Chapter 31
Terra
Elias stares at me like I’m utterly insane. He looks at the crates filled with pulsing hearts, dripping blood and quivering, then shakes his head cluelessly.
“Are you talking about the rocks?”
My jaw drops and before I can reply Amser hums inside my head. Only we can see the hearts. Emerai cannot hide anything from time. We see all the moments of a Shadows past, what they’ve taken and tried to discard.
I swallow thickly. How is this even possible? Then again, how is anything that’s happened thus far possible?
“They may look like rocks to you… but they are hearts,” I say with a knot curling in my stomach. They thump an off-beat tune, and as I watch them, a few stop moving, turning gray and cold before dulling into what truly resembles a stone.
My heart sinks. Those must be the people dying on the front lines… or at Alkrose. I wonder how many will be left by the end of all of this and how many have already been thrown away.
Elias’s brows pull in. “Well fuck, how are we going to find mine then? They all look like fucking stones to me.”
Amser whispers, His heart is older, among the first to be stolen. It’s tucked away with the others behind that wall. I frown, not sure how my Shadow can sense all of this, but who am I to disagree with it?
“Amser says to look behind this wall.” I press my hand against the cold stones and worry the entire room will cave in if we mess with it.
Elias’s face is skeptical as black smoke pools at his feet and Velis emerges in its small feline form. Amser wisps from my veins and joins its mate. They stand side by side and let their tails tangle. My cheeks warm at the affection they so easily show for one another.
Elias’s cold, gray eyes are staring at me.
“Will your eyes regain their color when you get your heart back?” I ask. I’m not sure I want them to change. The gray has grown on me—it’s hard to picture his eyes any other way.
“I don’t know,” he says as he steps closer, pulling me into his arms as we stand to the side so the Shadows can dismantle the wall.
“Do you remember their color?”
“Nope.”
The Shadows both place their paws on the stones. Dark vines start to crawl up the wall and form into an arched door. The black veins look like spindles of poison, the definition of evil and rot. Velis sits on one end while Amser takes the other and they both look up at us expectantly.
“Has Velis ever done that before?”
Elias approaches the makeshift door and pushes the stone. It opens eerily. Dust and mold sting my nose. “Negative,” he says curtly as he disappears into the shadows of the secret room.
I reluctantly trail behind him and wince at the dried blood that coats the stone floor. Enough light trickles in from the cellar to see shelves lined with stones and hearts. These ones are lined up like they’re special, nothing like the piles in the crates.
Velis and Amser weave through my ankles and sit in the center of the room. Elias looks at my Shadow and asks kindly, “Which one is mine?”
Amser stretches like a cat that’s just woken up from its nap and jumps to the middle shelf. It walks past a few stones and stops at a black heart. It looks straight at me and whispers in my mind, Arthur.
A breath escapes me and I rush to it, gently scooping the heart into my hands. It flutters, so much lighter than I could’ve ever imagined. So unlike a real heart. These, as I thought, are figurative ones. Phantoms of the real thing. But they hold the world inside them.
“This one is Arthur’s,” I say when Elias moves closer, his chest pressed along my back. He looks down at it and frowns.
“I wish I could see what you do.” His voice is somber. I wonder how many of the stones in here used to be the beating hearts of his comrades.
Amser jumps to the top shelf and walks along the edge diligently until it reaches the end and sits next to a white heart. It beats in slow, languid thumps. It’s lost all color—each artery and vein that line the cardiac muscles are like ashen roots.
I move to stand beneath Amser and it nudges the heart off the shelf. I catch it with care and stare in awe at the two precious things in the palms of my hands.
“This one is yours,” I whisper. I’m not sure why. It feels sacred to hold them and I don’t want anyone else in the world to know that I have them.
Elias’s eyes fill with what looks like fear but he swiftly blinks it away. I raise a brow when he doesn’t take his heart from my hands.
“Now what?” I ask.
He shakes his head and gives me an uncertain, beautiful smile filled with hope. “I have no fucking idea. I didn’t think we’d get this far.”
I look back down at the hearts and smile. “We found them. We really found them.”
Elias brushes my cheek with his hand as he mutters, “You found them. Now let’s get out of here before anyone realizes we’re gone.” Velis vanishes back into him and Amser does the same with me. I shudder at the cold sensation that encases my bones as it settles back inside me.
“What are we going to do with them? Should we give Arthur his tonight?” I wrap my cloak around my front so no one can see the hearts when we get back to Alkrose.
Elias tilts his head in thought before muttering, “Let me talk to him later about it. I’m not sure how he’ll react to this. We’re not supposed to be here, obviously. But of my comrades, Arthur is the most sensible.”
I nod and follow Elias back through the manor and portal. He escorts me to my room, where I hide the hearts in the bottom drawer of my wardrobe.
