Chapter 13
Rummy
Jessiah laughed, tossing his bronze hair back. His shoulders rose and fell with the movements. I was staring.
He was so damn beautiful, and he didn’t even see it.
He never saw it.
Watching him laugh with Huntyr warmed my chest in an odd way. Huntyr had been my only friend for so, so long. But recently…
Something was changing. I was changing. And goddess above, the thought alone made my heart soar in my chest. The last thing I wanted to do was fuck it all up.
I fucked everything up. I always did. Everything I touched went up in flames around me.
And Jessiah’s smile? His light? I refused to take that from him.
“You two are ridiculous!” I chimed in, hiding my smile. “You’re lucky those wings are as big as your egos. Both of you.”
Huntyr smirked, but Jessiah turned to me with an eyebrow raised. “You just wait until you can summon your own wings,” he joked. “I can’t wait to see the wingspan fit for the great Rummy from Midgrave.”
I rolled my eyes. “Not all of us aspire to fly through the air like we’re suicidal! My feet work just fine, thank you!”
Huntyr said nothing. She knew I was… well, sensitive about the topic of flying.
The few other fae that lived in Scarlata had at least tried to summon their own wings. Fae with strong magic could do it, it was in our blood, after all.
But there was nothing special about me. Nothing magical. I was a dirty damn fae forced to come to this kingdom for my own survival.
And that’s what I’d stay. I had no interest in becoming anyone else.
Jessiah was pushy, though. He couldn’t grasp the idea that not having magical powers could be enjoyable.
“I can teach you, you know,” he said. “I’m a great teacher. Ask Huntyr.”
I shook my head, hand on my hip as the wind blew my hair in my face. “I’m sure you’re great at just about everything you do, Jessiah. I’m not doubting your teaching capabilities.”
“What is it then?” He stepped forward, slowly closing the gap between us. “What are you afraid of?”
My chest tightened. Nothing, I wanted to say, but my throat closed up.
Everything.
Since that night… No, I would never use magic again. Not after what I’d experienced. My magic wasn’t like everyone else’s. I wasn’t like everyone else. I was dark and twisted. Cursed. And my magic would only bring death.
“Rummy.”
It was his voice, but his mouth didn’t move.
I squinted in confusion.
“Rummy.”
My vision snapped and blurred until a new memory replaced the old one.
Istood over my mother’s dead body, my hands far too small to be an adult’s. No, I was a child again.
This was not the first time I’d been exposed to death, but this was the first time I’d felt it.
My own magic.
The kind of magic that wasn’t supposed to exist in Midgrave. The kind of magic I wasn’t supposed to have.
I knew it was wrong the first time I felt it rush through my veins.
My mother was attacked by the hungry ones. She’d been bleeding, panicking. I was panicking, too.
All I wanted to fucking do was help. But the closer I got, the stronger the power coursing through me felt. I fell to my knees beside her.
“Mother,” I whispered. “What’s happening?” I held my hands over her body, but I didn’t touch her. Even more power fueled my veins like this. My senses ignited, flooding with intensity.
I couldn’t control it. I couldn’t stop it if I wanted to.
And I was too damn young to understand why I was feeling that way.
I should have helped her. I should have brought her back. All that love and fear, though, ignited something dark inside me. Something evil. Something monstrous.
The worst part? The part that would live with me every single night before I fell asleep? When she felt the touch of my magic, she actually trembled like she was terrified of me. Even my own damn mother knew I was made of something sinister.
I did not want to kill my mother, but my power needed an outlet. A single second passed, and that was enough to change my entire world.
I held my dead mother’s hand in mine, and I screamed.
And screamed.
And screamed.
“Rummy, open your eyes, dammit!”
Panic rushed through me. I tried very, very hard to forget about that day. To shove the memory into the locked box in the back of my mind.
And here it was, rushing to the surface and threatening to pull me under.
You’re safe, Rummy. You’re not there anymore.
I screamed again, though it sounded more like a defeated whimper.
But warm, tight arms embraced me from behind, squeezing harder. “It’s okay. I’m right here. I’m right here.”
I thrashed, fighting against his attempt at calming me, but it was no use. His body was an unmoving wall, a stable force dragging me back to reality. If only he knew. If only they all knew.
“You’re okay, Rummy. You’re with me at an inn. You’re safe.”
