Page 41 of Silver Slayer

My first thought was that it was bioluminescent. That sex with Vennox had triggered some kind of biological response on my skin. A surface reaction. Temporary and explicable and not?—

I clung to that theory for exactly four seconds before the presence at the edge of my awareness brightened, like something had noticed that I was awake and was leaning in to say hello.

I was on my feet before the thought fully formed, snatching my discarded top off the floor and pulling it over my head in the same motion.

The bunk creaked as Vennox stirred with a sleepy sound leaving his lips as I crossed the room, my spine against the wall. I hooked two fingers into my collar, pulling it away from my chestso I could look down at the glowing design sitting below my collarbone, as if it belonged there.

"Quin." My name came out rough with sleep, and I looked up.

Vennox was sitting on the edge of the bunk, the design matching my own, a soft glow against his broad chest, eyes locked on me with an alertness that told me his mind had already caught up with the situation. The expression on his face was careful. Watchful.

"What is this?" I tugged my collar down and jabbed a finger at my chest. "What did you do to me?"

He didn't answer right away. I could practically see him lining up the words like he was defusing a bomb.

"It's called a shawra," he said.

"Never heard of it."

“It's the mark of a bonded pair.” His eyes held mine, steady. “Between spirit mates.”

“Spirit mates?” There was that term again.

He nodded.

I rubbed my forehead as his meaning dawned on me. “You mean like soulmates?”

“Yes.”

“You guys believe in soulmates?” I stared at him, incredulous. “That’s a romantic idea, but redicu?—”

I looked down at the soft glow emanating from beneath my top. “Oh, fuck me running.”

Silence followed my curse as I focused on the niggling awareness of an echo now living within me. It was a subtle, quiet patience that didn't belong to me. A thread sitting just beneath my own thoughts, and I didn't know how to unfeel it. But the longer I studied it, the more certain I became that it was him.

"I can feel… something," I patted the shawra, "inside. Like a radio playing in the next room. Is that you?"

"Yes."

“How is that possible?”

"The shawra is a portal," he explained, “where our spirits emerge and coalesce to form an eternal bond. Mating is the catalyst for its creation.” His eyes held mine. "What you feel is a small wisp of my essence, the same as I feel of yours.”

“That’s preposterous…” Even as the words left my lips, I knew what he said was true. “Sex is just sex, nothing more.” At least, back on Earth. But we weren’t on Earth, and Vennox was an alien species.

I pushed off the wall and started to pace, working the mess I’d gotten myself into piece by piece the way I always did, because if I looked at the whole thing at once, it was going to flatten me.

Nobody had forced me into it. I had been the aggressor, while he was the virgin in this equation. My pants had come off by my own hand, and I'd shoved him onto his back and told him I was driving. That he wasn't human was something I'd known going in.

He'd even tried to warn me, telling me the choice was mine. I thought he’d meant the sex.

I hadn’t been willing to listen, since conversation wasn’t what I’d had in mind when I’d straddled his lap with a single-minded determination to scratch an itch. So most of this was on me. Fine. I could own that part. Yet a simple misunderstanding should not equate to a lifelong commitment.

"Does it go away?" I asked.

The pause lasted a beat too long. And thanks to our new connection, I didn’t need to look at his face to know how much my question crushed him.

"From what the elders told me, no. Not entirely," Vennox said. “I will always be a part of you, and you will always be a part of me, but it will fade with time as long as we refrain from mating.”