Chapter 16
Sixteen
I don’t know who’s actually being punished at this point. It’s been a week and I don’t think I can take it anymore.
We were going to try working it out. Me and Varian and Castiel and Thorne. Then she had went with Darian and that night. . . there couldn’t have been a doubt about what happened between her and the fucking angel.
I nearly couldn’t stand her. She had me – us, her fated – and yet she went to him.
That’s when Thorne said if she didn’t want us then she didn’t have to have us.
She’d be treated as any other student at this school.
She’d be invisible to us, as she had stated she wanted during that party after she fed from Castiel.
But I couldn’t stand to not be near her.
I couldn’t stand not to be near her familiar presence.
Her sweet scent muted but always there. The blue and pink becoming even more vibrant when it catches pieces of the light.
The spiders and now her snake always laying somewhere on her.
Her perceptive nature and micro expressions and depth of knowledge.
She has so many amazing qualities and such depth that isn’t coincided with her magic, and I wish she would just see that because she thinks that she isn’t worthy when in reality it is us who are not worthy of her.
I refuse to believe that Darian is though, and after tonight I’m finished with this childish torment. I miss talking to her and hearing her voice directed at me and this silent treatment will not help me in trying to convince her that she is more than enough for us.
Thorne and the others can do as they wish, but she is my fated whether she wants to accept that or not. I will do everything I can to be worthy of her and make her see that she is enough. That her scars and past do not define her. That we can live fulfilling and happy lives together.
Starting tomorrow. I’ll start tomorrow, a new day and the beginning of winter. And if she chooses to sleep with Darian then I will accept it because if she is not yet comfortable with me then that’s okay.
I lift and am about to drag my hand down my face when I remember I’m still wearing my mask.
The simple black mask covers only my eyes and nose and goes well with my simple black suit.
I had been planning, from the beginning of the school year, to take Mavyn to this.
She’d be dressed in an actual costume because I know she’s wanted to attend a masquerade before, and I know she’d dress as some sort of winged creature.
Winter owls are her favorite bird.
Since none of that happened I did not try tonight. I don’t plan on dancing or participating in any of the games and I’ve already decided I’ll be leaving soon.
“You’ve been talking about this ball since you were fifteen,” a deep timber voice speaks.
The owner of that voice steps forward to stand beside me.
Our three inch height difference never bothered me before, nor has technically being the shortest out of the five of us ever bothered me, but he is currently looking down on me patronizingly.
Lifting the drink in my left hand, I sip the bubbly wine and don’t comment. I’ve always had a romanticized outlook on things and they’ve never failed to point that out. Thorne says it’s because I’m the youngest out of them and I’ll grow out of it.
Not that that holds any weight. From nineteen to twenty-four there isn’t really any big difference for immortals.
We finish physically maturing at twenty-five and then virtually stop aging.
It’s the same for most non-mortals, the only difference between us and them is we live a lot longer.
The difference between living centuries and millenniums.
So me being nineteen and Thorne and Darian being twenty-two doesn’t matter. Even Varian and Castiel at two hundred and seventy-two, for mortal – or human – aging they’re maybe between twenty-six to twenty-eight.
No matter though. They can look down at me all they want and call my romanticizing immature, but of all of the hatred I have for myself, of all the self-loathing, I have never disliked how I view life.
Varian shifts his weight. “Callahan. . .”
I’m about to tell him to fuck off when a swish of snow white catches my attention. A rippling skirt one could almost mistake for fur.
A winter owl.
Taking a step forward, I cock my head and silently urge people to move. The song ends and people face each other as they bow with the end of their dance. Then they move and that woman in her white dress comes back into view.
Long straight hair down her back that’s white, but she could have dyed it. Except her dress is sleeveless and while decorative frost does cover her skin, beneath it is darker than Mavyn’s color.
“She’s not coming,” Varian grunts. “She already said yesterday she didn’t want to.”
