Chapter 34 Arwyn
ARWYN
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the athame plunging towards Hector.
His sharp intake of breath echoed in my ears, and there was no denying the look of defeat as he welcomed his end.
And I felt hot with anger, like the gathering of warm air in a glass greenhouse.
I was seconds from shattering. As my mind replayed everything that had happened, I could still feel the hot pump of fresh blood spatter on my knuckles.
The song of the Hunter’s skull cracking into the wall until it shattered.
No one touched him. Not my aunt, not my father. Not a Hunter bathed in the neatly woven threads of an illusion.
I scolded myself for not noticing the magic. I’d stood back and allowed the Hunter to follow Hector to his doom, all without realising the truth of it.
I was a fool. No, I was The Fool, inked on a tarot card and displayed for all to see.
Love had made me blind, useless. I hated to give in to the taunting thoughts swirling in my mind, those spoken with my father’s voice. But I did. Because he was right after all. Love was a weakness, and I’d nearly lost Hector because of it.
“You’re overthinking,” Hector whispered, water sloshing around his naked body as he luxuriated in the tub of water. “Stop it before you give yourself a stroke.”
“That’s a bold accusation,” I said, leaning closer to him, fingers reaching into the bath and swirling the pink-tinted water. “How can you be so confident that you know what weighs on my mind?”
I was sat on a small stool, the legs screaming with displeasure beneath my weight. I’d set it beside the clawed bathtub that’d magically materialised in Hector’s hour of need. It must’ve been a while because the water was cold to the touch now, and yet Hector showed no signs of wanting to get out.
We were in a nondescript room on the top level of the conjured tavern.
The walls were brown with age, wallpaper peeling in great streaks.
A small window let in the dull evening light, exaggerating the gargantuan cobweb that stretched from ceiling to windowsill.
Beside the bathtub, which I was confident hadn’t been here before, there was a single bed with rumpled sheets, a moth-eaten rug that I thought was once red, but now looked more like a murky orange.
All in all, this was no five-star hotel. But it was perfect, because it was ours for as long as the trials lasted. Or as long as we lasted in the trials.
Hector repositioned himself to sitting, drawing his knees up to his chest and resting his chin on them.
He did so all without taking his eyes off me.
“I know you, Arwyn. I can practically see the thoughts bashing in that big skull of yours. So, stop it. Don’t sit there and stew on what’s happened when, at the end of the day, it boils down to me being a stubborn prick. ”
“I won’t sit here and let you speak about yourself like that.” I couldn’t conceal the bite in my tone. Hector noticed. He winced, eyes narrowing whilst his lips forged shut.
I reached for him, the pads of my fingers skimming up his leg. If I was a better person, I would’ve apologised. Instead, I said, “How’s it feeling?”
“Sore,” Hector replied. “But at least the bleeding has stopped.”
“It would’ve stopped a lot sooner, if you’d just let us treat you.” I’d seen the wound on his upper arm, the angry red mouth of torn skin. It was a deep cut; the blood alone was enough to confirm that.
Hector had refused Romy’s offer to heal it with magic. Kai’s too.
“Leave it. I can’t fix every minor inconvenience with magic, Arwyn.”
I both loved and hated how he said my first name. “It’s more than an inconvenience. You nearly died.”
“But I’m okay. See…” He reached for my hand, and squeezed. “I’m real, I’m alive and it’s going to take a lot more than a piece of cutlery to finish me off. You said as much, the Hunter was here for Romy, not me. Are we going to talk about why Verena is adamant in wanting Romy with her, or…”
I swallowed hard, a justified reply evading me. Hector studied my reaction as if waiting for something I couldn’t give him.
“Arwyn. You can tell me.”
Tell you what, though? “The Hunter could’ve been lying. He believes you still have Bahmet’s magic. He thinks that if he kills you, he gets himself the golden ticket to the finale. For all we know, he came for you all along. Ask yourself why would my aunt want anything to do with Romy?”
It was Hector’s turn to fall into silence. His eyes drifted away from mine, falling to an unimportant place in the bath-water. His reflection, maybe. Or mine, because when I followed it I found that his eyes were still on me after all.
“I guess we will get the answers when we are faced with Verena again.” Hector swished his arms, disturbing the connection we made through his reflection. “I do know, deep down, that if what the Hunter said was true, Verena is no threat to Romy. Otherwise she would’ve acted during the last trial.”
