Chapter 36
Alistair beckoned me near.
Chills rushed down my spine, as violent as this night’s downpour.
We stood opposed to each other, like two beasts before battle. Only, I could not bare my teeth or growl. My molars clattered. Sniffles strained my nose. Three ragged tugs of air squeezed into my throat, and I wiped my face on my sleeve, smearing warm tears with cold rain.
Stepping from the hearth, Alistair came towards me.
I nearly stepped back into the rain, but he asked so gently—
“Rhoswen, what happened?”
I gathered enough strength to speak, though Alistair’s hand pressed away the tears, and my will vanished. He carefully cupped my face. Warm palms caught droplets, and his tension untied with hairs a mess. The smooth hush of flames stroked his silhouette, hiding me in the shadow cast by his broadened chest and shoulders.
“Will you tell me?” The voice of the lord had faded, leaving the man I was coming to know. Not a man of austerity or cruelty, but a man unlike what the gods had disgraced. Alistair’s hands were too warm to be those of the damned. His touch was too heartfelt to be heartless.
He reached beneath my chin and lifted my sore and heavy eyes. Calloused hands to soft skin—each point of connection was a fresh scratch. Another subtle mark noting that I’d let this lord touch me. Comfort me. I imagined his reflection mirrored like warping glass in my eyes, but in his, there was nothing. Nothing but the dark waters.
Another sniffle, another clatter of teeth.
Alistair reached his arm around my shoulders, guided us towards the fire, and pulled out the olive chair. I nestled in the seat, warm from the echo of flames, my skin and bones melting into the cushion. Allaying my grief. Cloth whisked around me, Alistair gifting his jacket. I clasped the hem, reaping what warmth I could. So soon, it was entirely drenched by the water in my gown.
My first easy breath was filled with embers and sage.
“Will you tell me what happened?” He asked again, kneeling before me, dividing me from the hearth. The lick of flamelight called attention to his sculpted jaw, catching the dip beneath his cheekbone. Remnants of his dimple.
Another sniffle.
“Vera left.” It was the only two words I could get out.
“I’m sorry,” he said without a changed face—displeased or gladdened, care or concern, I could not tell.
“Why did she leave?”
My expression hardened at each corner, scowl taking root.
“It doesn’t matter.”
Shoulder’s slumping in a knock of silent breath, Alistair’s face fell. He rose to his feet and paced towards the hearth. Contemplated the flames.
“This,” he said to the fire with a voice lowered to the man of station.
“This is why we must be honest with each other.” He twisted his neck to look at me—a heap of wet sadness in a chair.
“Though I am surrounded by men with their own volitions, it is only yours that is veiled to me.”
“By all means, my lord,” I grumbled more brashly than intended.
“Please, impart your honesty.”
A grin marked him as though he expected my defiance.
“You have yet to answer my question,” he said flatly.
“Tell me your secrets, my lord, and perhaps I will tell you mine.”
A growl left his throat. Eyes measured me. He lifted his chin, inaugurating another challenge—“So be it.”
Alistair sat beside me in my seat’s twin with elbows stabbing the armrests, ankle settled at the knee, and spine relaxed with the curve of the chair. I untangled myself and gave a final sniffle. Straightened my spine. Put on a mask of confidence.
We sat as pawns, and it made my stomach sink like water in a bottomless well.
“Tell me, Miss Fallen, what do you want to know?”
A flurry of anticipation pulsed in my veins, in my heart, through my thoughts.
At last, the iron gate of unknown had been unlocked. The gears grinded in his voice, the bolt unfastened with his tongue, though I did not know what lay on the other side. What might reveal to the sunless sky as I step beneath the doorway.
Deceit’s hands coiled into my mind. But what secrets he gives, he will expect in return, Princess. He is not granting truth. The young lord is bartering. Do not forget, he is cunning and wise. If you shall play his games, you must be more than he.
And how would I do that? I am on his grounds.
Be careful your words, be careful your questions, otherwise the lord might understand your intentions. Although, anymore you seem to be lost of ambition.
I pined within myself, ruminating on the incessant list of mysteries I’d conjured in my mind. Only, as Alistair watched me with devoted interest, no thoughts could come to fruition, no words could amalgamate into a question. I looked beyond my surroundings, hoping anything might spur a question worth asking—one that would be worth the cost of his question.
