22. Chapter Twenty-Two
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
MORTE
T he quietness of the bunker overwhelms me, punctuated only by the snapping and popping of a low fire Az conjured in the small fireplace and leaving me with my thoughts. My eyes track his movements—a silhouette defined by purpose and the kind of intensity that once drew me to him, that still does, even when his actions have flayed me wide open.
He picks up the drawer and all its contents I’d thrown at him. He uses a charm to dispel the mess I’d made when I bled out in his arms, and then uses one to clean himself of it, too.
He hands me a cup of water, his fingertips brushing against mine, and a brief shiver travels up my arm, unbidden. I shift back, eyes down, tracing the grooves of the cup, trying to find something steady within the familiar warmth of my own hands.
He settles across from me, every movement precise, like he’s walking a tightrope. He takes a sip, his eyes never leaving my face, and a raw vulnerability lingers there, woven into his gaze when I meet his stare. I don’t want to see it. I want the wall of anger I’ve built to stay solid, impenetrable. But here, away from the threats and madness on the mountain, that wall trembles. But I build it back up, brick by brick, because my other mates are counting on me .
I wish I’d told them about the king’s plans. Perhaps they’ll visit me in my dreams tonight.
I can’t feel them, and that worries me most of all, because I don’t know where they’ve gone, if they’re safe, or how the hell they’ll find me now.
“Eat,” Az murmurs, voice softer than I expect. “You’ve barely touched anything.”
A thousand things pile against the back of my throat, things I want to scream, questions I want to force him to answer. But his words from earlier, his promise to break free, echo in my mind, pulling me into their current, sweeping away the sharp edges of my grief. I pick up the bread, tearing it into pieces, but my appetite doesn’t come. I swallow it down anyway.
He watches me in the way that used to feel protective, safe. Now it only reminds me of the secrets, of his father’s influence coiled around us both like poison. I can’t resist one last question, harsh and bitter on my tongue.
“How will we ever get free of him? You’ll be forced to choose him over me. Again.”
He closes his eyes for a heartbeat, something raw landing there before he composes himself. “I never chose him,” he whispers, the words slipping through the cracks in his armor. “Not once. I was only ever forced.”
The firelight dances over his face, painting shadows that make him look tired, worn. It’s almost enough to shatter the last fragment of anger still holding me together. He’s fully dressed now in a tight black shirt that stretches over his wide chest, and his tattoos are on full display down the length of his arms. He catches me staring, but his usual arrogant grin isn’t there, just a sad acceptance.
Az hands me another small portion of bread and a mug of tea, the simple offerings an odd reminder of the life we’d imagined, far from all of this. I stare down at the bread, feeling its warmth, tracing its uneven edges. A heaviness settles in me, no longer the sharp sting of anger but a quieter ache, one that knows all the words that could have made this easier have stayed hidden .
He watches me, and I can tell he’s waiting, bracing for something. An argument, perhaps. A refusal. But I’ve run out of rage, and that, somehow, is worse. There’s nothing left but the empty, quiet sorrow of realizing he could have spared me, and he chose not to.
“Why now?” I ask, my voice no louder than a whisper. The words don’t carry judgment or fire, just a plea for something real in a crumbling world. “Why not then?”
His eyes drop, just for a second, before meeting mine again, his stare filled with something raw. “Because I thought if I could keep you safe without you knowing, I wouldn’t have to burden you with this part of me.”
I shake my head slowly, the explanation almost worse than I’d imagined. “Burden? You thought sparing me the truth would keep me safe?”
He leans closer, his hands spread open between us like they’re holding some invisible promise. “I wanted to keep this tainted side of my life away from you, Firefly. To give you something pure … something untouched by him.” His words are almost a confession, a realization he’s only now letting himself admit. “But I see it now—that was its own kind of betrayal.”
I bite back the tears welling in my eyes, lifting the mug to my lips just to give myself something else to focus on. When I set it down, I raise my head, feeling this enormous veil hanging between us. Truth on one side, and half-truths on the other.
“There’s no protecting me from you,” I murmur, “or from the truth. Not anymore.”
Az hesitates, his attention dropping to his hands, fingers twisting like he’s grasping for words he doesn’t know how to give shape to. “There’s more, Firefly,” he finally says, his voice barely a thread of a whisper. “Things I should have told you. Things I didn’t think I’d ever have to say out loud.”
I stay silent, letting him find the words. I’m not sure if I want to know more, but there’s no turning back now.
