Chapter 56 Emory #2
She realized with a pang that her reasons for doing so hadn’t been out of pure necessity like they had been before.
Yes, she needed him. But somewhere between the bargain she’d made and now, she had started to value him not for what he might bring her, but for who he was and how he felt and how he made her feel.
She had started to care about him. Wanted to stand by his side.
Maybe, beyond forgiveness, what Sidraeus truly longed for was loyalty. Companionship. The certitude that someone would stand by him in the dark, hold his hand on the tortuous road to redemption, and help him mold a better version of himself out of that darkness.
And maybe Emory, so used to hurting others before they could abandon her, had always craved the same thing.
“We’re in this together,” she said, needing him to understand, wondering, despite his words, if he felt the same.
He held her gaze with an intensity that made her aware of every fiber of her being. And when he looked away, it was down at her hands, as if seeing again the burnt flesh as she undid his binds.
“The souls of the Tidecallers cast out the gods from my mind,” Emory said. She described to Sidraeus the markings that had appeared on her. She’d puzzled over it ever since it happened. “How could those marks have had power over actual gods?”
Sidraeus seemed lost in thought for a while.
“I learned something at the Institute. About the last Tidecaller, who defied the gods and survived the sacrifice. I told you about Tala, the Luaguan Tidecaller who was like a sister to me. It turns out she escaped Equilibris’s culling by boxing away a portion of her power—putting a damper on herself to hide her limitless well of magic.
A damper that she would have had to Collapse to get rid of…
which is a practice that lived on in all Eclipse magic that came after her. ”
A fond smile played on Sidraeus’s lips. His eyes were distant and full of wonder as he kept speaking, as if he could see Tala before him.
“She was always far too intelligent for her own good. It doesn’t surprise me in the slightest that she would have not only evaded sacrifice for herself but also made it possible for Eclipse magic to remain.
For those born with it to survive. She was such a force. ”
There was so much love in his voice, it made Emory’s heart ache to imagine the relief he must have felt knowing she’d been the one Tidecaller to escape. Knowing there was at least one death he hadn’t caused.
“I believe Tala went one step further than this damper she placed on her magic by also tattooing herself with wards that would keep the gods’ notice at bay.
Wards written in the language of the gods themselves, symbols she’d learned from Atheia and me, which I’ve seen here tattooed on Luaguan Eclipse-born.
” He shook his head as if in disbelief. “I wondered why those symbols were so familiar. How they would have found their way into this world at all. And now I’m sure of it: it’s because of Tala.
She wanted to protect herself and her peers, and so she found a way for the practice to remain long after she was gone. ”
A way to ward against the Shadow’s curse—that was what Luaguans believed of their tattoos. But more than anything, it was a way to ward against the gods who’d sought to eradicate Eclipse magic from the start.
Tala was the reason Eclipse magic had survived at all.
“How did you learn all this?” Emory asked.
“The souls of the Tidecallers spoke to me,” Sidraeus said. “When the pain and suffering I felt was at its worst, when I was delirious from it… They told me how I could put an end to this bargain I’m cursed with.”
Emory blanched. “How?”
“By releasing them from their own curse,” he said after some time. “Finally putting their souls to rest, something they’ve been denied since the moment Equilibris sacrificed them to seal the doors. They are cursed as much as I have ever been. And they want to be free.”
“Is that something you have the power to do?”
“No.” His eyes bore into her. “But you do.”
Emory’s brows shot up. “Me? I don’t even have my magic.”
“You’ll get it back. And their curse is…
tied to you, in a way. To a Tidecaller. It all goes back to Tala, the one Tidecaller who survived the sacrifice and escaped the god’s punishment.
So long as a Tidecaller existed in the world, Eclipse magic would endure.
Not as Tidecaller magic, but as the Eclipse magic you know today. Except on rare occasions, of course.”
