THIRTY ONE.
threads of desire!
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After an hour or so of barreling through the galaxy in hyperspace, Din pulls the Razor Crest back, letting it coast through the stars at a more relaxed speed. At the sudden change in momentum, Zoya jerks awake where she's curled in her seat, blinking hazily at the backdrop of stars hung in place outside the window.

            Din glances back over his shoulder, eyes catching on the slumbering child, cocooned warmly in his makeshift seat. He should be fine. Standing, he stretches his arms out in front of him, rolling his head to the side before turning back to look at Zoya. "Want to come with me for a minute?" he asks softly, as to not awaken the child.

            Her eyes flick to his visor. Apprehension swells in her stomach. "Um, the child—"

            "He'll be fine."

            "Oh. Okay."

            Zoya swallows her nerves and unfolds her legs as he passes, moving to follow him with one last desperate look towards the child, who dozes away, unaware of the turmoil in her stomach. The moment passes, and she follows Din down the hallway, silence lying thick between them until they reach the ladder. He descends first, dropping down into the belly of the ship without saying a word to her.

            Are we really going to talk about this?

            Zoya climbs down the ladder instead of jumping, palms slick against the cool metal bars. When her boots hit the floor, Din's standing with his back to her, fiddling with something on the slim table pressed against the wall.

            "So," she begins, hating how her voice cracks on the word, betraying the taut line of tension that her body has become, "what's going—"

            "Sit down," he says.

            Zoya blinks. "Well, since you asked so nicely."

            Din turns, and there's a pair of silver scissors gleaming in his gloved hands. "Sorry. I meant to say please."

            "Uh-huh," she says slowly, easing herself down, eyes locked on the scissors. "What are those for, may I ask?"

            "You asked me to cut your hair, didn't you?" he asks. When she doesn't respond right away, he fiddles with the handles, glancing down. "And I thought we could do that before they get all bloody."

            Zoya raises her eyebrows. "Bloody?"

            "When we cut off your pant leg."

            "When we what?"

            The apples of Din's cheeks color a light pink underneath the helmet, and he clears his throat before he gestures to the wound on her leg, becoming flustered. "To bandage that. See if it needs any stitches."

            "Oh." Her mind whirs as she swallows, fingers automatically pressing to the blood dried into the fabric. "All right, then. I don't think you can do anything from over there, though." At his confused look, Zoya adds, "Come here."

            "Right," he mutters, stepping forward.

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"Make sure they're straight, Din—Din! Careful!" Zoya's eyes catch on a particularly long piece of hair as it flutters to the ground. "You're not supposed to cut that much off. I just want them here." She uses the line of her hand to mark the line of her brows.

            Din rolls his eyes beneath the helmet. "I'm not cutting too much off." At the snort that comes from her lips, he insists, "It looks good."

            "It feels short."

            Din sighs. "Isn't it supposed to be?"

            "Well—" Zoya cuts herself off, frowning in a way that he can't help but think is adorable. "Stop being logical. It's throwing me off."

            A quiet laugh tumbles from his mouth, and he steps back, squinting at the freshly trimmed bangs that fall forward over Zoya's forehead. The line is—surprisingly—quite even, and he gives himself a mental pat on the back, impressed by his own precision. "They look really good," he says. "I did an amazing job."

            "I think I'll make the final call on that one." With no mirror close by, she pulls her knife out of the sheath hanging from her hip and tilts the shining, silver blade until she can see her reflection. She brushes at them with a finger. "Fine. They look decent," Zoya allows. "Passable, maybe. Perfect? Debatable."

            "Stop," he says, grinning. "You know they're more than decent."

            "Maybe."

            "I can always make them uneven," Din threatens, stepping forward again and brandishing the scissors.

            Zoya holds up her knife, a spark lighting in her eyes as a smile tugs at her mouth. "You know what? They're great, actually. Don't do anything else."

            "That's what I thought," he says.

            "Yeah, yeah." Zoya slides her dagger back into its sheath, fingers moving to pick at the crusted blood on her pants.

            Din's gaze catches on the movement, and the lighthearted mood snags on something quieter, something that brings tension between them once again. Not for the first time since they'd left the prison ship, he reels her sudden, unashamed words back through his head, feeling warmth flood his face. The scissors hanging from his fingers suddenly feel ten times as heavy, and he has to take a deep breath to clear away the weight that presses against his chest.

            "Ready to check your leg?" he asks.

            Zoya glances up, trying to keep her flush contained. "Yeah."

            Din kneels before her, carefully bracing a hand against her leg as he slides the blade of the scissors beneath the torn material. The line of Zoya's jaw hardens, and whether it's from pain or the feel of his hand on her thigh or both, even she doesn't know.

