Chapter 31 #2
She cleared her throat, running her fingers over the spines on the closest shelf.
“When I was a child, my mom would read fairytales to me. Always fantastical stories about a prince saving a princess, or true love conquering all. It wasn’t long after that that my father started…
” She paused and let out a shaky sigh. “Well, she stopped reading stories to me, and I learned quickly that such fables didn’t exist. As desperate as I was for an escape from real life, I never picked up another book. ”
“Never?”
She shook her head.
“Maybe it’s time to try again?” The words came out as a question, echoing her sentiment from yesterday when I’d asked what she did when things didn’t grow.
Gray eyes pierced into mine. “Maybe.” A small smile curled her lips. “Which is your favorite?”
Though there were thousands of books in this library, my brain instantly jumped to one.
Taking her hand once more, I led her to the back of the room.
On the very end of the fifth shelf in the corner sat a book that was so old, the title was completely faded from the cover.
I had no idea what it was even called anymore, but I had read it so many times over the centuries, it had become my favorite.
“Try this one,” I said, offering it to her.
She held it gingerly in her hands, as if she was scared it might fall apart.
“Are you sure?”
I nodded.
“I thought we were finding you a distraction.”
“Read the book and we can talk about it. That’ll be my distraction.”
A hesitant flicker of hope lit up her face as she smiled at me, turning my world upside down. “Okay.”
Day three of waiting for the seed to sprout.
“Tell me more about your home,” I said as we sat on the balcony in the Magmara room, the bucket of dirt between us, legs swinging wildly off the edge.
The air was freezing, but I was able to wrap us in a weak cocoon of magic that at least cut off the wind.
After days being trapped inside the castle waiting, we were both a little restless to get some fresh air.
If frozen, dying air could be considered fresh.
She looked up at me. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything.”
A brief flash of surprise flickered in her eyes, but then she returned her gaze to the volcano in the distance.
“I have two younger siblings, Lila and Joey. I’d do anything for them.” She looked down at her hands in her lap. “I miss them. I wish I knew if they were safe.”
“From your father?”
She nodded.
The urge to apologize was overwhelming. I tried to stop the words, but they couldn’t be restrained. “I’m sorry I took you from them.”
If she was shocked by my apology, she didn’t show it, simply nodding instead. What could she say to me anyway? It’s okay? No, because it wasn’t.
“I just wish my mom would do something to protect them. I wish the burden hadn’t fallen on me.”
“Why doesn’t she leave your father?” I asked.
Maren let out a long sigh, her gaze fixed on Mount Kharos far in the distance.
“She tried once, when I was younger. My siblings were too young to remember anything. We drove for days, but my father tracked us down and dragged us home. She attempted to leave one more time when I was about to go to college.” She glanced at me.
“I was going to study psychology and planned to be a therapist so I could help other children in situations like mine.”
Her knuckles were red from how hard she was wringing her hands. I couldn’t help it—I reached over and took her hand. Maren swallowed but otherwise continued.
“The night before I left, all packed up and car full of my belongings, my parents got in one of the biggest fights I’d ever seen.
I grabbed Lila and Joey and we hid in the barn.
It was after midnight before I dared bring them back inside.
When my mom crept into my room, she told me we were leaving. She’d had enough.”
Tears filled Maren’s eyes, and her chin shook.
“I decided to leave for college at the same time so I wouldn’t be there when my father discovered they were gone.
The next night, I got a call from the hospital.
My mom and siblings had been found, car in the ditch on the side of the road.
There wasn’t a scratch or dent on the car, but my mom had been beaten within an inch of her life. Lila and Joey were okay though.
“I dropped out of college without hesitation and moved back home to take care of mom while she recovered, and make sure my father didn’t step a foot near my brother and sister.”
The tears finally spilled onto her cheeks, and I hated that there was a bucket between us that kept me from sliding my arms around her. The more I got to know Maren, the more I felt the urge to comfort her—a truly foreign feeling for someone like me.
“And no one ever questioned your mom’s injuries?”
“That’s the bad part about living in the middle of nowhere. There’s no one around to see, and my father always did an excellent job at pretending he was a good person whenever he left the farm. No one ever suspected.” She blew out a breath.
“My mom broke after that. She never tried to leave again and became a shell of a person. She stopped speaking up, stopped fighting back.” Maren’s sad eyes met mine, and she shrugged. “So I tried to.”
