Oh, how slowly he blinks his eyes and how quickly he rebuilds his wall.
Nayl watches as it unravels and how the bricks are cemented together and fortified. Her mouth opens to speak, but uncertainty strips her of the ability. There is nothing she can say or do to save him; she already began burning the bridge that tethered them together. She wants desperately to quench it, but she can’t give him what he wants – needs – and so she looks on with an uneasiness in her stare. ”There’s something about you,” she manages to mutter even as he withdraws and continues constructing his wall that she had once broken down, ”and it keeps me here next to you, wanting you to live here with me.” Nayl can’t pinpoint it as to why. When she looks across the ocean she remembers seeing him for the first time and how burly he had looked with his winter coat. Conversation was – is – difficult and yet she still wants more of him. This was to be strictly a sisterhood – a motive she supported – and yet she has brought men here and has given one (so far) a greater meaning and purpose. For that reason, she wants to trust him; she wants to turn to him and lean against him when the burdens weigh her down.
”Thank you,” is all she whispers when he denies betraying her. There is an unfamiliar tenderness when she addresses him, masking the iron-clad thoughts that support her answer. If betrayal ever happened, she is powerful enough to distribute punishment for anyone; nonetheless, she hopes to never harm him or even threaten him.
But even as she diverted the conversation toward betrayal and trust, her mind is still wrapping around him trying to touch her. The idea of his warmth against her skin is enthralling, and had she weaker resolution, she would have succumbed to her temptation and melted into his side. Perhaps, there truly is a sliver of fear that dictates Nayl’s actions. She peers up at him, her eyes the colors of a raging fire, and her shoulders ripple in an uneasy shrug. ”You were the first stallion I had ever spoken to,” she admits this quietly as though ashamed, but her steely posture reads otherwise, ”and none have ever touched me.” Certainly there are days that she imagines how it would be to experience an embrace, to fold perfectly into another’s side, but that would require her to be vulnerable which is difficult for her to grasp.
”Would it make me weak to crumble in the face of temptation?” Even as she seeks his answer, all she can hear is ‘yes.’
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