White Stag (Permafrost #1)(48)
Tibra’s egg-like eyes widened, and she scampered away, throwing one last sentence over her shoulder. “My way would’ve been funner! But I guess you’re stuck now!”
“More fun,” Soren growled. “It’s more fun, you heathen.”
My insides crackled with a static current as I stared up at him from my spot on the ground. “Grammar and sarcasm? You’re hitting a lot of firsts today.” The buzzing inside my head was akin to being drunk. Unable to process what he had said, unable to process how my body reacted to those words, I picked myself up from the floor and straightened my tunic.
Relief passed through Soren’s lilac eyes and changed to fear as he put two and two together. “How … how much of that did you hear?”
“I never would’ve guessed your master plan if I’d lived a thousand years,” I said.
Soren glanced around wildly for something to save him, his pale skin glowing faintly pink. My lips twitched, and the fire inside me grew stronger. After all the times Soren needled and teased me, it was amusing to see him squirm.
“You know I’d never do anything to hurt you,” Soren began. “I—I—” For once he was at a loss for words.
“You just want to take me in the throes of passion,” I deadpanned.
Soren blushed harder, the tips of his ears turning pink. “I was being sarcastic.”
I rolled my tense shoulders. The muscles ached when they loosened. The fire in them was nothing compared to the one in my chest, though, and I found the courage to speak my mind. “Then what do you want to do to me?”
He looked away, scowling. “I don’t want to do anything to you.”
“What do you want, then?” I asked. The voices in the cavern were no mystery now, but instead of fear, my stomach churned with anticipation.
Soren walked down the slope, skirting around a pool of black liquid too thick to be water. I followed, always one pace behind him as per custom. He inclined his head to the side and waited until we were walking side by side and something warm bloomed inside of me.
After a long moment he broke the silence. “You know, goblins don’t feel nothing. We’re not emotionless. I’m not emotionless.”
“It’s hard to tell when you always look like you’re suffering from intense boredom.”
Soren’s lips quirked. “We feel in extremes. Either complete apathy or complete obsession with whatever emotion takes us over. It makes us effective killers, but it’s also a weakness when it works against us.”
I was quiet for a long second. The drunk feeling was evaporating and the idea that Soren might actually want me in a physical sense, maybe something even more, was slowly seeping into my head. Strangely, I couldn’t seem to feel afraid, just hot in a way I’d never been before.
“Go on.”
“There’s a reason we don’t utilize certain feelings often. Rage, hatred, they’re wonderful when you’re on a hunt. Anything softer is a liability. We’re predators. We can’t afford to put anything else first; we can’t afford to think about anything other than our survival,” he said, his voice rough with frustration.
“You’re saying that I make you vulnerable. You’re saying you care for me.” When the words crossed my lips, the last fragments of my wall shattered. I’d seen him torture and butcher his enemies like pigs and the way he paid no attention to things he considered beneath him. I’d seen his unstoppable rage when someone threatened to hurt something he loved and the hidden compassionate side that offered me the warmth of his cloak and body. But never had he admitted he was vulnerable. In that second when fear flashed in his eyes, he was as human as me.
Soren watched me. “Are you afraid?”
“I don’t know.” Yes, there was something like fear inside of me, but it wasn’t the type I was used to. I wasn’t afraid for my life and didn’t sense any danger. There was only fluttering in my stomach that grew faster with each passing breath. It wasn’t fear; it was something more.
“I see you,” he began. “I see you and I feel like I need you. I want you with me. I want you by me. I don’t want you to cringe away. I want you to come close. But then I get angry because I shouldn’t want that. I can’t want that. That’s what my mind says. It’s a liability and it makes me weak as a predator. It makes me vulnerable. I hate it. And yet I don’t want to stop feeling it.” At first, he was spitting the words with a furious tone, but then his voice became softer. “And I don’t want to force you into something that will make you unhappy. And if that means that I release you from your bind and you go back to the human world and find a man of your own, then I’ll do it. Your happiness means more to me than anything in the world.”
“I understand what you mean now, Soren,” I said softly. “About monsters.”
His lilac eyes latched onto me, smoldering with feeling. “What happened to you down here?”
“I realized where I belong,” I said. I knew I’d never be able to speak of exactly what happened with my father to anyone, no more than anyone else could speak after death. “And I realized you were right. We’re all monsters in some way. But the only ones who are dangerous are the ones who don’t realize it. And—” I paused, my voice dying.
“And?” he encouraged.