“But that doesn’t mean that I didn’t know why I felt that way,” Hector went on. “It wasn’t because of our esha or because your sister killed me to save your life. It was because you looked me in the eye on that train car and held your ground. It was because I could see your fear and your pain and I knew that you had lived with it all your life, and you had never let it consume you. It was because every moment I’ve spent with you since then proved to me that you are the bravest, strongest person I’ve ever known.”

He was looking at her so earnestly. “No,” she whispered. “No, I’m not. You don’t know what I—what I’m—”

“Beru,” he said, taking her hand. “You have suffered more than most people ever will in their whole lives. And somehow, you haven’t let those things twist you. Even now, with the rage of a god locked inside you, you’re still fighting for us, all of us. Even Illya. So the question isn’t why I care about you, after everything. The question is, why wouldn’t I?”

She swallowed, staring at his dark eyes and the intense, almost challenging look on his face. There was nothing, she realized, she wanted more than to kiss him again.

His gaze flicked to her lips and she knew that, impossibly, he was thinking the same thing. His eyes closed, those long, dark lashes fanning against his cheekbones as he leaned into her.

“I’m losing,” Beru whispered in the disappearing space between them. He stopped, breath hitching. “Hector, I’m fighting, but I’m losing. You think I’m so strong, that I haven’t let any of this twist me, but you’re wrong. The god … I can feel it eating away at me. Turning me into something else. I can’t … I don’t know how much longer I can fight it.”

Tears bit at the corners of her eyes, her voice shaking with the effort of holding them back.

Hector’s warm, broad hand cupped her face, his thumb wiping gently at the unshed tears. She couldn’t stand the way he was looking at her, tender and open and like he wanted nothing more than to take care of her.

“I believe in you,” he murmured. “If there’s anyone who can do this, Beru, it’s you.”

I can’t, she wanted to say. She wanted to scream it in his face. I can’t do it. I’m not strong enough.

Then suddenly Hector’s expression changed, his eyes flicking over Beru’s shoulder and his whole body going still and tense.

“Beru,” he said in a low voice. “Get behind me.”

She did it without question, following his gaze toward the tree line.