Page 66 of Midnight Star

Sapphire

Grounding myself,I push back at the frost.

I’ll be no help to Riven if I try to do it with a broken heart. The pain will hold me back from being able to focus, to think, and to breathe.I’ll be worthless to him.

Miraculously, the ice creeping along my skin starts to melt. Not completely, but it’s a start.

“Sapphire.” Riven’s voice is soft but certain, drawing my attention back to him. “Look at me.”

I do.

The love shining in his eyes makes my chest ache. Because if he does this, that love will be gone, replaced by nothing but hollow memories.

“Do you remember the first trial?” he asks. “When you were in that frozen lake, trying to get the key?”

I nod, unable to speak past the lump in my throat.

“That’s when I started falling in love with you,” hesays, and my heart stops at the realization that he’s confessing this truth so I’ll always remember it, even when he doesn’t. “When you emerged from that water, alive and triumphant, I knew you weren’t just a game anymore. I knew my feelings for you were real.” His expression softens, and he continues, “I wasn’t just coaching you through the whisper stone because I needed to keep you alive to get what I wanted. I was helping you because I couldn’t bear the thought of losing you. And when you surfaced—when I knew you were safe...” He trails off, shaking his head. “Everything changed.”

Tears well in my eyes, and I hate that I can’t stop them. Because I’ve never loved like this before. I don’t think I ever will. I’ve always believed in soulmates, and I know in the deepest part of my heart that Riven is mine.

“I’ll have a moment like that again,” he says with fierce conviction. “A moment when I look at you and everything shifts. When I realize that what I feel is more than attraction, or curiosity, or duty. I’ll fall in love with you again, Sapphire—I promise.”

The ice magic from our deal surges against my skin, demanding that I accept his words.

But I push back. Harder. Because he might believe what he’s saying, but belief isn’t certainty.

The frost recedes again, just slightly.

“You can’t know that for sure,” I say, somehow able to speak through the tears.

I want to run to him—to kiss him and remind him what he’s considering giving up.

And luckily, even though I can’t physically escape this rooted jail cell, breaking through it isn’t my only option.

So, I project, materializing in front of him.

His eyes widen in surprise, but before he can speak, I press my lips to his.

The kiss is desperate and demanding, filled with every ounce of love, fear, and need coursing through me. I pour my entire soul into it, willing him to feel everything I can’t put into words. The way he’s become my anchor, my reason, my everything. The way losing him—not physically, but emotionally—would destroy me in ways I can’t comprehend.

He responds instantly, matching my intensity with his own. His hands thread through my hair, pulling me closer, and the rest of the world falls away. Wind rushes around us, and it’s like we’re surrounded by a storm, standing in the peaceful eye of it.

Every memory, every emotion, and every dream of my future with him rages through me at once.

The spark that ignited between us when I first saw him across the bar. The gentle way he held me after I fell into the fae realm. The trust in his eyes when he openedhis heart to me in the cave. The steady belief he had in me every time he taught me how to use my magic and my weapons. The safeness of his arms around me in the igloo. The conviction in his voice when he first told me he loved me. The confidence he had in me that I could successfully project myself across the universe to the Midnight Star.

All of it flows from my heart to his in a desperate attempt to make him understand the gravity of what we’ll lose if he decides to go through with this.

When we eventually break apart, his eyes are dark with emotion, his hands cradling my face like I’m the most precious thing he’s ever held.

“Don’t do this,” I whisper against his lips. “I can’t watch you forget how to love me.”

“I’ll find my way back to you.” His voice is rough with emotion, and the resolve beneath it makes tears well in my eyes again. “Because you’re not just in my heart. You’re in my soul.”

At his confession, the frost from our deal crawls back over my skin.

I fight it again, clinging to the fragile threads of hope that remain.

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