Chapter 13 #2
Her challenge hit close, stirring anger that mixed with the fatigue, making me speak more than I planned.
I stood slowly, testing my balance, the room spinning briefly before steadying.
"You think I haven't tried? The bond isn't something you snap like a chain.
It's in my blood, my veins. Destroying Virelya would destroy me.
And exile... I came from a world apart from this one.
Velrith. A realm where power flows through bloodlines and relics like the blade.
I was part of that, once. House Seraxen.
Not a lord in name, but close enough. Betrayal sent me here, bound to Virelya as punishment, my powers diminished, forced to survive in this mortal decay.
The blade was my sentence, to hunger and erode until nothing of me remains. "
She rose to her feet now, matching my stance, though she kept distance between us, her expression a storm of skepticism and fascination.
"Velrith? Another world? You're serious?
Like, parallel dimensions or something? Magic.
God, it sounds insane, but after what I saw.
.. your eyes going black, the veins... But why me?
You followed me, tried to kill me. If this is your curse, what's my part in it? "
The questions kept coming, relentless, her voice rising with frustration, and I felt my own irritation peak, words spilling out in response.
"Your part? I don't know fully. Virelya pulled me to you, not for feeding but something else.
When I tried to kill you, it rebelled, screamed in my mind, severed the hunger for a time.
Your presence quiets it, muffles the whispers.
That's why I brought you here. To understand.
You're an anomaly, tied to this somehow. Maybe blood from my world, distant, unaware. The dreams I questioned you about, the sensations—they are signs of suppressed magic.”
She paced a short step, shaking her head, the shard glinting in the lantern light.
"I've had weird feelings my whole life, dreams that don't make sense, but I thought it was just..
. my imagination. Stress. Not some connection to another world.
And if I'm quieting your blade, what happened last night? How many? What did you do out there?"
Her accusation stung, drawing a growl from my throat, exhaustion fraying my restraint.
"Too many. An encampment by the river. Dozens.
The blackout took over, worse than before because I left your proximity.
Foolish. It rampaged, fed beyond need. I woke in the aftermath, the hunger still there, twisted.
You're the only thing that steadies it now. Letting you go risks more of that."
She stopped pacing, facing me fully, her eyes searching mine with an intensity that made the air thicken.
"So I'm your… stabilizer? You're from some other…
realm, cursed with a sword that makes you a killer?
But you were someone before this, right?
House Sexting, or whatever. What happened?
Who betrayed you? If you're not always this.
.. monster, prove it. Tell me something real. "
The demand pushed too far, irritation boiling into anger that made me step closer, towering over her, though she did not back down.
"Real? You want real? I was a guardian in House Seraxen, part of a lineage that wielded power you can't imagine.
Betrayal stripped it all. Someone I trusted, schemes I didn't see.
They bound me to Virelya and cast me out, to this world where magic fades, where I scrape by in shadows, feeding the blade to survive.
Years of it, blackouts eroding me piece by piece.
I'm not the monster you think, but the curse makes me one.
And you... you disrupt it. That's real enough. "
She held my gaze, something shifting in her expression, not softening but deepening, a flicker of understanding amid the anger.
"Years. That's a long time to be alone with that.
I… I get it, sort of. The fear I saw in your eyes last night, that wasn't fake.
You're trapped too, aren't you? But that doesn't make this right.
Keeping me here, using me like some drug to keep your head clear.
If I'm from your world somehow, distant blood or whatever, does that mean I have power too?
The door, the shimmer—I saw it, felt it push me back.
Is that magic? Could I learn to break it? "
Her words carried a new edge, not just demand but curiosity, probing the cracks in my revelations, and I felt the dynamic between us alter, no longer pure opposition but something more tangled, intimate in its tension.
Exhaustion made me answer more openly than I would have otherwise.
"Perhaps. The wards are basic, drawn from Velrith's arts, holding you because you don't know how to counter them.
If there's heritage in you, it might awaken.
But it's dangerous. Untrained power draws attention, from this world and mine. "
She laughed again, bitter but with a trace of something warmer, almost wry.
"Attention? Like from the people who exiled you?
Great. So I'm a potential target now too.
This just keeps getting better. But... thanks for finally talking.
Doesn't mean I trust you, or that I'm okay with this cage.
But I see you're not all monster. Scared, maybe. Like me."
The admission hung there, her eyes meeting mine with a directness that pierced the fatigue, stirring an unwelcome recognition.
She saw the fractures in me, the vulnerability the curse exposed, and in naming it, she bridged something, turning our shared space from prison to a precarious alliance, tense and unstable.
I nodded once, the gesture small but significant, acknowledging the shift without words.
Trust was distant, the blade's hum a constant reminder of danger, but the walls had cracked, revealing us both as trapped in ways neither had chosen.