            Carefully, he cuts the fabric around the top half of her leg then uses his hands to rip through the rest with a quick yank. Visible goosebumps press up against the smooth, tanned expanse of her thigh, brought forth when his gloved fingers brush against her skin as he pushes the torn material down to puddle at her ankle.

            But where she becomes roses burning and butterfly wings fluttering against soft skin, Din becomes unreadable stone, focusing solely on the dried blood and the open gash instead of the way she looks down at him kneeling before her, eyes hooded and lips barely parted.

            "I don't think you'll need stitches," he says, keeping his eyes directly on the wound. "I'll need to clean it, though." Din pushes back onto his heels, cutting his gaze away from her leg, telling himself not to look.

            Minutes later, he holds a canteen of water and a dry rag, going down on one knee beside her once again. When he sheds his gloves, something catches in Zoya's throat, and she forces herself to remain steady, even at the first brush of his fingers against her bare leg. And though she doesn't know it, Din's holding himself together with fraying threads, focusing on the way her thigh feels beneath his fingertips instead of the methodical task of cleaning her wound.

            When all the blood is washed away, he sets the canteen aside, loosing a tensed breath. "Okay," he mutters to himself. "Okay." Without looking up at her, he smooths a gentle ointment over the cut before gathering the bandages. They wrap on easily enough, but it's the way he can't help but accidentally bump her leg with his fingers and how he can see the way goosebumps rise across her skin when he touches her that makes the process difficult.

            Din ties off the bandage when it's sufficiently secured, glancing up at her as he tightens the knot. She's looking down at him already, bottom lip caught between her teeth and a haze over her eyes.

            "Done," he says, but the word sounds choked.

            Zoya nods slowly; her eyes don't move from him. Suddenly, the nerves in his stomach swell, and he can't make himself bring up the comment she'd made after he'd singlehandedly taken out the group of droids. It sticks in his throat, refusing to come forth, so he stands, stepping away from her and dropping the scissors, canteen, and rag on the table.

            "You can go back up and check on the child," Din says, with his back still to her. He doesn't think he can see that tempting look on her face again without doing something she might not want him to do.

            Zoya doesn't move. "Don't you need help with your shoulder?"

            "I'll be fine," he denies.

            "I think it'll be hard for you to wrap bandages around your own shoulder," she counters. "I can help. I . . . I won't look at you."

            Din turns back to look at her, heat in his chest and lingering in his eyes as they trace her form, still seated, the bare skin of her right leg seeming to glow underneath the soft lights set into the ceiling overhead.

            Taking his silence as rejection, Zoya says, "Blindfold me, if it'll make you feel better. I won't look."

            "Okay," he says quietly.

            Zoya's head jerks up. "What?"

            "Okay," Din repeats. "Blindfold yourself, and you can help."

            She stares at him, opens her mouth to let out a witty retort, then falls silent when she realizes she has none. Din watches as she nods to herself before standing and walking towards him. She grabs the scissors off the table and cuts a strip out of other leg of her pants, lifting it up for his inspection, something tugging at the edge of her mouth.

            "This good enough?"

            "If it fits," he says.

            Zoya offers it to him. "Will you do it?" Her voice is softer and breathier than it should be, but she can't make herself change it. He nods in response as he's unable to speak, taking the strip of cloth from her hands. Zoya turns her back to Din, allowing him to pull the fabric over her eyes, tying it carefully behind her head.

            It works well enough; she can't see anything but shades of black, even when her eyes are opened. A clanging sound is all the warning she gets; it tells Zoya that behind her, Din is pulling off his Beskar, setting it on the table beside them. A particularly hollow sound says his helmet has come off; a bundle of fabric falls to the floor next as he grunts, presumably stretching the wound in his shoulder. Water sloshes in the canteen as she listens; he must be cleaning away the blood.

            Zoya feels the air shift as he steps around her, listens to his footsteps as they move a few paces away. "Where are you?" she whispers, when silence has spread once more, feeling exposed in her blindness.

            "Here," he says.

            Without the grainy filter of the helmet, his voice is deeper, its tones smoothing over a rough undercurrent that seems to become more prominent as he continues to speak. Hearing his voice this way feels almost intimate, as if it's what Din's been concealing this whole time instead of his actual face.

            "I'll lead you." His hands close around her forearms, and he pulls her forward gently, walking her carefully over to the spot where she'd sat before. As he stands above her, Zoya feels his exhales, curling warmly in the air between them. He presses something into her hands. "Here," Din says. "The bandages. I've already put the cream on."

            "Got it," she says. Unrolling a stretch of the bandage, Zoya reaches forward blindly, hands knocking against something that is definitely not his shoulder. She laughs. "Sorry. I have no fucking clue what I'm touching."

