Page 103 of Daughter of No Worlds

“Sorry,” he murmured, “I had to cut it.”

I let my hair fall, my hands moving to hold up my dress. I choked out, “Get the lower one too?”

His fingers moved down my back, falling to the delicate gold clasp that rested between my shoulder blades. “This one?”

“Yes.”

He obeyed. But his hands stayed there, his thumb swirling one gentle circle that set a shock from my toes all the way up the insides of my legs. “It pinched you. You have a red mark here.”

My laugh was weak, breathy. “It will fit perfectly with all of my other battle scars.”

He smoothed his thumb over it again. Then let out a low, rough chuckle. “If tonight was a battle, Tisaanah, you conquered.”

My breath caught.

“You were merciless.” It was almost a whisper, heavy with a certain reverence, as if he didn’t know he was speaking aloud. And he just stayed there, his knuckles brushing my back, as if we were both caught in some strange suspension of time.

Of their own volition, my eyes closed. I hoped he couldn’t feel the shallowness of my breathing, the rise of my goosebumps.

I was no stranger to touch. It was a professional tool, one of the few weapons I could wield to keep myself alive. Before, it had always been a demand, an instruction, a means to an end.

But not this. This was a whispering caress that reached past the scars on my back, past all of those ugly hurts, something that was only about the here and now. One that asked for nothing.

How long had it been, since someone touched me that way? With purposeless affection?

My body didn’t know what to do with it, except to fall against it, call for more. And gods, I wanted more.

I felt him begin to pull away.

“Don’t,” I whispered, before I could stop myself.

A pause. I could feel his breath again, against the back of my neck, the curve of my ear. “Don’t what?”

Don’t stop. Never stop.

I turned my face. His was so close that his nose nearly brushed my cheek, the space between us vibrating in a way that made my entire world narrow to those few inches where our breaths mingled. He looked at me with sharp, heavy-lidded eyes, utterly focused, and yet…

… And yet, I knew him well enough to see it.

That he was just as terrified as I was.

I had spent my life begging to be looked at.Look at me,I cooed at the men I danced for.Look at me,I demanded of Esmaris in my killing breath.Look at me,I commanded to every person who gazed upon my tattered back.

And I showed each of them pieces that were as Fragmented as I was, little carefully chosen parts of a whole.

But it was here, in this gaze, that I wasseen —seen for every incongruous part of me. And nothing had ever flooded me with such sweet, agonizing terror.

I looked at his mouth and wondered what it would feel like to show him another vulnerability, another truth. To let myself want.

Don’t what?

Don’t stop touching me, seeing me, needing me.

But I forced a light smile back onto my face. “Don’t flatter me,” I choked out. “It’s unlike you.”

And then, all at once, he was gone. He pulled away so quickly I was left standing there before a sudden, gaping absence.

“You should get some sleep,” he said, too quickly. And as I nodded my response, I clasped my hands together so he wouldn’t see that they were shaking.

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