Chapter Twenty-Three Damien
Chapter Twenty-Three
Damien
Something soft tickled my nose.
My eyes fluttered, working hard to open. It felt like they’d been glued shut. I twisted slightly, attempting to rouse feeling back into my limbs, but all that did was send excruciating pain sprinting down my shoulder and torso.
What happened?
A flash of an image before I passed out—of me on one of those metal tables, a sheet drawn up to my neck, my face cold and lifeless. It had been the final thing I’d seen before darkness ate me up.
I wished it had been the first time I’d seen such a thing, but there’d been those waking nightmares. Seeing people of the Void, visions of them in similar states. And then I’d envisioned myself, dead and gone.
Something was happening to me, and not due to my mirror and its fluctuating magic. I just didn’t understand it yet.
It took several minutes to garner the courage to peel my eyes open, and I instantly debated shutting them when harsh early-morning sunshine struck my senses.
Too bright.
A little sigh that didn’t belong to me came from my right. Every muscle tensed—the ones that weren’t already tense.
Biting my cheek, focusing on the slight pain, I turned my head, knowing deep down what I’d find but terrified to look.
Wren.
Her body was flush against mine, her hand wrapped around my very bare waist, her fingers digging into my skin like she held on to me for dear life. Faint exhales left her slightly parted lips, her stunning face serene in deep sleep.
At first there was confusion. So much of it that my vision tilted and black spots hovered at the corners. Then, traces of memories; dark alleys, pain, walking, mostly stumbling, to the northern end.
That hooded figure, the one I’d first met with when arranging the theft, and then again last night leaning against the carriage. He stabbed me in the back. There’d been darkness for a time after I fell, but as if it were a dream, I’d pictured myself going to a place where I felt safe.
Yet it had been no dream. Now I lay in a goddess’s arms.
Carefully peering down at my body, I took in the wrapped linen binding my wound. With my stiff neck I couldn’t examine it properly, but no blood seeped through the cloth. I wondered if she’d stitched me up.
I glanced at the sleeping woman beside me. Dark circles painted the sensitive skin below each eye, her blond hair a tangled mess. I grimaced when I spotted red flakes coating some strands. My blood.
I’d come here—instead of the pub. Instead of stumbling to Ruby’s little flat. I’d stumbled all the way to the north end and managed to fucking scale a tree. Or I thought I had.
It was a miracle I’d made it so far without bleeding out.
Memories of Wren’s distraught face hovered in my mind. A soft lamp illuminated her determined features as she threaded a needle. The next memory showed her dabbing liquor onto a shredded piece of linen.
My head pulsed with a nasty headache, my every inch heavy. Even with the pain, even after the attack, I had felt safe. Hell, I had trusted her with my life. Trusted her with so much more than I realized.
As if sensing my eyes upon her, Wren stirred.
Her eyes opened a second later, the turquoise in them piercing as she stared unabashedly into my eyes’ dark glacial depths.
It had always made my heart beat faster when she did that—looked into my eyes when no one else dared to.
I’d heard the whispers, starting at the orphanage; it had been the reason the other children hadn’t wanted to play with me.
They averted their stares to avoid the coldness in my eyes. The “death,” as some claimed.
“You’re alive,” Wren said, her voice raspy from sleep.
“So it seems.” My voice wasn’t much better. “Did…did you do all this?” I asked, nodding at the linen. Her taking care of me and cleaning me up. I suddenly felt vulnerable, like she’d seen too much, seen my weakness. Had I said anything to her? Said something I couldn’t take back?
Why did it feel like I had?
She adjusted herself, though she didn’t go far, her body remaining glued to my side.
Heat coiled in my belly at the way she melded herself to fit all of my sharp angles.
Perhaps she was too exhausted to realize our positions, but even in my state, I focused on nothing else.
Not the throbbing ache in my shoulder or the welcoming need for revenge.
It was only her and the fire she sparked. Only her and the sunshine.
“You scared me, Damien,” she admitted, turning to look at my shoulder. “It was bad. The wound…” She let out a heavy sigh. “I thought I would lose you come morning.”
My first instinct was to ask why she cared. Old habits, I supposed. I disregarded that instinct, though it took effort to say the next words, even if I meant them.