            "That's the wall," Din says. His hands catch her fingers and pull them down, pressing them against the planes of his chest. "That's me." His voice roughens as her fingertips graze his skin, and his throat bobs as he looks up at her, the way her breaths start coming faster, how the roll of bandages almost trembles in her fingers.

            "Okay," she breathes. "Where . . .?" She moves blindly, hand fumbling along the curve of his collarbone.

            A quiet laugh rumbles beneath her fingers, traveling along his warm skin. "You're there," he says, just as her fingertips graze the ointment he's spread across the wound.

            "That was harder than I thought it would be," Zoya says, grinning.

            "I don't think you did a bad job," he says, and as she leans down to start wrapping the bandages, the words dance across her skin. She can almost feel the ghost of his lips as they move, and she clenches her jaw.

            "Shit," she curses after a moment. "I can't get a good angle on this."

            "I thought you were supposed to be helping."

            Zoya laughs, a smile lifting her lips. "I'm trying."

            "Maybe you just wanted me to take off the armor," Din says, teasing her in a forthcoming way that she's not used to hearing from him.

            "Maybe I did," she returns without hesitation.

            It silences him.

            When she lets out another frustrated groan, Din reaches up to catch her hips, pulling her down until her thighs frame his torso. Her breath catches, and her free hand clutches his uninjured shoulder, feeling the defined cords of muscle laying beneath his skin flex as his arm hooks around her back.

            "Better?" Din says, voice low.

            Zoya tugs the bandage tight, ready to tie it off. "Yeah," she says, but the word sounds almost strained. She doesn't rush to finish knotting the bandage; both of them are well aware that she's taking her time. And even when she's finished, Zoya doesn't rush to move away, fingers settling carefully upon his shoulders. Din doesn't make any move to stand, either, his hands flat against the curve of her back.

            The tempting line of her neck captures the attention of his darkening eyes, and Din's leaning forward before he truly knows what he's doing. Zoya feels him move closer, dipping his head low enough that strands of his soft hair tickle her chin, and her question perishes on her tongue as soon as his lips brush against her neck, replaced with a dozen blooming roses and new flames burning on crackling wood.

            Zoya digs her nails unintentionally into him, trembling as his tongue moves against her neck. She makes a soft sound at the back of her throat at the feeling of his mouth on her skin, and Din's teeth nip at the hollow of her collarbone in response, one of his hands falling down to grip her bare thigh.

            "Din," she breathes, his name a poem on her lips.

            Her name is a soft groan tumbling from his tongue as his mouth finds the soft spot where her jaw and neck meet, and Zoya's hand tangles in his hair, feeling the silky strands slide between her fingers.

            Din pulls her closer as if she'll slip from his grasp and brushes the hair from her face, tracing his thumb around the outline of her lips, watching as she nearly crumbles underneath his touch, fingers winding roughly through his hair.

            Her voice is a summer's breeze, dipping between fresh flowers and lush grasses before a thunderstorm. "Please."

            The single word shatters his resolve, what little restraint Din has left. Fire rippling across his body, he tugs her closer, fitting his mouth against hers, and he finds her lips are as soft as he'd always imagined them to be.

            A whimper trembles from her tongue onto his, desperation laced through the sound. Zoya arches her body forward, yearning to press him closer as she feels the brush of what must be facial hair graze against her skin. His hand rises to curl around her neck, and if it were anyone else, she would feel vulnerable, but it's Din, and she trusts him, she trusts him more than she trusts anyone in the entire galaxy, and all she wants is to feel more of him. Even when his mouth opens to hers, even when she's so flush against him that not a single whisper of air could fit between them, it's still not enough.

            It's only when the ship starts to tremble and shake that they break apart, lips crimson and heat singeing their skin, breathing heavily.

            "What's that?" Zoya manages to say, still pressed so close to Din that the words scorch against his lips.

            His eyes open wider. "The child," he whispers. "Shit. I'm"—he grips her hips, regretfully helping her stand—"sorry. I . . ."

            In the end, he doesn't finish the sentence as he yanks on everything he'd discarded. When his helmet is back in place, he moves quickly over to the ladder, barely able to look at Zoya without feeling her lips on his and the bare skin of her leg pressing against him.

            "You can take it off," he says, clutching the ladder.

            When Zoya does pull the blindfold off, mouth burning and skin on fire with hundreds of scarlet petals fallen upon the floor, he's disappeared up the ladder, taking her heart with him.

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well. that happened. srry i made u wait 31 chapters but this IS a slow burn so u kinda did it to urself!!

&& big moves! we just keep winning out here