“And that’s why you’re so desperate to get home.”
She nodded.
“I’m sorry, Maren.”
A sniffle was her only response.
“I swear to you, if we break the curse, I will do everything in my power to get you home to your family.” The words were out before I could stop them, and I wished I could rake them back in. I had no business making such a promise. Not when there was no chance I could ever keep it.
Her face lit up, and nausea filled my stomach at the sight of it. I’d made an oath I couldn’t keep to a human who didn’t deserve to die.
My legs moved of their own accord, pushing me to my feet. I needed to move, to put space between us. I needed to remember what would happen in the end. I kept letting myself forget, getting lost in these stolen moments with Maren.
I muttered an excuse about needing to go do something else, and left her sitting on the balcony.
I was a coward.
Day four of waiting for the seed to sprout.
Try as I did, I couldn’t stay away from her. I was back in the Magmara room before moon rise, attempting to find some semblance of the patience that Maren demonstrated as I stared at the pot once again. Still, nothing had happened, and frustration filled me to the brim.
Breathe, Rhydian. Give it more time.
As if time was a luxury I currently had.
It didn’t take long before the creak of the door alerted me to Maren’s presence, and the clunk of her boots on the tile filled the room before she took a seat on the floor next to me.
“I finished it,” she announced, handing me the old, tattered book. “It’s a love story,” she said, looking at me like she’d never expected me to read such a book.
“How do you figure?” I asked, cocking my head. “It’s about two warring kingdoms and the lengths they’d go for victory.”
She shook her head. “That was part of the plot, yes, but the princes on either side were fighting to protect the women they loved.”
I’d never thought of it in such a way. I’d only seen it as a war story, violent and scheming, full of mind games and gruesome battles. Sure, Maren was right that the main characters each had a love interest, but I’d never thought of it as the central plot.
“I’m just surprised you’d enjoy such a book when you’re supposed to be a cold-hearted, dangerous Dark Fae.”
“Perhaps my heart is not as cold as I previously thought,” I replied.
Her answering smile lit up the darkness lingering in the room, sending my cold, unfeeling heart racing.
It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever felt.
Day five of waiting for the seed to sprout.
I woke up on the fifth day irritable and frustrated.
The final petal on the Magmara wavered on a single thread beneath its glass cage, taunting me as I braced my hands on the edge of the pedestal.
I despised that my life was tied to this flower, that those queens had done this to me.
And the last few days, the most annoying thing was that I was more upset over Maren being the collateral damage in all this, and that I had no way to change it.
Not if I wanted to finally be free and save Eroth.
I shoved away from the fiery flower, took one look at the never-changing pot of dirt, and stalked out of the room.
My feet led me up and down hallways as though they had a mind of their own for hours.
It wasn’t until they had led me all the way back to the Magmara room that I realized it was long past moon rise.
The door was already ajar, Maren kneeling next to the pot, pouring water on it once again. When she finally turned and noticed me leaning against the wall, her face spread into a smile that almost chased my bad mood away.
But then she started talking—or rather asking me endless questions, stoking my ire.
“How did you sleep?”
I grumbled an incoherent response. Her eyes burned my skin as she studied me, brow twisting at my nonanswer.
“Nico was just here,” Maren said, turning back to the pot, momentarily ignoring my grumpy attitude. “He’s bringing some food for us.”
I couldn’t even manage a response, opting to plop down on the floor and fix a death glare on the seed that wouldn’t sprout.
Maren tried again, asking inane question after question, until she finally got the hint when I stopped grumbling answers and simply ignored her instead.
Her silence felt like a kick to the gut, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. She wanted me to open up and share pieces of myself with her, but it was too painful. At the core, Maren was a good person. I wasn’t a good Fae.
Part of me was afraid that if I told her anything about my life, she’d be disgusted and want nothing to do with me. Especially if she found out about what I’d done to the others.
And after the feelings I had been developing for her over the past few days—ones I could no longer deny—I couldn’t stomach the thought.
So even though we’d made so much progress, I ruined everything by once again becoming short with her, snapping at her when I didn’t mean to, and shutting her out even though I so desperately wanted to let her in.
Maren and I ate in silence, and when I had proven that I wasn’t going to say another word, she pushed to her feet and left the room.
She didn’t talk to me the rest of the day.
It was the worst day yet.