Page 206 of Winter Gods & Serpents

Oh Sam, Sam. I lost you. Why? Why? My breath stuttered clutching his gift and I swallowed down on that cry. Sunrises were now my new curse, part of new nightmares. Sam was dead, his memories were now my torture. He was dead, gone, because of…me. What if it will never feel right, Sam? How many battles would I have to fight and how many more would I lose? My heart could never be uncorrupted by hate, my bleeding palms were proof of it.

He threatened to bend and break me despite all he had already done. It was not enough for him, he wanted more, he was hungry for it, for my pain. He might as well have already bent and broken me, but I also intended to keep to my words to make him bleed. For the love of irony, the only hands that were bleeding were my own.

I peeled my gloves gently to not let them rub with the wounds and headed towards the bathroom sink to wash them. The warm water more than soothed it dug on my wounds, giving a stabbing sensation. I had been so immersed in the pain from the wounds not noticing Kilian beside me and I startled out of my skin. He held a salve bottle and white gauze in his hands.

He rose a brow. “I knocked.”

I blinked back surprise. “You did?”

“Would you like me to go knock again?”

I gave him a push and he went behind me, his body pressing to mine as he washed my bloodied hands gently over the sink, delicately tracing his thumb over the fresh wounds to clean them. He kissed the back of my head and guided me to a stool so he could apply salve and wrap my palms in the gauze. Being nursed was another thing I disliked but I would dig new wounds from him to wrap all over again. I studied his features so carefully and closely while he was busy tending my hands, if they had not been wrapped in a thousand layers of cloth I would have traced my fingers along his tall nose, his dark eyebrows, and his thick lips.

He smoothed lines on top of my bandaged palms and threw me a pained gaze. “It is difficult to feel all of that and hold it without any means of release. I cannot tell you to control or stop it, but can I help you find a way out of hurting the one I care about?”

His words sent a hot flush across my cheeks.

It hurt when I did it, but it hurt less than what I felt, and that temporary physical pain dragged me out of the deeper emotional one. “I have been doing it for so long that I have forgotten how to stop. It is difficult sometimes to ground myself and not act on what I feel, and Kil, I feel so much, too much, that no one would be alive in this kingdom if I did release them,” I admitted, dropping my eyes to my bandaged hands, swallowing a hard lump of truth.

His hand smoothed over the side of my head. “We will find a way, to prevent you from committing genocide,” he said, making me laugh. “And to keep you from hurting you. There are enough who want to do just that, it feels unfair for you to be your own evil on top of everything. Pain cannot override pain, Snow, let's find something else that does.”

His words took me aback, he was right. I straightened myself and my features, weakness was not a good look on me. I did not like showing that side to anyone, especially the one in front of me. “Mal is—”

Knowing my line of thought, he interrupted me, “Stubborn woman, stop fighting me away with those methods, I know you enough to see through them.”

He stood drawing me a bath, sprinkling questionably all sorts of salts and scents inside, peaking glances of confirmation toward me.

“I am not a tea bag,” I said, lifting my severely wrapped hands. “With these one, the best I can get out of my hands is to beat you.” He had taken it too far by wrapping them like inch deep war wounds, such a dramatic Adriatian. Mal was right, he did make a lot of fuss.

I took a step back as he removed his jacket and started folding the sleeves of his tight white tunic. He took soft paces towards me, teasing me with a smirk. “I am not cruel, my love, as to leave you to struggle as such.”

I shook my head. “First time you will see me naked won’t be to be scrubbed clean, that I won’t allow.” I wanted him to join me in a bath, not give me one like a wounded child.

He unbuttoned his collar. “How should I see you naked for the first time?”

I blew a breath. “Red lace and possibly under you, over you, afront you. You get my point.”

He laughed and shut his eyes for a brief moment. “There, I saw you naked in red lace, over, under and afront. Now, do you need to be striped as well?” he teased, playing with strands of my hair, curling them around his fingers.

I crossed my arms tight over my chest in resistance and he grinned like a fool. “Pardon my rudeness, love,” he said, leaning in over my shoulder and reaching to unbutton my dress. “I should have offered, given your condition.”

“Smug bastard,” I murmured, and he laughed over the skin of my neck. Once the last button snapped open he ran his fingers over my spine before peeling it from my skin without losing my gaze, even as the dress dropped pooling to my feet leaving me naked. The bandages hid my hands plenty for someone to be called mildly clothed.

“You can look, I told you I am no shy blushing maiden.”

He grazed a finger over my temple. “I think the most undressed I have seen you has been with words.” He glanced between us and over my body shortly. “Though I have to admit, I had been wrong to think that was the best naked I’ve seen.”

I slapped his shoulder and he laughed. I could no longer hide the effects of that sound over my skin, the prickling and the changed pace of heartbeat shifting my chest. All I could think of was his body over mine, his lips over mine. I wanted him to have me, however he wanted.

“Kil?”

“Yes?” he answered absently, staring all over me with savouring relish.

“If I bathe in cold water you will eat snow out of my spoon for a week.”

“Shivering threat,” he said, tracing a finger over my arm and realizing I was indeed shivering. Worry swept his features. “I didn’t mean to get you to prickle, let’s get you in.”

“It's not the cold, it's you,” I said, shamelessly.