I cleared my tattered throat.
“Do the Shadows influence your actions?”
That is your question? Deceit thrashed.
I slapped at the dark. Do you forget that I have been marked by Shadow? I need to know more about them.
Alistair’s temple pulsed, clearly not expecting my question.
“Sometimes,” he said before a brief pause. Shifting in his seat, he set his chin on his fist.
“When I was young, the Shadow pulled me into myself. It would take over my consciousness, and then I’d wake up with the aftermath before me.”
“Aftermath?”
“Of whatever it made me do,” he said, emotionless, uplifting his stone veneer.
“And I’d never have any memories of what happened. With time, I’ve managed to navigate it.”
“What has the Shadow made you do?” I was quick to ask, tempted by clarity. Knowledge.
Alistair searched my face, and I did not conceal my desperate desire to know.
He only said.
“It is my turn to ask a question.”
I shriveled where I sat, my spine curling like a cat. Any interest that splayed my eyes and lips was lost to apprehension. As if to comfort me, Alistair’s lips quirked at the corners before resuming straight.
The fire crackled to fill the silence.
“Miss Fallen,” Alistair’s eyes traded between my own. Lips slacked, he allowed his tension to soften, only causing more unease in what he was about to ask.
“What truly attacked you in the wood?”
Sands. My mind went lurid, and Deceit rumbled his distaste.
I asked, perhaps too hasty.
“What if I do not wish to answer?”
“Then we are no closer to trusting each other.”
“I will not answer.”
Alistair clicked his tongue at the roof of his mouth—a tune of disappointment that willed his arms to cross and eye to break from me.
I nearly took his hand in my hunger for truth. To let him know this pain I held in not knowing—the dark magic, the Shadow, what did it mean for me? What would it do? Would the Shadow force me into myself and possess my body to commit horrors?
“Lord Alistair.” I sought his gaze, though he refused me.
A statue sat beside me. Stoic. Carved of stone. I held the chisel this day.
“What magic do you use to cast away the Shadows?” I asked, hands idle on my lap.
“It is unlike anything I have ever felt or seen.”
He looked at me with a sliver of solace softening his eyes—he saw the pain, the hunger on my face—then, he went rigid. Tipped his chin.
“You refuse me a question,” he began, leaning in his chair with a wicked smile and hands clasped behind his head.
“And I shall refuse you. Regardless—” he shrugged. “You have yet to grant me one answer.”
“You’re reluctant to tell me.”
If he was, he did not say.
Coiling in my seat—fingers, spine, neck, and toes—an unwanted light shone at the crown of my head. I had lived my life in masks and shadows, and now this lord was attempting to unravel me. This was a game, indeed, as Alistair sat still and allowed the quiet to drape over us. But with the ease of his stance—slow breaths with untroubled eyes—I could tell he was testing my patience. The question was sitting at the tip of his tongue.
“Miss Fallen—”
“Rhoswen,” I emended with tension budding from my heart.
Alistair’s lips lost any residue of a curl, stretching thin. Peeling his spine from the chair, he stabbed his elbows into his knees. His eyes were sharp on me. A beast before battle.
I turned slightly to look at the flames instead.
A hand blurred into the cusp of my sight, grabbed the leg of my chair, and Alistair’s trained arms flexed as the chair legs grinded. In one easy pull, he dragged me closer. Our chairs, our knees, collided.
“Miss Fallen,” he growled. Repositioning himself, he leaned nearer to show me his eyes that somehow darkened further between slats of hair.
I did not allow myself to become the sad heap that walked into this estate. As I sat one hair’s width away from this Lord of Ravens, I shed off his jacket, threw it against his chest, and hardened my stare. I was unsure if the ache below my stomach was derived from fear or something else.
“Ask me your question,” I challenged.
A low breath.
“Are you truly an advisor?”
“Yes.”
A dark voice.
“Do not lie to me.”
“Though, perhaps I am more.”
“That is not how this game works, Miss Fallen.” His exhale was my inhale, his breath, his sage, pouring into my lips.
“Broken truths only leave me thirsting for more.”
The tender ache grew.
I snapped out my question.