She said it, but she did not say it to him. He overheard, because as I was before, he wants to punish her but he can’t stand not being near her. I had seen him when he entered the ballroom yesterday and froze in place when he saw her.
She had been dressed in a simple dress and sweater as she danced with Jullia, but she could have been wearing a sack for all it mattered.
She and the mage swept across the floor with a practice and serenity as my fated hummed.
A song for just them two, and for my Firecracker who has always wanted this.
Music, dancing, masks.
I continue watching the woman dressed in white, nonetheless.
Her costume, now that she’s turned around to reveal her mask, is a snow selkie and she curtsies to another woman dressed as a fox.
Her hair matches her dress – burning orange with black ends – and her mask covers the entirety of her face and the top part of her head.
A new waltz begins and they pull closer to each other before beginning. Their gowns swishing as they spin and glide with the rest of the dancers. I’m envious. It should have been me and Mavyn.
Varian sighs heavily before saying, “Callahan, listen I – “
I walk away, not even letting him finish his sentence because right now I do not care. Downing the rest of my drink before setting it on an empty tray when one of the servers walk by and then beginning my walk around the room towards the exit. I made my appearance and now I’m done.
As I’m rounding to the halfway point I notice Darian walking in. Like me, he barely tried with his outfit. A tailored red suit with a simple black mask like my own. Except his. . .
I stop in my tracks as I watch his pause at the entrance and survey the room.
His red suit is a very specific shade I’ve never seen him wear before, and instead of black trims it’s a particularly familiar shade of blue.
The same particular shade of blue that also matches the single stem of blue belladon pined to his lapel.
His eyes meet mine and he grins. I’m not the only one who has paused looking at him, nor am I the only one who noticed the deadliest thing pinned to his damn jacket.
Out of nowhere Varian storms up to him but stops a few inches before grabbing Darian’s throat. The angel who’s wearing a suit the same colors that match my Firecracker and a flower that is her scent.
Their words are too quiet for me to hear from here with the music and chatter, but whatever is said Darian brushes off and then enters the ball.
When Varian spins around he catches my attention and shakes his head. Instead of leaving like I had wanted to, now I stay rooted to where I am and face the dance floor once again. Darian disappears into it and I strain my eyes trying to catch his white hair.
The current dance ends and another begins before I see him with the snow selkie. The contrast of white and red stark and hope flares for a moment because Darian wanted to make a point and now he’s dancing with who I initially thought was Mavyn.
Could it be her, just well disguised? Was he able to convince her to come when they were together last night?
Whatever had happened last night had wrecked her worse. She had looked exhausted more so than the days prior and she could barely walk. Watching her stumble and pause and shake herself to keep awake had shot white-hot spikes of envy, even as I noticed how breathtaking she was.
I had imagined it more than once walking her back to her dorm silently.
How she’d look in the morning after with her hair mussed around her head like a halo and sleepy eyes blinking at me with sex-filled satisfaction.
She’d be in bed all day because of how exhausted she was and I’d feed her both the food she needs and my blood.
In this fantasy she’d be able to drink my blood and she’d leave her pretty fang imprints all over my body and I’d trace my fingers –
I’d touch her.
I’d touch her like Darian is able to touch her even though she can’t be touched.
I narrow my eyes at his head as I think about it. She can’t have physical touch because of her scars. Making it only possible for her neck, hands, and feet to be touched without excruciating pain. So how is she sleeping with Darian if she feels pain?
My mind moves with thoughts and memories of every time she mentioned her curse and skin on skin contact and pain.
I remember asking if she had ever thought about a spell or way for someone to touch her without actually touching her scars.
Did she figure it out, or did she ask Darian for help in figuring it out?
She was in his room a week ago for some reason when Castiel went and confronted them but she never said why. She didn’t tell Thorne when he approached her when she left either.
The only other time she’s said anything about it was when she was in my rooms after waking up from her coma.
Laying in my bed in only a tank top and little shorts because her scars get irritated easily from constricting fabric.
She had asked me if I could trace my fingers on her arm. She asked if I would touch her scars.