“Thank you, Wren,” I said, the rawness of my gratitude seeping from every syllable. “I think you saved my life. Even if you probably hate me.”
As predicted, Wren’s cheeks turned a light shade of pink. Her blush would forever give her away, and I kind of liked that idea. Of knowing and seeing how I affected her.
“You hurt me, Damien, but not enough for me to want to see you killed,” she said quietly. “You kissed me back in that study, and then you left…you just left after what we shared. Was it just a distraction for you?”
She laid herself bare before me, her eyes wide and waiting. Vulnerable.
Did I open up? Allow her the chance to stab me with words just as thoroughly as the hooded man had with his blade?
She waited, the air growing thick with tension.
“No,” I said, breaking the silence. “It wasn’t just a distraction.” I couldn’t force out any more words. Not all that I wanted to say. The confession lodged in my throat, all the admissions I desired to speak trapped by years of training myself to protect myself.
She nodded like she understood. Or maybe she knew I wasn’t capable of more. “Nothing feels simple now.”
“It doesn’t,” I admitted.
She didn’t know what to say and neither did I.
Her full lips pressed together, eyes lingering on my wound as I yearned to see what went on in her head.
When she withdrew her arm from my torso, I nearly groaned, and not from pain.
I liked the feel of her weight there. Liked waking up with her tangled around me. Far too much.
It was the first time I’d lain beside another.
“Sorry,” she said at my wince. She scooted away and I hated it. “I tend to move in my sleep.”
“Why didn’t you sleep in your bed?” I asked, switching topics like a coward. I grimaced when I lifted my hand to tip her chin so she’d look at me. Worth the pain.
“I didn’t want you to sleep alone,” she admitted. “And I feared—”
“I’d die in my sleep?” I supplied, granting her a lopsided grin I knew she loved.
Wren shut her eyes and shook her head, likely resisting the urge to smack me for my lighthearted tone in such a serious situation.
“I’m all right, sunshine,” I coaxed, wanting that smile to show again. “Thankfully the prick missed my heart, but I’m still alive because of you.”
The blood loss alone would’ve done me in.
“Why did you come here instead of the pub?” she asked, gnawing at the inside of her cheek.
I squeezed my eyes shut as I answered. Damn me, honesty was hard. “I don’t remember much. Just walking.”
But I did know. Even if I wasn’t ready to admit it.
“It’s not like it’s the first time someone tried to stab me,” I joked, though she didn’t smile.
“If people get a hint that you’ve got coin, they’ll attack.
That’s why I had to install four locks on my door above the pub.
Cap insisted after I got my arse beaten three years ago by four thugs.
They took my coins and vanished. After they messed up my pretty face. ”
“I hate when you joke like that,” she said, her stare turning hard. “I hate when you use humor to hide every true emotion you have.” Her forehead creased as her voice rose slightly. “It’s infuriating.”
I frowned, eyeing the woman staring at me. She’d tucked both hands beneath her chin, her body separated from mine by mere inches.
There was fear there, her gaze a mixture of simmering anger and concern. Because of it, I forced myself to say something true, just for her.
“If I couldn’t laugh about it, then I’d just succumb to the misery.
” I turned to scrutinize the ceiling. “I don’t like what I do, Wren, but it’s necessary, and because of it, I make a lot of enemies.
Some who’d kill me on the spot if they knew I had a gift from the Fates. Only Ruby knows.” And Wren.
“You don’t trust easily. I get that,” she mused. “I wouldn’t either. Your life…I know I have no right to say anything, but I wish you didn’t have to go through all that pain.”
Something foreign stabbed at my heart. “We all face our own troubles. But surviving can be easy. Surviving is an instinct. Actually living…that’s freedom.
Which is why I want to go to the west, where the Fates are far away and I’d get to spend my days surrounded by open skies.
No one would know of my gift or hunt me for coin.
No one would call me the Ghost or admire me for thievery.
I’d get to start again.” A rebirth I desperately wanted.
Wren stayed silent for a few moments, and a twinge of anxiety shot through me. Had I revealed too much? Showed her I wasn’t the man she believed I was—strong and uncaring? Someone who’d get the job done?