“Do you regret killing Hendry Baird?” It was pointed, I knew, but the name, the murder, the thought of it, had continued to sneak its way into my life. I needed to know.
Deceit’s annoyance rasped my skull. What do you hope to find, Rhoswen? That the lord will be justified for slaying the Chosen?
Alistair’s eyes grew wide and cracked. He pulled away, expanding the void between us.
“It is not so simple,” he uttered.
There it was—a varnish of something deeper.
“That is not how this game works, Lord Alistair.” I matched his tone, masked in a cunning I did not believe I had this night.
Alistair sighed, long and dry. He looked at the flames, fever dancing atop logs.
“I had my speculations of Hendry.” Alistair spoke quietly, slowly. Weak.
The chair creaked as I leaned forward.
“I could see his—” He cut himself off, biting down his tongue, as though he wasn’t being entirely honest either.
“Hendry’s eyes were too distant, seeing visions in the broad of day. I confronted him once. Told him to leave. If Eadric ever learned, Hendry would be sentenced to die. But, then—”
Alistair’s knuckles turned pale in a clench.
“Hendry told me about a vision he had. Either my blade would strike him down, or he’d rot in the king’s prisons. It’d be a slow death.” He wrenched back his hair and looked at me with devoted eyes. Perhaps to beg my understanding.
The final words got tied up in his throat. He practically heaved them out.
“Hendry asked for my blade.”
Deceit was silent. We watched the lord with dire intrigue, our attention drawn to a single point—Alistair’s words—in a likeness to unbridled possession.
“When we stood in the wine cellar that day,” he continued.
“I was not overcome by the Shadow because Hendry served the gods. I was overcome by the Shadow because it was my blade that sentenced him to death.”
I gave my thought to the god—Hendry would have gone to the king’s prisons when the guild fell.
“You had made a public display of it,” I said, digging. Challenging.
“Do you remember Cedric?”
“My first day here. He was at the meeting, after Hendry…” was killed.
Alistair nodded.
“Cedric is well-known by the crown and lords. He keeps his people close—people who listen for rumors, and, well, there was a rumor about Hendry. When Eadric died, and I took the estate, Cedric had confirmed Hendry served the gods. New to the lord title, I needed to secure my place. Make sure the crown did not question my strength.” He paused for a breath, then added.
“Hendry knew it would happen. A hundred eyes will fall upon me, drawn down with the swing of steel, he had said.”
“I don’t believe you,” I hushed, not certain that was true.
“I do not ask that you believe me.”
“Why do you tell me all this?”
Alistair’s voice was smooth.
“I have left this information in the dark, but that is where you hide.”
“But you do not trust me.”
“I do not trust you wholly, but I want to.”
He’d said this before, only… when I was wearing Freya’s skin.
Deceit hissed with a flicking tail.
Alistair unclenched his hands.
“Miss Fallen, I will ask again, are you an advisor?”
Be wise, child. Be Deception. The god seeped his magic into my mind, calming me.
“I am an advisor,” I said, slick and smooth.
“I have served many houses through my years.”
“Including Percy’s.”
A sting of grief prodded at me. I knew that was not Alistair’s intent—his stare was gentle. It was genuine interest, sorrowful interest, that dulled the edge of the lord’s demeanor.
My head bowed in confirmation.
“I knew Sir Percival, yes.”
Alistair’s tone was keen on verity.
“I am well aware of your time with Percy.”
“My lord?”
“Alistair,” He corrected.
“Rhoswen, I—” He stopped short again. It looked as though someone had stabbed him, the way his chest concaved like a grave’s hollow.
“I believe I had heard stories of you in your time at the Calhourn’s estate.”
I was lost for words. I did not yet know what to deny.
Alistair stood from the chair, his back to the flames.
I sat beneath him, swallowed by his shadow.
“A beautiful woman, Percy had said.” He mirrored Percy’s inflection well—it was difficult, hearing the familiar.
“A beautiful woman with hair as dark and rich as soil after spring’s rain. Skin so fair, it was fashioned by moonlight. Eyes so knowing, yet so secretive, one could not help but fall into them. To read them, as though they were written in strange text, just as her heart.” Alistair’s eyes fell to my mouth.
