Total pages in book: 153
Estimated words: 141492 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 707(@200wpm)___ 566(@250wpm)___ 472(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 141492 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 707(@200wpm)___ 566(@250wpm)___ 472(@300wpm)
He held out his hand to her. “Come to me, Safia. Let us try this.”
She couldn’t look away from his gaze, trapped in that liquid heat. Drowning in it. She swallowed her protest and put her hand in his. Was it a compulsion? Or obsession? She honestly couldn’t say, only that she needed someone to save her because she couldn’t save herself.
“What are you going to do?”
He shackled both wrists by wrapping his fingers around them, settling his fingers over her pulse, beating so hard. “Amastan, Gwafa and Izem, I will speak the ritual binding words in my language and interpret them so you will know what I say as I take Safia into my keeping.”
Her heart jumped. She shook her head. Don’t do this. Not yet. I’m not ready.
You will never be ready, sívamet. You insist on scaring yourself. I will answer your questions, and we will work past your fears once this is done.
It won’t work.
You know it will, or you would not look as though you are about to faint.
Safia would rather fight another vampire than face this. She had driven him to this. Aura had warned her, and yet she’d still pushed him. I don’t want this. Not yet. Could she be close to a panic attack?
I warned you I was not capable of giving you up. Your heart needs to follow the rhythm of mine. Breathe with me.
“Te avio päläfertiilam. You are my lifemate.” Petru’s voice was soft but very firm. Éntölam kuulua, avio päläfertiilam. I claim you as my lifemate.”
Safia instantly felt the fusion as tiny threads connected them deep inside. Not a few but hundreds. Instantaneously. Rapidly. There was heat, embers smoldering, threatening to burst into flame. She wanted to tell him to stop, but she couldn’t speak, couldn’t look away from his eyes, that intense heated silver.
“Ted kuuluak, kacad, kojed. I belong to you.”
Did he? Did he belong to her? Did she want him to belong to her? He sounded like he meant the words. She wanted to reach up and brush strands of his silvery hair from his face and claim him with her fingertips. At the same time, she wanted to run for her life. She had the feeling that if he continued, she would never be able to get away from him. Arrogance was carved into every line of his face. He was hard. Masculine. He truly could be every inch the controlling dictator she feared.
“Élidamet andam. I offer my life for you.”
Those words sank into her. He had sacrificed so much two thousand years earlier to save so many others. She didn’t understand how much he’d suffered, but she knew he had. She’d caught glimpses of his desolate life, more than he would have allowed had he known. She feared she would never measure up. Never be good enough.
A small part of her knew the vampire had programmed her to believe her own family had chosen life over her and he had given her up to save them. Was he really offering his life for her, or were the words simply recited through conditioning and meant nothing? She wanted to belong. She wanted Petru to be that person in her life who was truly her partner.
“Pesämet andam. I give you my protection.” For the first time, a faint smile touched his face. You will not always appreciate my way of protecting you, but we will negotiate terms.
Petru made her want to smile. There was such intimacy in speaking telepathically with him. He seemed to brush her mind with caresses, making her feel special despite her fear of him.
“Uskolfertiilamet andam. I give you my allegiance.”
The strange liquid quality in Petru’s eyes had formed pools of swirling silver that she found mesmerizing. She found herself drowning there, caught by the words of his ritual, his compelling voice and the pull of the threads binding them together.
“Sívamet andam. I give you my heart.”
The moment Petru uttered that vow to her—and Safia knew it was a promise he meant to keep—her heart responded with a leap. An instant recognition, welcoming him with joy. The things he said might mean nothing to anyone else, but she felt each solemn promise branded into her very bones. Even deeper. They sank into her, becoming part of her cells, her DNA, impossible to ever erase.
“Sielamet andam. I give you my soul.”
That was the moment he bound them together irrevocably. She felt the lock snap tightly in place, the two halves coming back together, fitting perfectly. If she hadn’t been convinced before that she was his lifemate, now there was no denying it.
She had caught brief flashes, tiny vignettes of his life when she’d been with him before. With their souls bound together, she saw far more. Raised ugly scars, dark and terrible, as well as the torn and tattered places worn from the centuries of battles in a lonely gray void.