TWENTY-NINE #2
“I know, Winslow.” He averted his eyes as he re-screwed the jar closed and put it away, setting the satchel aside on the dusty floorboards.
There was a weighted emotion in his tone, eyes cast low, like he didn’t want to look at her.
Her fingers twitched, wanting to reach for him, to ask him to explain, to understand this moment and why he seemed so distant from her.
She watched him swallow, his throat shifting with it.
Silas looked into the fire, the flames reflected in his eyes, like they, too, were on fire, blazing with emotion.
“I wish I could be someone you could rely on.”
Amelia sucked in a small breath. Her hand flinched again, desperate to reach out.
“You are…” She paused to steady herself.
Her heart. Her breath. She felt uneven and untethered as she considered the words that had been so ready to fall from her mouth.
But after the pause, she realised they were true, and she wanted to say them.
“You are the only person that I trust implicitly, Finley. I think—no, I know —thatI trust you with my life.”
He blinked. Once. Twice. Then he turned his head, meeting her eyes. His chest rose and fell, the tattooed tree breathing in time with him as she waited for him to respond.
Amelia’s heart dropped when his head shook imperceptibly, before dropping his gaze again.
Her eyes lingered on him for a beat too long, and then she slowly turned and faced the fire, letting out a long breath.
Disappointment settled heavily on her heart.
She pulled the blanket tighter around herself, chewing at her bottom lip and wondering what that small shake of his head had meant. Amelia was afraid to ask and find out.
Perhaps, he didn’t believe her. Their history was an uneasy one.
She swallowed her fear and prayed for strength.
“The runes can only be activated if you’re touching me, my skin,” Amelia said, her heart thundering so loudly that it beat in her ears, almost blocking out the sound of her own voice.
Silas’ head shot up, eyes searching hers with brows pressed together.
“Only my parents have ever known the activation word. I’ve never trusted anyone else in my life with that, knowing what it could mean.
But I do trust you and I want to prove that to you. The word is—”
“Amelia—” Silas said quickly, hand shooting out to grasp at the top of her blanket-covered leg.
“ Domare ,” Amelia finished, the word like acid on her tongue.
Silence descended between them as they stared at one another. His eyes were wide with shock while her chest squeezed from having said the word aloud for the first time in her entire life. A word that had meant nothing but desperate pain and bitter desolation.
He shook his head again, keeping her gaze this time. “You didn’t need to do that,” he whispered.
“I…I wanted you to have no doubt. That I trust you.”
He swallowed visibly again, his fingers biting into her knee. “That’s, uh…” He stopped to sigh. “Amelia…”
She let the blanket drop away from one shoulder, releasing her hand to set it on top of his own, his fingers warm despite the lingering nip of the chill from their unscheduled ocean dip.
“What is it? Why are you being like this? Is it because I left this afternoon without you? I knew you didn’t want me to go, but we got the ring, and I’m sorry—”
“No.” He shook his head, eyes falling shut briefly.
“ No , I’m not angry or upset. Not with you.
I just…” He met her eyes, a fierceness there.
“I want nothing more than to protect you, to be the one you can rely on, to trust. But Amelia, you have to know…I won’t be around much longer.
This feels so futile, and I don’t want this to be more painful than it needs to be for you. For both of us.”
Amelia pulled away from him then, hand letting go of his as her body reared back like she had been pushed. His words settled like a stone in the pit of her stomach.
His shoulders sagged at her retreat, and he slowly looked away from her.
She felt the emotion clogging in her throat, felt tears threatening in the corners of her eyes.
“We don’t know that yet,” Amelia said, voice wobbling. “But I do know something. That this is painful. You pulling away from me.”
Silas clenched his eyes shut, keeping his face turned away. He stood, hiking the blanket higher around his shoulders as he moved away from the couch and the hearth.
“It’s for the best,” he said resolutely, and Amelia narrowed her eyes as she watched him stalk to the corner, sitting himself in a rickety wooden chair, the thing creaking threateningly as his weight sank onto it.
“Let’s just get through tonight so we can figure out where we are in the morning and how to get to Ivory City.