“Could she, though? Bahmet made the rules clear. Those paired up couldn’t harm one another,” I reminded him. “My aunt is comfortably sitting in a grey area right now. One moment she seems to protect us, the next she sends a Hunter into our circle who tries to kill you.”
Hector reached for his arm, fingers dusting over the broken skin. “Have you figured out the real reason I refused help with healing?”
I sensed the question was a tactic to divert the conversation. Deep down, I knew I was right. “I have my suspicions.”
Hector scoffed, a small laugh leaving a mouth trapped in a frown.
“I want this little mark to be a reminder to think before I act. Hekate knows I need one. The pain, it will keep me sharp. Next time, when faced with uncertainty, I’ll remember that acting alone will only lead me down the path to self-destruction. ”
“That’s what I’m here for. You don’t need to put the onus on yourself, Hector. Going forwards, I’ll be more persistent in making you think before you act. I can promise you that.”
My eyes lingered over him for the millionth time since seeing him into the bath.
I searched for other marks that I might’ve missed.
There wasn’t an inch of him I didn’t already have memorised.
From the dusting of freckles across his chest, to the way his ribs pressed against his flesh when he took a deep breath in.
I could’ve closed my eyes and painted him in the bright colours of my mind…
“Talk to me.”
“Of what?” I asked.
“Anything. Everything,” Hector persisted, eyes wide and glistening.
How could I have missed the sudden shift of his emotion?
Was I so distracted with my own concerns, that Hector’s had slipped through my fingers?
“I hate the silence. I hate this place. I hate the world, and how it treats people like us. I hate it all.”
“Goodness gracious me,” I sung, trying to inject some humour into an otherwise damning mood. “Is there anything you don’t hate, little kitty?”
“Yes, in fact. There is. You. Arwyn Hopkin, I love you.”
If I thought my world had ended when that athame jolted towards Hector, this was the moment that healed it. Every nerve in my body buzzed in response, my mind unable to think clearly as Hector continued.
“I don’t want you to bear the weight of my wrongdoings. What good am I to you if I continue to wear you down.”
Out of everything Hector said, my mind hyper-focused on three words.
“You love me?”
“Wasn’t it obvious?” Hector said, bottom lip pouting.
If I wasn’t fully clothed, I would’ve crawled into the tepid bath with him. Dragged his body into my arms, and never let him go. “You. Love. Me?”
“You make it sound weird when you say it like that.”
My cheeks tingled, a strange feeling that warned about the promise of a smile. Slowly, but surely, the corners of my mouth tugged upwards. “Hector Briar, I love you too. So much that it consumes my every waking thought.”
“At least you get a reprieve when you dream then.”
“Impossible. You exist in every part of me. In sleep, or waking. In life, or in death. There isn’t an ounce of me that means anything without you.”
Apparently, I didn’t say the right thing.
A shadow passed over Hector’s face so suddenly, it stole the air from my lungs.
He rocked closer to me, water lapping up the porcelain tub until it soaked the sleeves of my shirt.
His damp hands found either side of my face, thumbs brushing tenderly over the apples of my cheeks.
“Don’t say that,” Hector said, head tilting to the side. “Don’t you ever say such a thing again, or I’ll be forced to… to… drag you into the bath and drown you. Okay?”
“I sense that I’ve put my foot in proverbial shit, but I’m not sure which foot?”
“There’s more to you than just the way you feel about me,” Hector said, finally making it click into place. “I don’t want you to love me if that is all you feel you are worthy of. It’s impossible to love another without loving yourself first, you do know that, right?”
“I didn’t mean it—”
Hector cut me off with a single look.
“Yes. Arwyn, you did.” To make sure I didn’t speak again, he placed his dripping finger over my mouth.
His touch, the softness of his cold finger, sent a shiver into every corner of my body.
“You meant exactly what you said even if you didn’t realise the severity of it.
There is more to you than just your feelings for me. ”
There is more to you…than just your feelings for me.
I wasn’t brave enough to face this conversation yet. As much as Hector and I were bound together, there was still so much he didn’t know. I wished I was brave enough to show him my scars and tell him every story that accompanied them. But I was simply not ready.
“You’re freezing,” I announced, diverting the conversation from the wild track that was my internal turmoil.