Lucille
Chapter
Thirty-Five
Istood outside Aspen and Oliver’s door, my hand hovering over the doorknob.
I had words left unsaid.
Grime, sweat, and dungeon stench still clung to me. I needed to bathe. I needed to process the last twenty-four hours. I really needed to go to the library.
But first…
I needed Aspen to know.
I opened the door with a clammy hand. The fireplace crackled, a soft glow casting shadows over the chairs and settee. Books I hadn’t seen before rested in a pile on a small table.
“Aspen?”
“I’m in here,” he replied from their bedroom.
I walked to the cracked door, hesitating before pushing it open. The hinges slowly creaked, sounding awfully loud.
I stood planted in the doorway. I’d been in their room before, but suddenly it felt different.
Wrong.
Aspen lay propped against a pile of pillows. He lowered the book in his hand, his bright blue eyes matching the color of Hadrian’s flaming orbs as he rested beside him.
Aspen still seemed different.
He sat straighter. The empty, heavy gaze I’d come to hate appeared lightened by energy and life. Even the dark circles beneath his eyelashes had eased.
I hadn’t wanted to hope earlier in the arena.
But now?
Something had clearly changed within him.
My tongue knotted in my mouth, terrified I’d ruin this progress.
“Lucille?”
I dropped my head and fiddled with my fingers, contemplating leaving.
He sighed, and the bed squeaked with his movement. He stopped in front of me and lifted my face to his.
“I know, sweetheart.”
“Know what?” I whispered.
Aspen inhaled slowly, drawing his shoulders back, his eyes glossy.
“I know it’s over.”
I couldn’t speak around the ache in my throat.
“That’s what you came to say, right?”
I heard her cries.
That na?ve, younger version of myself.
She still clung to the fantasy of her prince sweeping her off her feet. Still clung to a life that would never exist.
But her voice was small, trampled by reality and by a stronger one that wanted to experience a life she never imagined.
My throat ached, and it traveled into my eyes.
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
He framed my face, wiping away an escaping tear with his thumbs as his own pooled.
He blinked aggressively as he tried to hold them back.
“And I don’t want to take one more single fucking thing from you,” he said hoarsely.
What have we become? Why did this have to happen to us?
“I’m sorry.”
He pulled me into his arms, murmuring into my hair.
“What did I tell you about apologizing to me?”
“I never wanted to be the one to add to your pain. I want you to heal.”
He drew back, and there was strength in his expression.
“I am.”
I turned his words over, his face, searching for the lie.
Then he eased back his mental block, and my knees buckled at the truth laid bare in his emotions.
Aspen caught me, holding me tight.
We grieved a future we might’ve had. We forgave a past that destroyed a love that was never meant to be. We held each other as we broke and reforged something new, but just as precious.
“You deserve the world, Lucille. And I know Ronen will give it to you.”
I peered up at him with a wet smirk. “Ronen? I plan to give it to myself.”
Aspen smiled, dimples and all. “I imagine you’re going to have to fight him for that honor.”
I brought a hand to my mouth, nodding and staring at his full smile.
When I finally found my voice again, I whispered, “I know how to fight. And it seems I’m not alone.”
“A night and a day.” Confidence threaded through Aspen’s tone.
Hadrian’s bony head wedged between us, a large tissue box in his maw.
I laughed, taking one to dab my eyes. “Where did he come from?”
“I don’t really know. He just appeared. I’ve been trying to read up on Soulhounds to understand him better.”
Appeared where exactly? I was about to ask, then decided I was more curious about another question.
“How do you communicate?” I’d always been curious to ask Ronen.
“We can talk to each other, mind-to-mind.” Aspen sounded awkward, as if still trying to come to terms with it himself.
“Really? Is that normal?”
Was that how Rune and Ronen did it?
“Yes and no. Their age determines it and how long they’ve been searching for a soul-bind, or so I’ve read. Hadrian’s been searching for hundreds of years. He’s old.”
Aspen frowned down at him.
Hadrian unceremoniously dropped the tissue box and walked into the sitting area.
“Did you offend him?”
“The only thing that has ever offended him is—was my state of mind.” Aspen sighed. “He hears someone coming.”
I turned toward the door just as someone yelped.
“Fuck-a-duck!”
We walked out of the bedroom, finding Oliver with his hands raised and irises glowing green.
“There’s a Hellhound in our room! Quick, Lucy, incinerate it!”
Hadrian growled.
“Oliver, it’s Aspen’s Soulhound. Calm down.”
“Why is it skeletal then?” he asked, still standing in the doorway.
“He receives his body and fur once we’re officially bonded,” Aspen explained.
Oliver looked between the three of us, lingering on Hadrian, then crossed his arms.
“If he thinks he’s sharing a bed with us, he’s got another thing coming.”
Hadrian lunged forward, chomping his teeth.
