Page 76 of Claimed By the Wraiths

“So answer it.”

“It got frightened and latched onto my hand. All four feet. One claw caught when I tried to pry it loose.”

I smiled. “And now the question is what Mairuke means.”

He looked toward the ceiling as if there might be an extraction route there.

I waited.

“Little sweet one,” he said finally.

I stared at him.

“No.”

“That is the translation.”

“Sweetie.”

“Approximately.”

“You named your tiny gliding creature Sweetie.”

“I was six.”

“You have been refusing to tell me this since the Ghost.”

“I had reasons.”

I was still smiling when I caught the part he wasn’t saying.

“Why that word?”

The smile faded.

Serak looked at the scar again.

“My mother called me Mairuke when I was small.”

Something in my chest went soft.

“And you gave it to the saorik.”

He shrugged once, almost defensive. “It was a word I knew.”

That was all he said.

It was enough.

I kissed the scar.

This time he let me.

This morning it was a thin line along the inside of his left wrist, so fine I almost missed it until I kissed it and the light answered under my mouth.

“Come here,” I said from where I leaned against the headboard.

Serak looked at the space between us as if I had given him an operational problem.