I'd found my refuge. Tucked away in Azriel's arms, smelling of the same soaps after he scrubbed our bodies clean. It was tranquil and delicate, entirely different than what he'd done to me just an hour before.
I remembered when he had once been stiff when I asked him to stay. He'd sat on the bed and stared off at the wall. Now, his arms were wrapped around me as I leaned against his chest. We were both nude, a blanket pulled to our hips. My fingers drew mindless circles on muscular thighs whilst his held my face. His arm circled around me, crossing over my breast so his hand could lay across my cheek.
He'd grown silent when he kissed me softly and whisked me away to clean the evidence of our deeds from my skin. He'd then dried us off and laid me in the bed, tucking me into his arm. We hadn't spoken and I feared those emotional walls were rising once more in his mind. Then, every so often, he would turn his head and press his lips to my hair. It felt like a gentle kiss, and almost like he mouthed unspoken words. I wanted to know what he thought or wished to say.
I turned my head in his hand, his fingers and chest warming my cheek. I knew he felt how hard my heart pounded as I thought over and over just how badly this could go. Perhaps he didn't find attraction as I did. Maybe this was purely physical for him. Was my body his refuge, or could my mind also be? I didn't want to intimidate him with my questions, but I found so many of them whirling within my mind.
My eyes fell to the toned torso beneath me, to the curve of muscle above his hip. He had many scars, some more silvery than the pinkish hue of his hands. What caught my eyes, though, were the marks on his skin that were reddened in their center, as though his skin had patched itself only in the past few hours. I noticed them earlier, when he'd been bathing me, but now they found their way into my constant thoughts. Had it been training? Had he been attacked?
"Azriel?" I spoke his name in a question. My voice sounded horrid against the calm silence in the room. He hummed, lips against my hair. "Were you training this morning?"
I felt his body stiffen beneath me and I nearly cried out. I knew questioning him would make him close off. He'd run away and I'd drown in the sorrows and absence of him.
"No, I wasn't," he answered shortly. I frowned, moving my hand over to trace the dark toned mark. His stomach tensed, a breath caught in his throat.
"What happened?"
He didn't answer me. Silence took over once more, but it felt too thick with anticipation or dread. I didn't want to pry, but I felt something deep within me that this may be my only chance to learn more about him. I wanted his emotion. I wanted his darkest side, his deepest thoughts. I wanted to know what his shadows said to him.
"I- I want you to know that I will not judge you, Az. I want to hear the worst parts of you. I want to hear them... because I want you to know that I can love those parts of you just as much as the rest."
I'd feared I'd gone too far. I'd confessed a deep part of my own soul, and he still hadn't breathed. My hand slid back to his thigh, my body trying its best to cease the trembling. The hand that cradled my cheek started to fall, dropping to my chest above the swell of my breasts. I knew he felt my stress then.
"I'd never-," Azriel begun, clearing his throat. "I'd never heard someone say that to me."
My heart cracked. He deserved to hear that someone loved him. He was so young, yet he was so broken. I wanted to piece him together, I wanted to hold all of his fragments in place and be the one to stand behind him when he needed me.
"I have never had someone care like that. I don't know... Freyja, I don't know how to react. I don't know what to say," Azriel murmured. I wanted to turn and face him, but his face was still pressed to my hair as he held me against him.
"You can start by telling me why you always wore gloves," I suggested, hoping it's reasoning was small enough that he would share it. His chest rose heavily beneath my back.
"Do you know why they're scarred?" He asked softly.
I shook my head, not sure if Rhysand was meant to tell me when he did all those years ago. I didn't know the full story, just that his father's wife's children had done it.
"As a child, I wasn't blessed. My mother got pregnant with me through aggression. My suppose my abilities were fairly obvious at a young age, so my father stole me away. I was allowed to visit her for one hour only one day a week, but that stopped long ago. He was married to another female. She had these two sons. They were twins, if you can believe it, and just a few years older than me.
"Well, they hated me. They thought I was weak, childish. It was ridiculous, I was a child. But, they did everything in their power to torment me. They'd throw me outside and convince my father that I had tried to run off to my mother. After that, I was locked up. It was some small room beneath the cabin in our village. I was left in the darkness, only allowed to leave once a day."
My heart ached for him. I brought my hand from his thigh and laid it over the hand on my chest. Azriel inhaled shakily as my thumb traced the rigid lines in his skin.