He studied Emory. “When Tala put a damper on her magic, it left her with only Healing power going forward. Which is why, every time a Tidecaller was born, they were born as a Healer. And this brush with death they needed to unlock their true power, to become a Tidecaller in full, was a Collapsing of sorts. An eradication of Tala’s damper.
And every time a Tidecaller rose into their power, they heard the call of the doors.
Not only because of Atheia’s pieces that called to their magic, but because of the Tidecaller souls that were waiting for them to release them. They’ve been waiting for you, Emory.”
A million thoughts raced through Emory’s mind. “So that’s why you’re still here,” she said flatly. “Why you’ve stuck by me. Because you need me.”
“That’s not—”
“No, I get it. I made this bargain against your will. Of course you want me to end it. I want to end it too. I just thought—I don’t know. That maybe this thing between us was more than that. More than us using each other to achieve something else, I mean.”
Fitting, she thought, that she should get a taste of her own medicine.
Sidraeus withdrew as if her tone had slapped him. “Is that what you still think of me, after all we’ve been through?” When she didn’t respond, he breathed, “Did he really break your trust so completely?”
Her gaze snapped to his. She knew who he spoke of. And he was right. Keiran had broken her ability to trust her feelings—to trust in her attraction to this deity before her who had done nothing but save her time and time again, only for her to still question his motives.
Sidraeus will never care for anyone but himself, and if he has made you believe otherwise, it’s only to get something from you.
Atheia’s taunting voice sounded in Emory’s ears, her warning so similar to the one Lizaveta had once given her about Keiran. The difference was, Emory hadn’t believed for a second that there was any truth to Atheia’s words. But now… had she been fooled again?
Sidraeus’s nostrils flared angrily. “I can’t say I appreciate being lumped into the same vile category as that sorry excuse of a person,” he said, voice low and rough.
His eyes went to her throat, as if he could see the imprint of Keiran’s fingers there.
He sighed, meeting her eye with a gentler expression.
“But I can’t fault you for how you feel, and I’m sorry that I’ve given you reason not to trust me in the past.” His tone turned almost pleading.
“I promise you I’m here to make it right.
And it kills me that you might not believe that. ”
At her silence, he started to leave.
“Wait.” He turned to her, and the devastation on his face fractured any resolve she’d had. “I don’t want to do this alone.”
He was by her side in an instant, kneeling where she sat. His hand covered her own, resting on her lap. “You’re not alone.”
She realized that, other than their embrace after escaping the Institute, it was the first time he’d really touched her since he’d regained his true form. As if realizing the same thing, he made to take his hand away.
Instead, Emory pulled him close and kissed him.
Damn whatever resolve she’d had. Damn the doubts in her head that popped up whenever she thought of him.
These doubts were not about him. They were born out of Keiran’s betrayal.
But Sidraeus was not Keiran. He’d proven this to her time and time again.
He’d taken swords for her. Had nearly died for her.
Had suffered the sleepscape and the abyss and Atheia’s wrath for her.
And while she had mistrusted her own instincts where he was concerned, all of them had been proven right.
This thing between them, this attraction, this sense of belonging… She knew he felt it, too.
But perhaps she’d read him wrong, because the second their lips touched, he froze. Didn’t reciprocate the kiss.
Emory pulled away, cheeks burning with the sting of rejection. “I’m sorry,” she said. “This was a mistake.”
But then—his hand touching her cheek. Her name spoken like a prayer. His thumb ran over her bottom lip as his eyes peered into hers, and in the vulnerability etched on his face she could only see a boy, not a deity. As scared as she was to do the wrong thing, take the wrong step.
He tilted her chin up with the tip of his fingers, ever so gently, as if still scared to touch her.
And when his lips met hers, they were light as a feather, as a breath of air against skin.
It was unlike anything she would have expected of him.
The deadly deity motivated by vengeance.
The wry humor that had set her aflame. No.
Here was someone who was as touch-starved as she was, as eager to be seen for all that he was, yet still so very scared to put his heart on the line. To give in.