“I have to leave for a few days, so don’t do anything until I get back. Promise me you won’t.” Elias wraps a strand of my brown hair around his finger and holds my gaze until I close my eyes.
“I won’t do anything… Are you going back to the front lines?”
He nods.
I wouldnt care what happened to him if he were the same hollow assassin I met in Navasik. But he’s shown me that he’s so much more than a shell of a man. He’s still in there. He’s still human, and I have his heart now.
I can fix him.
Arthur levels me a tired, unenthusiastic grin as I fail horribly again at the Shadow leeching technique. I can grapple his Shadow when he allows it, but when I’m attempting to take it from someone forcefully, that’s where I’m running into problems.
“If you’re going to use this in battle, it needs to be nimble and fast. Otherwise, your opponent will have no trouble killing you at point-blank range.” Arthur steps across the lake’s solid surface and resumes his stance.
Raine watches us as he and Finn chat idly. They throw spits of flame and ice long distances, trying to reach the shore on the other end. Raine’s private lessons with Elias have been put on hold until he returns from the front lines in Whales of Tauh. It’s easy to see that the training has been helping him immensely. His eyes, however, expose the pain of the blight wearing on him.
Raine winces with every wisp of power he sends out, molding his face into a firm, angry expression before anyone else can catch it.
“Focus, Terra.” Arthur lunges at me and sweeps my legs out from beneath me.
I land on my ass and let out a low groan. “Really?” I glare at him and he raises a shoulder.
“We don’t have time for games,” he says with all seriousness and I try to match his mood, standing and refocusing. I stare into his gray eyes and swallow the dire need to tell him I found his heart. I promised Elias I wouldn’t, but holding onto a secret this important feels like betrayal.
We practice until the sun dips below the mountains and the air stings our noses. I study with Finn, Kai, and Raine in the library until the sun sets, and by the time I’m back in my room, I collapse onto my bed. Raine will be here in an hour or two. Sometimes he makes it in here before I fall asleep and other times he just crawls into my bed long after I’ve dozed off. Either way, I enjoy his company.
I’m midway through the anatomy book when chatter arises in the hallway. My head perks up and I listen to the muffled voices. It sounds like Arthur and another male, but I’m not sure who.
The door is cold against my ear as I press close to listen. But the voices have stopped and the footsteps are leading away. I crack my door open and peek, seeing the top of Arthur’s head as he descends the stairs.
Carefully, so as not to make a sound, I tiptoe to his door, trying the handle like I’ve been doing for weeks now with no luck, but to my surprise, it clicks open.
He forgot to lock it. Gods, this is stupid.
I quickly close my door across the hall before slipping into his room. My eyes widen as I take in his mystical room. It’s unlike the others I’ve been in at Alkrose. His room is two stories tall, a full library against the walls above with wooden catwalks, rickety railing lining the edges.
No wonder he always smells like pages of old tomes. He’s really made this place his own. I walk slowly through his impeccably clean room. Whereas Elias’s room is black and filled with papers and books, Arthur’s is a dusty shade of brown, scholarly and woodsy like a cozy cabin.
My fingers brush against the cream-colored sheets on his bed and I sit, looking around, but finding no notes or papers to compare to the one Raine and I found in the library.
I exhale and lie back on his bed for a moment. He’s so meticulous and careful; maybe he really is hiding something. It seems like everyone here is in some way or another.
I must doze off at some point because when I wake, I’m staring into Arthur’s gray eyes, the faded smears of green barely visible. My body seizes and I sip in a small breath as I stare up at his face. His black hair tickles my forehead and cheek.
His lips are so close to mine, the warmth of them just out of reach. His arms are a solid force of muscle around my head, the weight of his body begging to fall upon me.
“I’m only a man, little shadow. What are you doing to me?” he whispers and his sullen gaze consumes my soul with thousands of emotions I could never articulate.
I want him to hold me—to touch me and ravish me.
He brings up his hand and lets his thumb gently coast over my bottom lip, drawing it open. His eyes flick down to my mouth, yearning and lust burning between us.
“Why are you here?” he asks, a hint of distrust and curiosity in his voice. It’s unusual to catch Arthur off guard, so I relish in the sight of his bemused, handsome features.
Of its own volition, my hand reaches up and touches the smooth hollow of his cheek. His eyes are rimmed with red. He’s so weary. I wish I could give him some relief. A person as kind as him deserves it.
“Another lesson?” I say softly, watching him as his eyes dip to my throat. He glides the pad of his finger down the tender skin and grins.
“What knowledge are you seeking?”
I daringly let my hand trail across his flexed neck and down to the opening of his shirt, tugging the fabric open with implication.
He chuckles softly and looks back at me with hooded eyes. “This is a lesson you’ll have to see to the end. Are you sure you want to begin?” His eyes are feverish and dark. I want him to show me what he’s hiding inside. I want to see all the darkest thoughts in this man’s head.
