Okay, so, somehow I forgot this chapter or skipped over it, which sucks because it's like the best one. I realized it when I was updating it on Wattpad and realied a chapter was mistitled. But, here it is now! (I suck)

4

Since none of them could be certain how many people still remained on the boat, and also because Ayah and Kai weren't too keen on letting anyone be alone after spending so long in the darkness waiting for death, the three of them agreed to sleep in the room with the bathroom where Tyson had showered. It spared any of them the possibility of finding bodies, and also the mattress in there happened to be a king size. The moment they had cleared a space and flipped it back over, however, Tyson was down and out with snores to rival the best. Ayah and Kai exchanged glances.

"I'll push him to the side," said Kai. "We don't want him in the middle, trust me."

"It's okay, I can sleep at the foot of the bed," she said, a bit hastily.

He thought he could make out a darkening of her cheeks in the candlelight they had managed to scavenge. He wasn't keen on plucking out all his feathers for light, after all. "And be kicked by him?" No, that wasn't it. She wouldn't meet his eye. He sighed. "I can sleep on the floor."

"No! It's okay."

But the way she had squeaked that told him plenty.

"Just lay down." He tugged up the fallen comforter and threw it onto the bed. "I'm going to take a shower. You got your chance to take one earlier, right?"

She nodded, so he took up one of the can-width candles and headed into the bathroom.

Since the water was freezing, he wasn't able to withstand a shower for long. He settled for lathering up outside the shower, then rinsing off like a speed-demon. Despite his efforts, he was still left shivering madly and fighting the temptation to suck in the flame on his candle for warmth. It irritated him how delicate he'd become ever since his change. Though it did make him aware of how much of a difference it made to his tolerance of water his own strength and health made.

Back out in the room, only one candle had been left lit, and it was enough to see that Tyson still snored alone in the bed. He found Ayah huddled on top of a pile of clothes with an old coat over herself.

Kai sighed. "Ayah, get on the bed."

"I want you to have it."

Yeah, because he was a big enough jerk to make a girl sleep on the floor while he got the bed. Honestly. "Look, if it's that big of a deal to you, we can both sleep on it. It's not like I'm going to try and do anything to you." He wrinkled his nose. "Honestly, the fact you think anything would happen with Tyson there...ew."

She made a noise between a giggle and a cough.

He dropped to his haunches and put his candle on the floor, just in case he'd end up having to carry her to the bed. Force was a wonderful thing. "Come on. You said yourself it'd be like a big ol' sleepover."

When she didn't move, he reached out. The moment his hand fell on her arm, she spoke.

"It isn't that I'm afraid of something happening." She dropped down to a whisper. "It's that I want something to happen."

He pulled back, but her hand caught his fingers in her own. She turned over and sat up, her grip firm, albeit gentle.

Meanwhile, a havoc of flying, rabid things had taken up his insides. He didn't know whether to push her, fly out of the room, or take that as an invitation to discover what it meant to ravish a woman. The gleam of her eyes in the candlelight did nothing to remedy that.

"I love you, Kai. We've known each other for a short time, but your actions over the past few days have led me to hope-"

He tugged his hand out. "Yeah, it has been a short time. That should mean something to you."

Hurt flashed across her face, and he hated himself for that. But not as much as he loathed his sudden stupidity for not being on his guard since they had woken up; letting her fall asleep on him and touch him how she liked. Of course she'd get ideas.

But she only grabbed for him again, taking hold of his forearms. In a moment she was almost nose to nose with him, glittering eyes boring into his own like spears of icy sky.

"You said I could do what I want. You gave me your warnings, your disclaimers, I heard you. But remember, you said I could do what I want."

"This isn't some cute trial date you're talking about, though," he said, just as earnestly, even as her proximity ramped up his heart rate and sent the fire in his gut flooding into his veins.

"I wasn't raised to expect any 'trial date,' and I'd like to think our hardships together have meant something." She blinked, slowly, allowing him to watch the long shadows created by her eyelashes as they traveled across her cheeks. Her grip lessened. "Do you not want me? Is it you who wants to look around?"

"There's nothing to look for," he said without thinking. He hadn't been looking for love in the first place. Once Ayah had broken through his prejudice, the quest had begun and ended. She was softness, goodness, and beauty personified.

"Then can I at least kiss you?" she asked, breathing her musk across his face. His eyelids fluttered.

He couldn't tell if it was her or himself who closed the distance. When their lips met, it was as though something clicked into place within a spot that had once been empty. One of their wings knocked over the candle on the floor, snuffing it out. He had never been so willing to be in someone else's control as he was then, drawing deeper and deeper into her embrace.

When she pulled back, his scattered thoughts pieced together that she had managed to crawl onto his lap, where she straddled him, hugging his head to hers with both her arms and her white wings creating a cocoon of white space where only they existed.

"Say you love me?"

The words were vulnerable, tiny things, and yet they pierced him deeper than any gaze could have.

He had to answer. Speaking like that, he would have been compelled to obey even if she had told him to jump off the ship.

"I love you."

The moment he heard those words coming out of his own mouth along with the depth of their truth, he started to tremble. Any warmth he had been experiencing before vanished, and the fire in his blood went stale. His heart started hammering for a whole other reason.

Ayah jerked back. "Kai?"

He couldn't speak. He couldn't think of what to say. His throat was constricting and the air had become too thick and sticky. His mind started shouting orders at his body, telling him to snap out of it or get out of there or something, but it was as though his muscles had seized up.

In the dim light of the lone candle atop the dresser, Ayah's eyes went wide. Her pale hands came up to cup his face.

"Kai, Kai it's okay. There's nothing to be afraid of."

And as she said it, he remembered where he had felt this way before. Back in an ancient underground room built of old world stones. The chains about him had been ice, and it was the first time he had ever seen Boris really sneer at him as though he were the unwanted filth forced on him. Someone precious had been taken, someone Kai could only remember by the popping of grass and summer skies, and Boris was sneering at his tears.

It was also the first moment Kai had fully comprehended just how much hurt the world could inflict on him through his heart alone. The broken bones or lashes Boris could give him were nothing compared to every day emotional and mental pain. Yet all those words-the loss of those summer days of popping grass and soft mother's laps-

Ayah had her wings and arms around him again, tight.

"You're safe," she said, softly and clearly. "I won't hurt you. I won't let anything hurt you. I won't betray you. You're safe, I promise. Kai, Kai, don't be scared. Breathe."

She said it as though it were such an easy thing.

Suffocating, he pushed her off with shaking arms and tripped to his feet. Black popped across his vision and he caught himself, hyperventilating, reaching for the door, stomach cramping harder and harder. The only thing that seemed to make sense anymore was that he had to get away and hide.

Stars burst into being, brilliant after the darkness of the bedroom before. The ocean water didn't reflect the starlight, but swallowed it, deep and fathomless.

Kai caught himself on the railing.

"What the hell am I doing?" he rasped. "What the hell...what the hell..."

She called for him once, twice, but she didn't follow him as he walked away from their room and back down the ships cabins, hand trailing along the wall, legs trembling beneath him.