths meet, I melt. He’s decadent, sinful, saintly.
He breaks away from the kiss. “What have you done to me?” he whispers. “What have you done? Wife, wife, wife,” he murmurs against my skin, his lips moving lower. Down my throat and across my collarbones. He trails his mouth over my chest wound, which has now scabbed over, thanks to him. After a minute, his mouth continues on to my breasts.
His hands tighten as he presses my arched back deeper into him. War’s mouth closes over a nipple, and a moan slips from my lips. I’ve never been this way with other men. I’ve never been able to let my guard down so much.
“Ve lethohivaš,” he says.
You intoxicate me.
His tongue lashes over the tip of my breast, toying with me. I press myself deeper against him, needing more, so much more.
All the touching, the kissing, the oral—none of it has been enough. Especially not now that War makes me feel beloved, and not when he looks at me with something like humanity in his eyes.
Not when he’s given up raising the dead because I asked.
War’s mouth moves from one nipple to the other, and his hand slips between us, his thumb running down the length of my slit.
I’m breathing hard, gasping as I arch into him.
Not enough. Not enough. Not enough.
“War,” I breathe.
I need him inside me. Screw my remaining injuries, they’ll heal—he will heal them.
The horseman stills. I’m sure he hears something in my voice. He breaks away from my nipple, his gaze rising to mine.
My breath is caught in my throat, and my body is beginning to tremble with nerves and excitement. I’m not sure I can force out the words I want to say.
I hesitate, unsure of everything except my own foolishness.