Falling in Love with the King of Beasts

RETH

"It's hard for me to explain, Elia, how it felt to see you there that night." He turned himself to face her, pulling one of his massive legs up so his shin rested along her thigh and he could stare her full in the face. "I had spent almost ten years reminding myself that you were gone, unattainable. That we had only ever been children together—forcing myself to acknowledge there was nothing between us. I had made myself cold." His eyes were sad. He stroked her hair and let his fingers comb into it. "When it came time for the Rite, I had steeled myself. Forced myself to accept that this dream was impossible and it was time to move on. I'd done it, too. I'd… I'd let myself make choices I would never have made. Forced myself to step out and… Creator's Light, Elia, there's so much I would change about those years and months before the Rite if I could—if I'd known you would come. But they are in the past. I can't do anything about them now. I can only promise you, show you, that no one else has my heart—or has ever owned it the way you do."

She nodded sadly. "I know, Reth. I know. I believe you. I do. I just… this is so hard. I wish it had started differently. I wish we'd had more time. I wish you'd come for me—I wish I'd known it was even possible! I would have tried to come to you, I think, if I'd known. I always thought about you and wondered what had happened to you. And I know if I'd seen you… if I'd just seen you, Reth!"

She dropped her face in her hands and he pulled her into his chest, wrapping her in his arms, and cursing himself for all the mistakes he'd made. Every assumption, every conclusion he'd drawn that had brought her to this point of such doubt and shame.

That little voice inside him urged him to tell her about Lucine, to make sure she was never blindsided by that. His first instinct was to deny it—she was already sad and angry, hurting, uncertain of herself. To let her know that he'd been close with the woman that had almost killed her… but then he stopped.

And he could see, suddenly, how his own pride, his confidence in himself and assumption that everything must happen because he willed it—or that people could not succeed unless he helped them—had brought her to this place where she was made less. And if she were to learn that by the wolves, it would not be kind.

It was his fault she hadn't known everything she needed to know. His fault she'd come here under these circumstances. So, even though he couldn't change the past, he could change how he stepped forward into the future.

"I feel terrible, Elia, but there is something I have to tell you," he whispered into her hair.

Her head snapped up immediately, her eyes wide and wary. "What?"

He cupped her neck and held her gaze. "Some of the choices I made in that time—when I was convinced you were never coming, and I was being forced to step into a future without you… some of them were foolish. And others were… just wrong. And those… if they ever come out… you will be forced to face them with me." He let her see his remorse, his plea for her forgiveness, his ache to have done anything differently.

"What is it?" she whispered, fear and the edge of anger in her voice.

Reth swallowed and dropped his hand to find hers, to twine their fingers together. She let him, but never took her eyes off his face. "I told you I hate the blood rites?"

She nodded.

"Well… in the weeks leading up to the Rite of Survival, I was angry and struggling. I was forcing myself to give up on you, and trying to find a way to be… enthusiastic about my future with someone else."

Her brows pinched in over her nose. "Go on."

"A few weeks before the Rite, a female offered herself to me. One that I should not have touched. But I was lonely and angry trying to convince myself that I could make it work with someone else. So I… took what she offered."

"Who?"

Reth sighed. "Lucine."

Elia didn't move.

*****

ELIA

She had to have heard that wrong. "I'm sorry… who?"

Reth shifted his weight and the expression on his face reminded her of a ten year old boy who'd been caught stealing cookies. If her heart hadn't been dropping like a stone, she might have laughed to have seen him, this massive man, the King, so shamefaced.

"It was Lucine," he murmured, his eyes searching hers.

Elia pulled her hands out of his grip. "The one… you're telling me that the woman that killed all those others—that wanted to kill me—you… had sex with her?"

He nodded.

"But I thought… I thought they were all virgins, like me?"

"They were supposed to be," he croaked. "When she approached me, she broke the Rite—she told me she was the chosen sacrifice for the wolves, and she convinced me… she was certain she would win and we would be together. I knew she was right—had you not been there, Elia, she would be my mate, and my Queen, and my skin crawls just speaking those words, but they are true," he said fiercely.

Elia's entire body recoiled from him and he saw it. He winced.

"Elia, you cannot think—you must know it was not what I desired, or what I would have chosen. You know my heart lives because you're here and I wouldn't change a thing about that. I wish… I regret that night. Deeply—and not just for us. I regret it for Lucine and the place it has left her. Had I known you were coming, I wouldn't even have been tempted. I forced myself to it because I thought I had to find a way with her and I was afraid, honestly. I didn't want to combine my bloodline with the wolves—and Lucine…" he trailed off miserably.

But something inside Elia broke when he said that woman's name like it was so comfortable for him. Like he knew her.