“And with lips so smooth, the fire’s reflection was unhindered.”
My voice lessened to the ghost of a whisper.
“Percy said all of this?”
“No.” Alistair’s fingers found the soft place beneath my chin, calling for me to rise. I stood, and he set his palm at the small of my back. He lowered himself to me and said.
“He only said she was beautiful.”
I came alive and died at the same time. I was overwhelmed by the beat of my heart, the heat in my neck, the twisting of my desires, but, somehow, I could barely feel any of it.
Alistair tucked wetted hairs behind my ear, his fingers grazing my neck.
That was all I could feel. His skin against mine.
I reached out to do the same, to tuck those dark, unruly hairs behind his ears. I yearned to see his face, but again—he took my hands before I could.
“Rhoswen,” he hushed, lips loose and nearing.
“I only have one other question.”
“Yes, Alistair?”
Arm tense at my back, his nose grazed mine.
“Why do you trade faces?”
“W-what—?” My mind froze.
“What did you say?” A second passed, and his question unraveled my thoughts—a dozen screaming voices telling me to run. I startled back.
Everything fell dark.
A burning cold rested on my shoulder, sinking to my bones. The realm crashed in on me. I had been discovered. My faith was unveiled. In a violent gasp, I ripped away from Alistair, breaking his hold, pushing him away. I did not look at him. I only charged for the door.
He called for me.
I twisted beneath the threshold and fled into the storm without a backward glance. My heartbeat drummed a song of terror. Rain thrashed against me like a thousand glass shards cutting at my skin. Stones slick, my feet kicked backwards with each step.
To your steed, Rhoswen, Deceit bellowed, holding my mind like reins.
“Rhoswen, wait!” Alistair shouted somewhere in the distance.
Through the tune of battering downpour, the charge of his steps grew.
He was gaining.
I tried to dig up thoughts of another—anyone, but dammit, my mind could not draw out a single person. The god delved his nails into my mind and reached for memories. Before I knew who he was sculpting me into, my skin began to burn, legs stretching—speed gaining—but something darker held me back. It captivated the thought. Something cold. My bones did not stretch, my muscles did not harden.
Stones traded for mud at the stables.
Deceit, what is happening?
He tensed, swelling. Shadow.
The realm was darkening. My blood was turning cold.
A hand tightened at my arm, Alistair threw me around, mud stealing my balance. He caught me and held me tight, saying things I couldn’t make out in the noise of the storm and dread. I balled my fists, looked into his dark eyes, and struck his nose. He winced. Blood came after. But still, he held me at the arms.
Alistair hunched his spine until we were eyelevel.
He yelled through thunder and rain.
“I will not hurt you, Rhoswen! I will never hurt you.”
Fist to chest, I punched him again.
“I know your kind,” I spat.
“You end what you do not understand.”
Alistair grabbed my cheeks, refusing to let me look away. Ire stamped his brow.
“Then help me to understand, Rhoswen. I want to know you. Ever since I met you, I have wanted to know you.”
“You will never know me, Alistair Raven. I am the masked, the one dwelling in the dark.”
“And where do you think I’ve lived my whole life?” He asked.
“You are not the only one tortured by a father’s hatred, forced to live a life in shadows.”
“You do not know a father’s blade.”
“Do not be so certain.”
I read his face, read the honesty of it. But it didn’t matter.
With all the strength I owned, I lifted my arm and sliced downward against his—severing his bind. I pushed him away, threw myself backwards, and charged to the stables.
Before I could mount Skye, that burning cold poured over me. Sinister and damning.
Like daggers to skin, the Shadow broke past the barrier of my flesh and joined the god’s magic in me, curdling my blood. Rich in black, the webbing of my veins became a map beneath my skin. The storm fell muted, like raindrops tapping on a pool I drowned in. The flicker of torch flames extinguished.
Rhoswen, you must fight the Shadows! Deceit wailed in my mind.
I-I didn’t know how.
Alistair grabbed my shoulder. I could feel it, somewhere far off like a memory.
“Tell me, Rhoswen,” his voice rumbled.
“Who are you?”
It was unnatural, how my neck turned and shoulders stayed. My fingers curled like claws.
Alistair was surrounded by dark mist and lightless night. His chest concaved in a sharp breath. He was startled by the sight of me.
