Chapter 28
Enid was here.
Anelize caressed her sister’s hair, her cheeks, her arms, her hands. This girl she loved with her entire soul, more than her own life, was finally back in her arms. And she would never let her go again.
“How did you find me?” Enid whispered, the sound belonging to her, while not at all. Her delicate cadence was still there but there was also something else. Something hollow. Not right.
“There’s much to discuss but now is not the time. I need to get you out of here.”
She felt Enid tilt her head. “How are you here? Were you also taken?”
“No, it’s a long story, and one I’d be more than happy to tell you about when the time is right. I just need you to give me time and I’ll find a way to get you and Wellyn out. Where is he?”
“Wellyn…” Enid murmured as if she just remembered he had also been brought here. “I think he’s dead.”
The words, despite being spoken so bluntly by Enid of all people, left her utterly stunned. Feeling as though the world beneath her feet was shifting.
It took her a few shallow breaths before she managed to utter another word. “How?”
“The Watchmen took him. They said he was going home, back to his family. When he refused, they dragged him out anyway. That was days ago, and they still haven’t returned him.
” As if admitting those words to her drained what little strength Enid still had, she slowly slid to the floor.
Anelize followed, never taking her hands away from her.
Her sister’s voice was so low, so defeated, that it broke her already tattered heart. “Do you think he is dead, too?”
“Enid, listen to me. I need you to stay strong for a little longer. Long enough for me to find a way to get you out. I swear to you, I will get you out of this wretched place,” Anelize implored as she ran her thumbs over her cheeks repeatedly, trying to warm her skin.
Enid nodded against her touch. “I’ll wait for you. I always will, Anya.”
A breathless cry escaped her, unable to stop herself from doing so. “I’m so sorry, Enid. I never should have left you. I should have been the one—”
“Shh.” Enid’s hand eased through the bars and cupped her cheek this time.
Her touch so cold yet so familiar that she never wished for it to end.
“I never would have been able to come to you. You were always stronger than me, Anya. You always bore your suffering well, better than I ever will. So do not cry. If this was the one thing I could do for you, then I am glad for it. We’re together now. ”
Such tender words filled with such horrible truths.
The sound of footsteps echoing through the corridor made them both tense.
“You should go,” Enid whispered. “If they find you, they’ll kill you. Please, go.”
Anelize shook her head, every fiber of her being refusing to leave her side once more. But she stood, her fingers slowly sliding away from Enid’s face as she took a step away from the cell.
“I will come back for you,” she said through the knot in her throat.
As she stood by the door and watched as a guard strode past and unlocked another door, disappearing inside, she heard Enid’s smile through her final words. “I’ll be here.”
Taking a deep breath, she eased the door open and gently closed it, mindful of every sound she heard as she slowly took bracing steps backward.
Her eyes trained on the opened door where the guard had disappeared as the back of her boot hit the first step of the stairwell.
Turning around, she began ascending the steps before she slammed straight into a broad chest that nearly sent her careening back down.
An arm wrapped around her waist at the same time a hand covered her mouth, muffling her gasp.
Through the shadows, she stared up into piercing blue eyes as they glared down at her.
Aeric.
His grip tightened on her at the sound of footsteps heading their way from the corridor and his glare shot over her shoulder.
“Come with me,” he ordered, his tone as unforgiving as his grip, as he pulled her up the stairs and into the light.
The structure Aeric led her into before the guard could reach the top of the steps of the tower was a small chapel within the ward.
It was a small building which consisted of a long hall where a worn rug led to the two pews facing the lancet stained-glass windows.
The only light they were rewarded with were the few candles lit upon the candelabrum beside the altar.
Aeric closed the door behind them with a deep exhale before he released her arm. He kept his back to her as he turned to walk farther into the chapel, his shoulders tense.
It didn’t take much to know he was angry with her for her carelessness, her reckless actions that could have cost them everything. She did not care since finding Enid after spinning her mind in maddening circles for weeks. Wondering if she was alive or dead. As Wellyn was likely dead.
Their footsteps echoed through the chapel as they walked toward the pews. Aeric braced a hand upon one of them as he stared at the stained-glass windows.
When he spoke, his voice was a deadly rasp.
“Do you have any idea what would have happened to you if you had been caught by anyone else?” Anelize was silent for so long that he glowered over his shoulder as his eyes found hers.
“What a Watchman would have done to you? How they would have relished at the opportunity to torment you with no one to hear you, save for the poor souls locked away in those cells who can barely help themselves. Do you?”
“As you can see, I am fine. I would have found a way to hold my own.”
It was the wrong thing to say.
“Fine.” Aeric took in a sharp breath, the leather of his gloves crackling as he tightened his grip upon the pew. “And would you have been fine if they’d realized your sister was in there? If they tortured her for the sake of discovering what you were doing here? Who else was working with you?”