"One day, during my hour outside of the room, one of them held me down while the other poured oil on my hands. They thought that because I was a bastard child, I couldn't heal like they could. They wanted to test my abilities. One of them lit my hands on fire. They didn't let me stand up. I was pinned to the floor, screaming. Finally, my father heard me and came running. It didn't matter, though. My hands were ruined. Scarred."
I brought his knuckles to my lips, kissing them softly as I shook my head. I was not blind to the horrors of our world, but I still could not fathom someone doing that to a child.
"Are you ashamed of them? The scars?" I wondered if that could be why he hid them. I found them beautiful, with all of their lines and colors. They told a story of a young child that had overcome the horrid experiences that the Cauldron dealt him. I wished I could pull that pain from him.
"Not always. I mean, I've always hated them, but they aren't the reason I hide my hands. I don't like... skin contact. I don't like being touched without my approval, I don't like my hands touching another. I've done terrible things, and I thought that because my hands were so ugly and cruel, I wouldn't be able to stop myself. I have these moments where I can't seem to get comfortable in my own skin and that's when I hate my hands. Like maybe if that never happened, if they were smooth and pristine, I wouldn't find the urge to use them for violence."
I continued laying small kisses across his knuckles. He didn't deserve to feel that way about himself. All I'd ever seen him do with these hands was care and please, never harm.
"Your anger and your desires have nothing to do with your hands, Azriel. Maybe you crave violence because of your past. You've only ever known violence, never gentleness," I suggested, now grazing my cheek over his knuckles. His chest deflated as he sighed.
"That could be true. I just think that it's best for everyone if I hid them. If they're hidden, I can't be seen as strange or unusual."
"Strange and unusual isn't necessarily bad, Azriel. I am strange, I am unusual to those who are not used to me. Do Rhysand and Cassian stare at your hands? Do they find you strange?"
"I'm sure they find me strange, Freyja. I- After the war, I haven't been like them. I couldn't just go to the tavern or laugh with them. I fell into some sort of anger. It's as though I can't understand how life goes on after the things we've seen or done. It's almost like I haven't moved past the war. My mind is still there."
I frowned, brushing my lips over his hand. Somehow, I'd gotten him to speak his mind to me. I didn't want to lose that, I wanted him to keep talking to me. I wanted to know the worst parts of him.
"What do your shadows say to you?"
"Terrible things. The thoughts I try to push away. They call me a monster, they taunt me, they tell me to do the things I shouldn't do," he muttered, voice low as though he didn't want me to hear it. I turned my head, my cheek to his chest and his heart pounding in my ear.
"Like what?" He didn't respond right away. His hand twisted in my hold, cupping my cheek again.
"I don't want you to be afraid of me." Azriel spoke in a way that almost sounded like he was pleading; begging me not to think poorly of him. I didn't turn to look at him, knowing eye contact may overwhelm him, but I still wanted to make my point clear.
"Azriel, I saw you training in those camps. I watched from the hillside when you injured the other trainees. I've heard the stories from the battlefields from Mor, Cass, and Rhysand. I know what you faced and I cannot be afraid of you. Not when I spent my entire life wanting you."
The movement in his chest of his breaths were shaky, his hand nestling my head closer to his chest. I felt the shake in his hand and I wanted to badly to turn and wrap myself around him.
"My shadows feed off of my worst thoughts when I don't give them a job to do. They tell me to do things- things I already think of. I've found pleasure in torturing people, Freyja. I- fuck- I distract myself from thoughts of my past by going to the camps and killing the males I find hurting females. Rhys banned me from Windhaven. He said Alcaeus would kill me if he found out it was me."
My mind thought back to what my father had told me. When my mother and I were meant to go back to Windhaven but there had been a string of murders.
"Have you done it more often in the past few months?"
"Yes, I have," he whispered, voice breaking. My chest squeezed and I succumbed to the urge to face him. I pulled from his grasp, hooking my leg over his hips and settling myself on his thighs. His eyes were hollowed and his bottom lip caught in his teeth. His eyes were turned to the side of the bed. I took Azriel's face in my hand, lifting his chin so that he looked at me. Leaning forward, I pressed a slow kiss to his lips.
"Tell me what you did to those males."
His eyes glanced between mine, hands clutching my thighs.
"It's not pleasant, Freyja. You don't want the details. You'll look at me differently."
He didn't realize how badly I did. It excited me to know he was the one bringing vengeance for the females who were too afraid to stand up for themselves. The females that I wanted to save. I kissed him again, slow and serious.
"Trust me, Azriel. You tell me how badly you hurt them and I will look to you as a God."