Finally, on a rainy afternoon, she touched his shoulder.
Kaelen sat on the porch and watched them, his heart so full it ached.
She tilted her head. “You know I could kill you in your sleep.”
“I don’t need saving,” she said, crossing her arms. Her voice was gravel and honey. “And I don’t share easily.”
She was quiet, pale as moonlight on water, with eyes that shifted between blue and green depending on her mood. Lianhua had been a river priestess before her temple was flooded by a rival kingdom’s curse. She had drifted to Veridonia on a raft made of lotus stems, half-drowned and wholly serene.
She pressed a seed into his palm. “Plant this where you need me most.”