Emory was done being careful with her heart and her trust. She wanted this. And after what she’d gone through, she needed to feel alive—needed to feel something.
She ran her hands through his thick curls, drawing him closer. His hands snaked over hers, pulling them from the back of his neck down to his heart, before breaking the kiss to look at her.
“We shouldn’t,” he said. The words lacked conviction.
“Why not?” she asked.
“I—” He swallowed visibly, gaze trailing down to her mouth. His eyes were molten when they flicked back to hers. “To be honest, I’m running out of reasons.”
“So am I.”
Emory pressed her lips against his hands, still cupping her own, and held his gaze as she did so. He made a sound deep in his throat, and then his mouth was on hers again, setting her aflame.
The kiss was slow, indulgent. Emory melted into him, breathing in the vetiver and blood-orange and cedarwood scent of him as her hands fisted in his shirt to tug him closer, wanting to feel him against her.
Sidraeus’s hands were everywhere. They remained delicate as they gently cupped her face, the nape of her neck; as they found their way to her hips, the small of her back.
He touched her like she was an ice sculpture that might melt away in his grasp, like she was crystal that might break and shatter into a million pieces.
“Sidraeus,” she breathed, holding his face in her hands. “Sid.” The way his dark lashes brushed against his cheeks as he closed his eyes, leaning into her touch, made her heart flutter.
“Emory.” His eyes opened, intent on hers. Searching for an answer in them. “Are you sure this is what you want?”
“Is it not what you want?”
“It is. More than you can know. But I—” His jaw worked as he fought for words. “Can you ever forgive me, for making you feel so unsafe while I was wearing his face? For taunting you with the trauma he inflicted on you?”
She understood then that this softness was him not wanting to bring up the ghosts that plagued her, the memory of Keiran’s hand wrapped around her throat, the insecurities that might forever linger.
And this—the tender way he was treating her, the unspoken power he was giving her by letting her lead—it made her want to curl up in his embrace and never let go.
“We said we forgave each other, remember? I trust you,” she said, and she meant it. She had never felt safer. “I want this.”
The words unlocked something in him. Her name escaped his lips again, and then they were crashing together like two burning stars, hands clenching into hair and shirts without reservation now.
They kissed like they were chasing the last bit of the sun’s light.
Like there would be no tomorrow. Like there would never be enough time between them to savor this.
As if they knew they would be interrupted a minute later, ripped apart by the creak of a door and a squeal of surprise.
“I didn’t see anything.”
Vera stood in the doorway, staring pointedly away from Emory and Sidraeus. Emory felt heat rise to her cheeks as she pushed Sidraeus away, mortified at what her cousin had walked in on.
“Just letting you know Baz is back,” Vera said. “He’s fine, before you ask. Waiting downstairs to speak to all of us. I’ll, uh, give you two a minute.”
Vera winked at Emory as she left. No judgment, no questioning Emory’s choices. As if what happened here was an inevitability. Something she’d seen coming all along.
Emory and Sidraeus looked at each other in the quiet, swollen-lipped and panting.
She wondered how much further they might have taken things if Vera hadn’t interrupted.
Images of what could have been played in her mind, making heat coil inside her.
Sidraeus’s burning gaze on her mouth didn’t help.
She didn’t need to hear his thoughts to know he was imagining the same things, and if they didn’t get out of this room soon, he wouldn’t hesitate to turn them into reality. And Emory would gladly let him.
“We should head down,” she said, trying to break the spell, to convince her own limbs to move.
But she wanted so badly to stay in this room, even as relief coursed through her at Baz’s safe return, even as his voice reached her from downstairs and she yearned to see his face.
Because if Baz was back, and if he’d succeeded at what he set out to do, then what happened next might change everything.
She wanted more time to explore what this was before they set out to save the worlds again.
But at least they’d had this moment, which had briefly felt like eternity.