Chapter 347: Amara

Chapter 347: Chapter 347: Amara

Arik woke before Liam.

For several minutes, he made no attempt to move.

Morning had barely reached the bedroom, pale light filtering through the heavy curtains and laying narrow strips of silver-gold across the dark floor, while beyond the glass balcony doors Deira remained half hidden beneath low clouds and the distant hum of the first transit lines.

Liam slept with his face turned toward him.

After the previous night, the bedding had been rearranged into something neither of them could reasonably blame on sleep alone, although someone had apparently made an effort to drag the blanket back over them before exhaustion won. Liam was buried beneath it to the shoulders, brown hair scattered over the pillow and across Arik’s arm, his expression softened by sleep in a way Arik rarely saw when Liam was awake enough to notice someone looking at him.

Arik watched him.

Saint’s breath still lingered faintly beneath the warmer scent saturating their room, delicate and fresh against the unmistakable trace of their completed bond.

His mate.

The thought had never become ordinary.

Arik lifted his free hand and moved a strand of hair away from Liam’s cheek, careful enough that his knuckles barely touched the skin.

Liam made a quiet sound and pressed closer.

Arik smiled.

He was entirely willing to remain there for another hour.

Unfortunately, the palace had never respected his preferences.

A soft knock came from the outer bedroom door.

Arik’s eyes lifted.

The door opened only after he released a small pulse of permission through the room’s security field, and Kamal stepped inside wearing dark formal trousers and a long charcoal coat that suggested he had already been working for several hours.

He stopped when he saw the bed.

His gaze moved to Liam.

Then to Arik.

Arik raised one eyebrow.

Kamal lowered his voice.

"Amara arrived twenty minutes ago."

Arik hummed.

Kamal waited.

Arik looked back down at Liam.

His arm was trapped beneath his husband’s head, and Liam had somehow folded one hand around Arik’s wrist in his sleep, as though even unconscious he objected to anything leaving without authorization.

"She is waiting in the eastern reception salon," Kamal added.

"I heard you."

"I was confirming that."

Arik gave him a flat look.

Kamal’s mouth moved faintly.

Arik returned his attention to the actual problem.

Removing his arm.

He eased his fingers free first, then carefully lifted Liam’s head enough to slide his forearm from beneath the pillow.

Liam frowned.

Arik froze.

Kamal remained perfectly silent near the door.

Liam shifted into the warm hollow Arik had left behind, caught the nearest pillow beneath one arm, and settled again.

Arik stared at him for a second.

Apparently the pillow was an acceptable substitute for the Emperor of Nuria.

Offensive.

Useful, but offensive.

He pulled the blanket higher over Liam’s shoulder before sitting at the edge of the bed.

His body felt different every morning now. Not merely larger. Complete.

That was the only word that had ever fit.

The Gate had changed his physical body, but the bond with Liam and Nuria’s core had altered something considerably deeper. Pieces of a soul that had once existed across separate lives had settled together without erasing the man Arik had become.

Goliath was not gone.

He was simply no longer waiting somewhere beneath the surface to overwhelm him.

Memory behaved differently because of it.

That had taken Arik months to understand.

Certain people, places, and ether signatures could still provoke fragments of the past, but they no longer dragged him backward without permission the way they once had.

And Amara had always been an interesting case.

Arik reached for the black trousers left folded over a nearby chair.

"She asked specifically for me?"

"Yes."

Kamal remained near the door while Arik dressed, his posture relaxed despite the early hour.

"No one else?"

"Not initially."

Arik pulled on a dark shirt and fastened the lower buttons while leaving the collar open.

Interesting.

Amara had known Goliath better than almost anyone still alive.

His adopted daughter had spent decades carrying memories the Gate had stripped from nearly everyone else, and before Arik disappeared, she had already possessed enough history to disturb parts of his old life merely by speaking about them.

But not through ether.

Amara had never possessed enough ether to force a memory response from him.

Even before his soul completed itself, when certain strong ether contacts had been capable of tearing open Goliath’s memories with very little warning, Amara had not been among the people capable of doing it.

Her channels had been too damaged. Her reserves too weak. Her presence could make him remember because he knew her. Her words could unlock things. Her ether could not.

Arik fastened his cuffs.

And now?

Now the bond and Nuria’s core had stabilized him so completely that even stronger influences struggled to disturb the boundary between memory and identity.

Kamal watched him through the mirror.

"You look remarkably calm."

"Should I not be?"

"You have not seen her since before the Gate."

Arik adjusted the collar of his shirt.

"That does not require panic."

"No. But most people would probably consider meeting their adopted daughter from a previous life after more than a year of presumed death emotionally complicated."

Arik looked at him through the mirror.

"She is ninety."

"That does not make the sentence less strange."

"It makes the word ’daughter’ sound misleading."

Kamal considered that.

"Fair."

Behind them, Liam shifted.

Both men looked toward the bed.

Liam blinked slowly against the morning light, crimson eyes unfocused before they found Arik standing beside the wardrobe.

His expression immediately sharpened.

"Where are you going?"

Arik crossed back toward him.

"Amara arrived."

That woke Liam considerably faster.

"Already?"

"Apparently."

Liam pushed himself slightly upright, hair falling across his face.

Arik leaned down and kissed his forehead.

"You can sleep."

"I am awake."

"You were unconscious twelve seconds ago."

"That is irrelevant."

Kamal looked toward the ceiling.

Arik smiled against Liam’s hair.

"I will speak with her first."

Liam studied him.

There was too much intelligence behind those sleepy eyes for Arik’s comfort.

Then Liam reached up, straightened the collar Arik had deliberately left imperfect, and let his hand rest briefly against his chest.

"Fine."

Arik kissed him once more.

When he straightened, Liam was already reaching toward the bedside table for his tablet.

Of course.

Arik looked at Kamal.

"We have approximately four minutes before he decides sleep is wasteful."

"Three," Liam corrected from behind them.

Kamal opened the door.

Arik followed him into the corridor.

Before it closed, he glanced back once.

Liam had already unlocked the tablet.

The warm bed had lost.

Predictably.