Chapter 105 Washing Blood
I knelt on the stone in front of him, wedging myself between his knees.
I reached for the small wooden table and grabbed the white cloth I had used earlier. It was still damp with warm water. I gently took his right hand. The heavy, broken iron cuff still dangled from his wrist, the jagged metal edges having bitten deep into his pale skin during his struggle on the balcony.
I pressed the warm cloth to his wrist, carefully wiping away the dried silver blood and the gritty white quartz sand from the arena.
He didn't look up. He just watched my hands working over his skin.
"They are going to kill you," he whispered. The sheer, naked terror in his voice made the blood-bond throb in my chest. "When the Emperor realizes you gave me the blood of the First King... he won't just lock you in the tower. He will rip your throat out to get to the magic."
"He has to get through that door first," I said, my voice steady.
I rinsed the cloth in the basin, squeezing the murky water out, and took his left hand. His knuckles were bruised and split open from where he had punched the Trench-Stalker’s armored underbelly. I cleaned the wounds with agonizing care. I could feel the dull sting of the cuts mirroring in my own hands through our tether.
"You gave me everything today," I told him, looking down at his battered fingers. "You walked into that pit and let a monster tear you to shreds just so I wouldn't have to break my vow. You were willing to die so I wouldn't have to sing."
"And you sang anyway," he murmured, his voice thick with a sorrow that poured directly into my mind. "You shattered the arena. You filled my lungs with ash."
"I would do it again," I said fiercely, dropping the cloth into the basin. I leaned forward, resting my hands on his bare thighs. "I would burn this entire Citadel to the ground before I let anything take you away from me."
Klaus finally lifted his head.
His sapphire eyes were wide, luminous, and filled with a desperate, ruined kind of worship. He looked at me as if I were the only light left in a world that had gone entirely dark.
He reached out, his large, clean hands cupping my face. His thumbs traced my cheekbones, brushing over the dark, exhausted smudges under my eyes. His touch was feather-light, so incredibly gentle it made my throat ache.
"I have spent three hundred years drowning in the dark," he whispered, his eyes searching mine. "I thought the curse was a grave. I thought your bloodline was my executioner."
He leaned in, his forehead coming to rest against mine.
"But you are my Anchor, Nerissa," he breathed. "Not the other way around."
I closed my eyes, letting the profound, overwhelming weight of his love wash over me through the bond. It wasn't the violent, possessive hunger of the vampire lords in the court. It was a fierce, quiet devotion. It was the love of a man who had absolutely nothing left to lose.
I moved my hands up his chest, carefully avoiding the dormant black veins over his heart and the bandaged wounds on his side. I wrapped my arms around his neck, my fingers tangling in the thick, soft silver hair at the nape of his neck.
I kissed him.
It wasn't like the frantic, desperate kiss in the Abyssal Gate. This was slow. It was raw and deeply, painfully vulnerable. His lips were dry and slightly chapped, tasting of salt and stale air, but as he kissed me back, a soft, involuntary groan vibrated in the back of his throat.
He pulled me closer, his arms wrapping around my waist, lifting me slightly off the stone floor until I was resting against his uninjured side. The kiss deepened, becoming a silent, desperate conversation. We were communicating everything we couldn't say aloud. The terror of the Emperor. The ticking clock. The agonizing reality that we were locked in a cage, waiting for the executioner to arrive.
But beneath it all was a fierce, stubborn defiance. They could take our lives, but they could not take this.
When we finally broke apart, we were both breathing heavily, our foreheads resting together.
"Lie down," I whispered, pulling back just enough to look at his exhausted face.
He didn't argue this time. He let me guide him backward until his head hit the pillows. He let out a long, shuddering sigh, his eyes sliding shut as the pain in his ribs settled into a dull, manageable throb.
I crawled onto the massive mattress beside him. The dark wool blankets were rough against my bare legs, but I didn't care. I curled against his right side, resting my head on his good shoulder.
He shifted his weight, wincing slightly, and wrapped his arm around me. He pulled me tight against his side, his large hand resting flat against my back.
We didn't speak. We didn't need to.