Chapter 21 #2
The scrape of his chair had barely scratched my ears when he already stood next to me, that same fearsome shadow which had swooped through the clearing to save me. Only this time, his expression was softer. More cautious.
“Stop that,” he said slowly.
“Stop what?” I looked up at him, unsure.
“Trying to make yourself smaller.”
“I’m not–”
“You are. Terrible things have happened to you.” He clenched his jaw, gaze darkening as it sparked deep blue. “They have left scars and let you heal them alone. But those scars didn’t take away what was most important.”
“Most important?” A sick, hollow laugh burned up from my chest. “I have lost my father, my Clan, my throne, my title, my allies–”
“That is awful. I’m sorry for your loss.”
That unprompted, steady show of empathy didn’t penetrate the growing anger. “I am stuck in a frozen Blood Brotherhood realm being chided by the enemy I’m supposed to marry. I am weak and harmless to you–”
A mighty frown marred his face. “You’re not harmless to me. You have no idea what power you could wield.”
What power? I wanted to scream.
“Nadya and Geryll already gave you up.” The edge in my voice slashed through the room. My own chair scraped the floor as I rose, furious and self-righteous. “You stand there telling me not to make myself small and you’re stabbing me with words when I turn my back–”
He closed his eyes and rolled his head, a frustrated hum vibrating in his strong chest. When he popped his eyes back open, they shimmered blue, a sea of calm. I didn’t know where the Commander’s well of patience sprung from, but I suddenly wanted a sip of it.
“I told them you are harmless to them because you would not harm them ,” he said. “They would never admit it, but they were afraid of the big, bad Huntress coming to stay in our fortress.”
“Hey, I can be big and bad whenever I want, thank you very much.”
A corner of his lips trembled, as if he was dangerously close to smiling. Smart man, he didn’t, because I was furious.
“You can, to your enemies. Nadya and Geryll are not among them. You didn’t even want to hurt Orion.”
The pain of that memory was too hard to bear. “It didn’t matter. He died anyway.”
“But not by your hand. That sharp tongue and your harsh glare can’t hide the fact that you are kind above everything else.”
Calling a Clan member kind was the equivalent of insulting five generations of their family. “Is that all you see when you look at me now? Weak? Fragile?”
“No.” His voice was even–too even. Like he could sense the storm being unleashed and wanted to remain standing. “For some godsdamned reason, it’s how you see yourself.”
He should have picked up a dagger and sunk it straight into my chest. It would have hurt less and exposed fewer of the soft spots I never wanted exposed. “Do you want me to stab you?”
“I want you to try .” He took a determined step closer, his heat invading the coldness shrouding me. “I want you to grab a bottle and smash it. I want you to roar. I want you to scheme and make me wonder what other crazy plan I need to watch out for. I want you to do something .”
“Sorry I’m not in the mood to entertain you with my crazy antics.”
“You think this is about entertaining me?” Another step. Harder. Closer. I had to tilt my head back to keep looking into his eyes. “ It’s about remembering who you are.”
I bared my teeth. He was exposing too much of me. Too raw, too vulnerable. “You don’t know anything about me.”
“I know enough,” he said, not relenting in the slightest. If anything, he finally didn’t speak with that hint of hesitance, like he was afraid I’d finally break.
“I met you in a massacre where you risked your life to save your people. We exchanged our first words after you woke up in a coffin on enemy ground, when you barely stood, and you still found the energy and courage to threaten me , the Blood Brotherhood Commander. You didn’t let me kill Orion though he would have strangled you.
People show their true selves during hard times.
You shined through them. And now, when you’re safe, you’re dimming yourself. ”
“So I should have walked out of the most traumatic events in my life unscathed? I am not made of steel."
“No, you’re human. It’s normal to grieve.
But you haven’t.” We were so close now, his words brushed against my temples.
“Take this time in my crater as a chance to get back on your feet. Gods know you deserve it. Recuperate. Rest. But strive for something after you’re healed. The Huntress cannot be aimless.”
“What if she is?” I yelled, tears stinging the corners of my eyes. “What if she’s been through too much to keep clawing and clinging and fighting?”
“Then she should stop and lick her wounds until they scab over and sink back into her as hard lessons and ugly memories that don’t control her .” I felt his long sigh in my own trembling body. “Sleep. Cry. Curse the gods. But don’t vanish.”
His voice was as level as ever, like the gentle waves of Marea Luminaria at sunrise, lulling me awake from a fretful sleep.
“Why do you care?” I asked, words filled with rage.
Not at him.
At the world.
This world who’d pummeled me into this unhinged, weak, aimless mess.
“I’ve seen what betrayal can do to the greatest warriors,” he said, gaze darkening as our breathing turned erratic to the same chaotic beat.
His face contorted, upper lip rising like a wolf ready to howl.
A chink in the armor, a crack in the unflinching mask.
But neither showed what ghosts he hid underneath. “It festers. It breaks you.”
“I am not some broken thing you need to put back together!”
“You are not broken,” he said fiercely. “But you will break if you keep going down this route. And I will not be able to reach and yank you back to reality if you keep fading.”
“Then let me fade!”
Everyone else had.
And if fading meant the pain would go away, maybe it wasn’t such an awful fate.
Met with the Commander’s steady, attentive stare, my frantic gaze faltered and lowered to the empty dagger baldric that spanned his chest, small vials of swirling blood webbing around it on his leather armor.
Filled with fear, I’d turned into a petulant creature, raging against the wrong person.
And that made me ashamed.
I was lost and embarrassed and he was so composed and controlled, standing there in front of me like a mountain, while I shattered inside.
Worst of all, he was witnessing it.
I’d been holding myself together by the threads of my soul my entire life, too afraid to let anyone see me anything other than strong. And when I needed to be powerful the most, I’d fractured, and every weakness had spilled out.
“No.” His hand rose slowly. Tentatively. Finally, one of his fingers ghosted underneath my chin, a gentle touch. He tilted my head up and I let him.
I sucked in a breath as our stares connected once more. His steady hand was so at odds with the maelstrom raging behind his patient gaze–and my own shaking hands, terrified they’d be dropped as all the other times before.
The sparks that flickered too suddenly in his eyes mesmerized me.
“Why not?” I whispered.
He inhaled my words, nostrils flaring. “Because you are under my protection. If I have to drag you from the depths of despair, I will. As long as you let me.”
As long as I let him …but what if I trusted and hoped and got crushed again ?
The want to agree was strong–but the fear was stronger.
It might have been the soft way he spoke, soothing the fear caging me from the inside.
Or the way he saw too much of me, even the fragile, broken pieces I tried so hard to shield, and didn’t rush away.
Maybe, just maybe, I wanted to lean on someone so powerful and composed that nothing seemed to shake him–not even that sharp tongue of mine that had made others quake or the ugliest, weakest sides of me.
Have another person in this world keep me upright while I finally took a breath and curled against them, to be held while I rebuilt myself.
Maybe he truly didn’t care about the crown and throne I no longer had to offer.
Whatever the reason, I made the biggest mistake of my life.
I kissed my enemy.