“Roth,” he begins, his jaw tight as he forces out the name. “He’s not just a physician, or a counselor to my father. He’s … he’s the one in ch arge of all the experiments, the blood magic conditioning, the … enhancements they forced on me.” His voice trembles with an edge of something I’ve never heard in him before—a kind of vulnerability that only comes from facing horrors buried too deep to resurface without tearing everything apart.
My stomach twists, a bitter taste rising in my throat as his words sink in. I want to reach out, to pull him closer, but I don’t even know if my touch could offer the comfort he needs right now. “Experiments?” I whisper, my voice catching. “Az, what did he?—”
“They wanted a weapon,” he interrupts, his words spilling out in a rush. “Something that could withstand any kind of torture, any spell, any curse they could devise. Roth was … creative with his methods. It wasn’t just sanguimetal in my veins.” His eyes darken, and the shadows there reveal a depth of pain I hadn’t been able to imagine until now. “They cut and carved and poured magic into me until I was something else, something built for their war games. And all the while, Roth would take notes, watch me break, and write it all down.” He looks away, his expression resigned. “They’d maim and torture me, killing me over and over again, and bringing me back with feathers they’d stolen from the dead.”
My voice cracks into a broken shard as I demand answers. "Stolen from who?"
I watch as grief washes over his features, causing him to shutter his eyes in pain. “First it was Silas, Orinath, Caelum, Caidan, Evandor, and Rowan.”
A piercing twinge of agony ripples through our bond, raw and pulsing. My heart clenches at the thought of what he must have gone through. "Did you know them?" I barely manage to whisper, already knowing the answer.
“Know them? They were my best friends, the closest thing I ever had to real brothers. He made me kill anyone I got close to. So, when I stopped having friends, stopped allowing anyone to get close to me, he started taking the feathers from soldiers and servants.”
The servants by the river.
I swallow hard, bile stuck in my throat as the enormity of his words crushing me. This wasn’t just training or manipulation—this was systematic cruelty. This was him, trapped and reshaped under the control of someone who saw him as nothing more than a tool. “Az …” My voice falters, helpless under the realization of everything he’s been through, everything he kept hidden from me.
“One command was all it took for me to end the lives of the people I loved most in this world.” He doesn’t look at me, his focus fixed somewhere on the floor. “I didn’t tell you because … because I couldn’t bear for you to see me like that. Roth designed me to be the perfect weapon. He stripped me of anything that might have softened me, that made me fae.”
His words cut through me, a raw, bleeding wound. I reach for him, my fingers brushing his arm, a small gesture that I hope tells him I’m here, that I see him, every fractured piece of him.
“I wish you’d told me,” I murmur, my voice as unmoored as I feel. “You shouldn’t have had to bear this alone.”
He lets out a shaky breath, his shoulders slumping, as though finally allowing himself to feel the weight of everything he’s been holding back. He clasps my hand in his, clutching it with a desperation that tugs at my heart.
“When they finally kept me dead and I ended up in the underworld, I thought I could leave that part of myself behind. I thought …” His words falter, and he clears his throat, almost as if he’s trying to speak around an invisible shackle. “I thought maybe with you, I could be something … someone else. But every time I looked at you, every time I started to hope, he’d remind me.”
“Roth,” I whisper, the name slipping from my lips like a poison.
He sighs, his expression twisting with anger and something close to shame. “He never really left me alone. Even when I got away, his influence lingered. He kept tabs on me, sending messages through the newly dead, ensuring I never forgot who and what I was supposed to be.”
I swallow the knot forming in my throat. “Az, you’re not what he tried to make you. Not to me.”
His grip tightens around my hand, and he glances up at me, a look of raw, unguarded emotion in his eyes. “I needed to believe that. But he’s always been there, reminding me that everything I touch will crumble, that I’ll never be free. He’s the reason I kept the truth from you. He made sure I’d believe no one could ever look past what I’d become.”
“You kept it from me because you wanted to protect me,” I say softly, tracing my fingers along his wrist. “But Az, Roth’s influence over you—his cruelty—it doesn’t define you. Not anymore.”
He meets my stare, eyes reflecting a well of hope mingled with grief. “I never thought you’d understand. Or forgive me.” His words are barely more than a whisper, and it’s a confession wrapped in vulnerability I rarely see from him.
“I do understand,” I murmur, my fingers threading through his. “But you have to let me in. You can’t shield me from this if we’re going to stand a chance against them both.”
A heavy silence stretches between us, but this time, it’s different. It feels like the last remnants of Roth and his father’s control slipping away, like Az is finally allowing himself to be seen, stripped of all the armor he’s carried for so long. And slowly, he brings my hand to his lips, pressing a kiss to my knuckles.
“Forgive me for underestimating you.”