I wrap my hand around the back of his neck and pull him down, his lips softly pressing down on mine. The groan that rolls out of his throat is filled with turmoil.
We’re two Shadows burning out in a world filled with so much suffering. Arthur feels all of it, carries the weight for most of us who’ve already let go. I want to carry some of his burden.
He scoops me up and sets me in the center of his bed, keeping one hand at the back of my neck in a tight vice grip. My chin falls limply as he lets his teeth skate across my throat, sucking in my flesh and releasing it over and over again as he kneads my breast greedily.
He looks up at me and slowly draws my lower lip into his mouth, biting down on the plump part of it before sucking hard. I moan at the slight pain and he responds by shoving his hand beneath my pants, swirling my clit a few times before pushing two fingers inside of me.
My back arches at how much he fills me. Arthur devours the moans as he elicits them. He kisses me hard, our tongues hungrily sweeping and exploring one another. He pumps his fingers into me and angles them up, rubbing me relentlessly until my eyes are rolling to the back of my head and I’m on the verge of losing control.
Arthur breaks our kiss and leans back, pulling his black shirt off and tossing it on the floor. He shrugs his pants off and frees his dick. The length of it makes my throat dry and as he lines up his hips with mine, I’m certain there’s no way it will fit.
It’s always the quiet ones that are hung.
I fist the sheets as he slides this tip up and down my slit.
“You’re soaking wet,” Arthur teases and gives me a heated smile.
I look from his enormous dick to him. “I thought you said you were just a man?” He lets his head fall forward a bit before chuckling and slowly sliding the tip of his dick inside me.
Pleasure and pain race up through my core at the intrusion and I inhale sharply to keep from screaming. He throws his head back as he slowly thrusts just the tip of his dick inside me, easing his way in so as not to hurt me. My hands find his over my waist and our eyes connect briefly before he grits his teeth and grabs my flesh, pulling me in hard enough to bruise as he penetrates me.
This time there’s no holding back the scream.
Arthur’s hand flies down and covers my mouth, stilling with his pelvis pressed firmly against mine. We freeze, looking at one another with wide eyes. I’ve never seen him so flustered and the boyish look of worry that tugs at his eyes makes me laugh. He only looks surprised for another second before he cracks a smirk and chuckles with me.
Our laughter is short-lived as he starts to pump his hips into me again, slowly moving his hand before shoving a finger inside my mouth. I moan as I suck on him, eyes lolling as I try to focus on his lovely face.
His brows are pulled tightly together with pleasure, but he also looks so fucking anguished. I think I’m imagining it until tears start to brim in his eyes. I press my hand to his chest, but he drops himself onto me and hides his face in the sheets.
I tilt my chin up as he pumps into me slowly, letting out a quiet moan.
Why does fucking me make him sad? I thread my fingers through his black hair. It’s so soft and smells entirely of him, torn pages and midnight candle wicks.
“What’s wrong?” I whisper, pressing my mouth to the side of his head.
He leans up to his forearms and looks down at me. There’s a wealth of sorrow in his gaze but the tears have dried. Arthur doesn’t try responding, no, he lowers his mouth to mine. His kiss is so placid and soft. Like a lover would kiss another’s shoulder, it’s tender and light, filled with so much more than just the physical sentiment.
There’s no doubt in my mind that he holds affection for me, but is that affection the cause of such anguish? Such torment?
Even our Shadows tenderly brush against one another, old friends, or perhaps lovers. Time and memory. Must we be apart?
I wish I could return his sentiment—how bruising and aching his heart is for me.
I’m pulled from the thoughts as my orgasm reaches the climax. My hands fist his hair and he lets out a low groan, moving his hips faster and harder until I’m unraveling completely beneath him. He sits back swiftly and wraps his hand around his cock, jerking it to finish himself off. I lie on his bed and stare at his ceiling, letting myself get lost in my thoughts again.
He feels so good and right.
So familiar, yet still unknown.
Arthur grunts as his come shoots over my stomach. I smile as he collapses beside me on the bed, his raven hair falling over his forehead, a strand over his nose, partly hiding one of his eyes as he looks at me. He’s not smiling.
We stare into each others eyes with sullen expressions.
“That was the saddest, best sex I’ve ever had.” I finally break the silence and he cracks a grin. I return it with a soft smile, pulling his face close and pressing a kiss to his swollen lips.
“I’m sorry, little shadow. I think too much,” he says on a breathy whisper.
“That’s broad—what could you have possibly been thinking about—” I remember Za’Afiel and all the children there who were dealt with. That was only a few days ago. Shit. How could I forget?
Arthur quirks a brow at my sudden silence so I shake my head.
“Never mind. We all have our secrets, don’t we?” I caress his cheek and he does the same, brushing a strand of hair from my face and letting his hand rest on my jaw and neck.
Arthur’s smile fades as he says, “No secrets are as terrible as the ones we cannot speak.”