Anger fueled her next words, unable to hold them back after all she’d seen in those cells. She stepped closer to him and said, “I followed Horia after overhearing him and Esna Santir discussing the tunnels and the people they’ve been taking to the book. What was I supposed to do?”
Aeric turned to face her, his eyes still cold. As if he’d forgotten to take the mask of the Captain of the Watchmen off.
“Not only did you follow the physician—who works closely with the king and the council—but you willingly wandered into those cells knowing the risks you were taking. Risks that could have very well cost us our lives. Do not delude yourself into thinking you would be strong enough to withstand what people like Esna Santir would do to you to get any information they could on the rebels. That you would not tell them of our plans.”
Anelize scoffed, running a hand through her hair.
“You clearly think little of me if you would think I would betray you. Are you sure you’re not merely placing your frustrations onto me for being incapable of doing anything other than serving the king and hiding in the shadows after all these years? ”
“What? Is that truly what you think of me? That I’m playing some fucking game?
” Aeric sneered. It was the first time he’d ever spoken to her in such a manner, and while it lanced through her heart, she was too full of memories of all that she’d seen in the cell that she could not bring herself to care.
“You knew,” she started through gritted teeth, shoving a finger toward the door as if she could feel the tower looming over them, watching them. “You knew Enid was down there in that cursed place. And you’ve done nothing to help her or the others.”
“And what would you have had me do?” Aeric snapped, raising his voice.
The harsh sound carrying through the chapel and striking her like a whip.
There was anger and agony twisted in his face, so much of it she could only watch him in stunned silence as he slapped a hand over his chest and said, “Do you think I would not shed the clothes off my bloody back to hand over to a single person down there if it meant providing them a shred of warmth, comfort? Do you think it is easy for me to bear witness to such desolation and death? That I do not mourn my people—my mother and sister—who have suffered at the hand of that monster.”
He took a step toward her, then one back, as if he knew to keep his distance. For her sake or for his, she did not know.
“Do you think I do not curse my own ineptitude for being unable to do more? I loathe myself for this role. That I must order men to arrest innocents and persecute them and still remain impassive, when inside I burn with rage. So much I have been consumed by the very flames I have used to kill in cold blood. All for the sake of putting a stop to this.”
Before she could say anything, he walked toward the altar, staring up at the windows as if they may shatter and allow him an escape from the horrible life that he’d been forced into all these years.
A part of her shattered as well when she heard his voice break.
“Do you truly think me so heartless that it does not rip me to shreds that this has been my path?” A single tear rolled down his cheek, caught by the candlelight.
For all his pain and no matter how angry he was with her, she knew he would never truly harm her. And so, she slowly approached him.
He tensed when she placed her hand on his shoulder as she came to stand beside him.
The moonlight shifted over the windows, painting them in soft hues.
Diamond patterns of lapis blue and lilac caressed the side of his face, so broken and tormented, as he stared into her eyes.
Reaching forward, she wiped away his tears, unable to hold back her own.
Before she could speak, he said, “I cannot lose you. Not you. Hate me, curse me, do whatever you want to me, but do not make me bear the weight of losing you, Anya. If anything were to happen to you...I do not think you truly understand what it is that I feel for you.”
And while he hadn’t touched her, hadn’t given himself the privilege to do such a thing, his eyes consumed her. Greedy and unrepenting.
His voice echoed like a phantom destined to haunt her when he murmured, “Time…what a cruel, twisted game it’s entangled us in. And what a mockery it’s made of me for wanting more of it.”
Reaching for his hands, she brought them up between them and he watched as she pulled his gloves off and placed them upon the altar.
“We have time now,” she whispered to him. That gesture alone, shredding away any traces of the Watchman, seemed to be his undoing. Snapping the final thread of restraint that he had tethered himself to. His hands cupped her face, his touch finally his once more as he pulled her close.
His breath caressed her lips, holding her a mere inch away as he watched her. His eyes flickered down to her lips then back up to her face, taking in every detail. The same way she had within the comfort of his room, their own carved out piece of the world. How she longed to return there once more.
“I’m sorry. For everything.” Anelize slid her hands up his chest as she closed the distance between them, finally placing a gentle lingering kiss.
When she made to pull away, he tightened his hold and deepened it.
Searing her with his lips, his tongue, his every breath.
Prolonging the touch as if it would be their last.
And maybe it would be.
It wasn’t long before they wandered back to the castle where neither of them spoke as Aeric escorted her back to her room, only stopping once they reached the hall.
She sent Aeric one final glance over her shoulder as he remained stoic, nodding once as if granting her permission to leave his side. The wicked captain and the insignificant apothecary who would never be anything more than that.
And perhaps, they were all wicked and cruel. Perhaps, it was all they were deemed worthy of. Be it by saints or kings. They were, after all, products of their makers. Why should they bother striving for more? Why should she?
As she strode away, leaving him behind to watch her, perhaps, being wicked was all she could afford to be. For all their sakes.