Hopefully we only got flung a little off course. Could be walkable.”
Amelia felt a surge of exasperation and impatience, glaring at him as he continued to ignore her. She stood as well, shifting around the edge of the couch, holding the blanket firmly around her body.
“Finley, I’m supposed to be the stubborn ass, not you,” Amelia said, letting some of her anger leech into her tone.
His jaw tightened, eyes fixed on the darkened corner of the cottage. “Well, perhaps we’ve spent far too much time together and your traits are rubbing off on me.”
Her mouth dropped open and then she scoffed. “Please, Finley, you are so transparent.”
He rolled his eyes and finally looked at her, keeping his expression bland. “Am I?”
“Exceptionally so.”
Silas raised a brow at her, and it was so much like how they used to be, back when they were uneasy rivals, always trying to one-up each other. Amelia pursed her lips, hating it.
“You’re purposefully being a dick,” Amelia said, “in some futile attempt to anger me so that…what? It’ll suck less if you disappear?”
His eye twitched and he stood back up, taking two angry steps towards her. “Perhaps I’m just finally tired of your company. It’s been close to a month of your non-stop chatter and demands, and frankly, it’s getting to the point where the Midnight Realm sounds like a lovely little vacation.”
Amelia knew what he was doing, and yet the words still hurt, sending a pang of pain across the centre of her chest. Her foot shifted back, arms slackening at the feeling, the blanket dipping to rest across the tops of her arms and only just covering the edges of her bra, though she didn’t care in the slightest.
Silas shifted his jaw, eyes stuttering as they looked at each other, as he took in the expression on her face.
He turned away with a muttered, “ fuck .”
“I know this isn’t easy,” Amelia said in a small voice, “but it doesn’t have to be like this.”
Silas let out a rough breath. “And how should it be then, hm?” His gaze swung back to her.
He moved forwards a step, reclaiming the one she had taken away from him.
“Should we get closer than we already are? Should we confess all sorts of things about ourselves, our pasts, just for us to be torn apart in a matter of days?” His voice rose, anger and sadness mixing as he took another step, the blue of his eyes intense.
“Should I tell you how long I’ve yearned to simply be near you, that I took projects you might be interested in over the years just in the hopes our paths may cross?
” Amelia’s chest rose sharply, eyes widening.
He took yet another step, almost within reach now.
“Should I make it worse and confess that I think you’re the most intelligent, witty and achingly beautiful force I’ve ever known, and even if all we did was argue, those were the best moments of my damn life? ”
“Finley…” Her heart pounded, body shivering beneath the blanket, but not from cold.
“Is that going to help?” Silas demanded, taking one more step that brought his warmth and scent close.
He looked down at her, the fierceness still there, but his chest rose and fell unsteadily.
She could sense so much more than anger radiating from him.
“Is any of that going to help either of us when it boils down to it?”
Amelia closed the small distance between them, letting the blanket slip all the way down one arm so she could reach for him.
She knew one side of her torso would be visible to him, but it didn’t matter.
Not when he didn’t pull away this time as her fingers brushed the top of his chest. He just looked down at her, almost beseechingly.
“I don’t know,” she whispered, “but nothing about this has been easy from the very beginning. And I know myself, and you, well enough to know that we’ve never taken the easy way out.
With anything.” Her hand shifted up, running over the sharpness of his collarbone until she was at the side of his warm neck, gripping there. “Why start now?”
His eyes fell shut for a moment, jaw clenching, like he was summoning control. When he reopened them, he looked at her with an intensity that thrilled her.
Amelia could not believe how wrong she had been about Silas. Everything with him, ever since their lives had become entwined through their mutual work, had always felt like a competition, each of them vying for the upper hand.
Until they had been forced to spend true, real time together.
To get to know one another. For him to get to know her .
Parts of her that she never shared with anyone else.
Because she could never have trusted anyone with the real her.
Not after her parents had decided when she was so very young that her real self was not good enough.
So they had forced her to be someone they deemed worthy.
Amelia had spent years trying to unlearn that belief, but it had lingered. She couldn’t help it. The distrust, not only in other people, but in trusting in herself. That she was good enough.
But this.