“Nowhere is safe.” My voice shook, but I squeezed my eyes shut in an attempt to escape this reality. In an attempt to make it all disappear.
“It was just a dream.” Jessiah’s arms tightened around my squirming body.
“Let go of me,” I argued.
“No.”
“I said let go.” My voice cracked.
“And I said no.”
“Dammit, Jessiah!” I attempted once more to break free, to thrash out of his solid arms, but it was no use. He only held me tighter. Steadfast. Unwavering.
“I can’t do this.” My words rushed out in a harsh whisper. “I can’t—I can’t—I don’t know what’s happening to me.”
Jessiah shifted on the bed, twisting until he was above me, staring down with his white wings blocking my eyesight of anything but him.
“We’re at an inn just outside Pericius. Your injuries were severe, but a healer came for you. She said you’ll be physically fine.”
He spoke, but all I could think about was the weight of his body pressing against me, and his knee shoved between both of my thighs, pinning me in place.
Until…
“Wait, she healed me?” The agonizing wound in my torso was now nothing but a dull throb, even with Jessiah’s belt pressing into my skin.
His ashy brows drew together, but his gaze softened just a few seconds later, any sign of what he was thinking long gone. “She said you would be physically fine.”
Seconds passed. My heart still raced from the all-too-vivid memories. Or maybe it was from the way Jessiah’s chest touched mine with every deep breath…
“Wait… Why do you keep saying physically fine? Did the healer say something else?”
He swallowed audibly, his eyes darting to one side…
“I’m going to ask you a question, Rummy, and I want you to tell me the truth.”
My senses ignited, but I forced myself to remain calm. He could probably hear how my heartbeat skyrocketed. He could likely hear my pulse, sense my thoughts. “Okay…”
“Have you ever tried to use your magic? Have you wielded it at all? Have you ever had even an inkling that you possess magic?”
I stiffened, and a pit opened up in my stomach, yawning wide.
He assessed me with those perfect, concerned eyes, seeing too much. He wouldn’t understand. He was pure light. He was a damn angel, for crying out loud.
And I was… My heart sank. I was nothing good. And any magic I did possess would be locked deep, deep down, too.
“Why are you asking me that?” I retorted. “Did the healer say something?”
His jaw tightened as he held my gaze. “She said there’s darkness inside you. A sickness. A disease or something. Then she said darkness becomes the chain that binds.”
Jessiah’s face was too close to mine. The room around us shrank, the air in my lungs fleeing.
Face carefully blank, I stared back. “She was elderly? She was probably senile, then. Where did you find her? We’re in the middle of fucking nowhere, and you just so happened to find a healer?
Don’t you know not to trust everything you hear? ”
Where chaos reigns and hearts beat, through the veil of love and deceit.
Darkness becomes the chain that binds, love discovers the thread that unwinds.
I pushed those words away. How the likely insane woman knew those words was a mystery. She might have healed me, but she didn’t know me. She didn’t know my magic.
He took a long breath, his wings shifting a little. “So that means nothing to you? And you’re not the slightest bit concerned that she was saying the same damn thing those caves whispered on our way through?”
I pursed my lips. “Nope.”
It was the first time in my life I’d ever felt bad for lying.
But my heart couldn’t take the idea of being truly cared about.
My mind couldn’t accept that someone like him might actually want to look after someone like me.
Why the hells was I like this? I truly didn’t know why I could so easily take any soft, innocent moment in life and sour it. Twist it until it was ugly.
It wasn’t right. Once he knew me… once he saw the real me—this ugly, dark, thing lurking in the shadows of the world—he would regret it.
They always did.
So even though making him flinch like that hurt me more than a fucking knife to the chest, I kept my bitch mask in place.
“Forget it,” he said, flopping back onto his side of the mattress. “I don’t know why I even try with you.”
Thank fuck we were shrouded in darkness and thank fuck he’d turned to face the opposite side of the bed.
Because I couldn’t hold on to the facade any longer. I curled onto my side, willing my heart rate to steady out after that fucking nightmare, and squeezed my eyes shut.
Like this, I could pretend my throat didn’t burn. I could pretend my chest didn’t fucking hurt. I could pretend I wasn’t a repulsive, unlovable fae who would continue to do nothing but hurt Jessiah.
In the darkness of the inn, I could pretend I wasn’t one damn second away from falling apart entirely.