Oliver stumbled back.
“He doesn’t agree,” Aspen said.
“I gathered.” Oliver pointed at Hadrian. “Keep your paws off my back, or we’re going to have issues.”
Hadrian prowled back to us, and Oliver finally came into the room.
“So, did you tell Sam you want a relationship with him? Or were the last few hours just a sexathon?”
Oliver gave me a wincing smile.
“Yeah. Thought so. I’m going to shower.”
It was late, and I still had things to do.
I touched Aspen’s shoulder, giving him a gentle smile.
He mirrored me and gave my hand a quick squeeze.
We’d be okay.
Different. But okay.
On my way out of the room, Oliver blocked the door, one brow lifting.
I frowned.
Why—
“Have you told Aspen yet? Or Ronen, for that matter?”
“Told me what?”
I scowled at Oliver, more frustrated with the fact that he brought it up now instead of at a time of my choosing. It’s not like it’d change anything.
But Oliver wasn’t going to let this go.
I sighed and turned back toward Aspen and Hadrian.
The bony hound sprawled across the settee, leaving no room for Aspen.
Not that Aspen appeared to be in a state to sit down.
He stood a couple feet away, arms crossed over his navy shirt that matched the second ring around his irises. He planted his feet, and pushed his chest forward in a way that suggested I wasn’t leaving until I told him.
My life was filled with pestering males.
“Your mom had a prophecy about me,” I admitted.
He remained silent as I explained what Oliver and I had discussed.
A soft frown was his only reaction.
“Do you think we need to wrap her in bubble wrap and hoard her away?” Oliver asked, stepping aside from the door.
“I think the prophecy says she needs to sacrifice, not that she’ll be sacrificed. We could consider that part fulfilled if we considered your mother…” He trailed off at my wince.
I guess I never thought about it like that.
Not when she seemed so adamant about my father.
“But why would my mom think otherwise?”
His brows furrowed.
“I’m not sure. Have you thought about the other lines?”
Not as much as I probably should have.
“Unbalanced and sorrowful could be Hell,” Oliver offered, glancing out the tall arched windows. It was dark out, but we didn’t need to see to know what Hell looked like. “I’d be pretty sad if I was supposed to be a cold, sparkling torture device and turned into a muddy, decaying excuse for Hell.”
“I’m more curious about the last two sentences,” Aspen said, his voice lighter than his eyes.
“What world has been concealed from you, Lucille?”
Aspen patted Hadrian’s bony rump and squeezed beside him on the settee, much to Hadrian’s growling displeasure.
“Elora?”
Aspen pursed his lips, unconvinced.
“The Divide’s pretty vibrant,” Oliver added to my weak suggestion, sitting in a chair across from Aspen and throwing his feet onto the low wooden table between them.
“My mom did try to hide it from me.” Emphasis on tried. “But in the beginning, I only knew of Elora through stealing her books.”
“Awaiting a shudder?” Aspen mused.
“Metaphor?” I shrugged.
I had no idea.
Oliver snorted.
He seemed a lot more at ease now that Aspen knew and had offered the suggestion that I wasn’t going to be a sacrifice.
And maybe Aspen was right—killing my mom seemed like a large sacrifice.
Which left the last lines, and they didn’t seem too concerning.
“And your thoughts on when the ice whispers?” he asked, looking almost concerned by what I’d come up with.
“My father?”
Oliver bobbed his head back and forth.
“Ice… Ice king… okay. Whisper and fissures… a stretch.”
I sighed. “No, I haven’t thought about the other lines much.”
Aspen’s lips twitched with a small smile. “I can tell.”
The humor on his face warmed me and reassured some part of me that still worried about him.
“Well, seeing as I’m not bound to some sacrificial slab about to be bled and murdered by my real father, I’m going to bed.”
Aspen and Oliver both frowned.
Even Hadrian lifted his head from his paws.
“Too soon?”
“Yes,” Aspen said over Oliver’s, “Undecided.”
I rolled my eyes and opened the door.
“Have sweet dreams, Princess. Particularly ones about my sister,” Oliver sang eagerly.
“I will, Oli.”
He gave me a grateful nod, and I left, shutting the door behind me.
“Is your skeletal dog going to bite me?” Oliver asked, his voice muffled through the wood.
“Only if you call him a dog again,” Aspen replied.
Tonight, I stood in front of the large mosaic doors, and a chill clawed into my veins.
Tiny red, black, and white pieces depicted Hell’s gates open again, the ground soaked in blood.
But this time, my father knelt in the puddle, Tsal-mawet gripped in his hand and the rune stark on the back of his neck—the one I couldn’t figure out but Ronen had confirmed was there.
The dagger had blood smeared across the blade, but the image showed no signs of self-inflicted harm or a dead body.
But the blood had to have come from somewhere.
“This is how the gates are opened, isn’t it?” I asked the doors.