“I am of shadows, darkness beyond night. They call to me, denying my blight as I ravish myself in sinners’ lust.” I did not know what I was saying—it was not me. It was as though the Shadow and I spoke in unison.
“You cannot save me, Alistair Raven. You cannot save yourself. This is your fate. To be washed away of morals, so that Andrael might dawn a new era.” My feet shifted through the mud, the rest of me angling towards Alistair.
I watched his hands tighten at my shoulders, though I did not feel him. But I wanted to. To know with certainty he was there. I wished I hadn’t left the estate. Whatever he had in store for me could not match my fears as the Shadow strung me up like a puppet.
“Rhoswen, listen to me.” Alistair held my gaze.
“You must fight this. You can fight this.”
“You speak of what she can do.” My voice was ravaged by Shadow. Gone.
“The woman you claim to barely know.”
“Rhoswen.” Alistair leaned near, hands cupping my face.
“Come back to me.”
My face snapped—brows stiffening, teeth smashing, nose flaring. The cold touch of rainfall needled my skin, and the warmth of Alistair’s touch burned.
“Alistair?” I said feebly.
“Gods, please, help me.”
Tears were washed by rains.
My neck cracked in a stretch, and a scowl demented my brow. The Shadow took my tongue.
“You cannot help her. She has been marked. And you know what happened last time you attempted to separate a woman from Shadows. You know the weight of your regrets.”
I laughed, sickening and vile. I laughed as Alistair stood tortured by my words.
And then I screamed. Bloodcurdling, violent, I screamed into the night, the wood screaming with me as my cry cast into the wood.
Alistair came closer to me. Hand pressed against the back of my head, he pulled me in as I trembled in the Shadow’s bind. My manic breaths spilled into his chest. His voice then fell over me in words I could not understand. Luminescence cracked through the dark, nearly blinding me. I had to close my eyes.
“Your magic cannot save her.” The Shadow’s voice lessened as mine grew.
Alistair spoke foreign words, and the Shadow writhed like nails scraping beneath my skin. The air began to soften. Pelts of rain began to echo in my ears. Alistair’s chest heaved in dire breaths as he held me in his arms.
In a final jerk, the Shadow left.
The realm stilled.
We stayed as we were for a moment, both of us gathering our breath beneath the storm cloud’s flurry.
My forehead lifted from his chest, and our eyes met.
Hesitation unfound, Alistair’s palms held my jaw with a stare completely and entirely sworn to mine.
Once more, I was taken by the darkest night in his gaze. Only, the mysterious thread of silver light shielded his pupil like a ring, dazzling and bright. It was as though the Goddess of Light had never died, as though the Shadows had never been born.
Alistair lowered himself to me. A tear of his own ran along the brim of his eye, falling down the hollow of his cheek.
“I promise to you,” he said in unrestrained conviction.
“I will never hurt you.” Alistair lifted my jaw, nearer to him, nearer to his lips that professed.
“Whatever secrets you keep, whatever pieces of yourself you refuse me, I do not care. I care for you, for all that you show me and all that I have yet to know. And I will cherish the day you free yourself of the secrets you keep.” His fingers tensed against my skin, drawing out the sensation of my blood. Feverish pounding.
All I saw was him.
“I do not care if I drown, Rhoswen. I want to be breathless.”
He came for me—for my lips—and I threw myself to him. Into his arms.
Our lips pressed together.
It was desperation, desires too long denied. Our lips could not be divided, sealed and thirsting like famished faunas. His body tensed against mine, and I fell into the bends of his hold. Each of his hard muscles flexed against me, and I was disarmed. In a realm that left me at dagger’s edge, I laid down my defenses, and he held each one in his protecting arms.
In a gust of air, he said my name, and the deep ache overwhelmed me.
My blood was hot in my veins. Breasts rose in shuddering breaths.
I slipped my tongue over his teeth, and his lips opened wider, alluring the taste.
Alistair’s hands clenched my back, in the small of my waist, as he pressed his lips further into me—into my heart and mind where I had never let men wander. Past the fortitude I had built through the years, Alistair tore me down, leaving me weak and trembling in ways I coveted.
My hands, at last untied by the unspoken, tensed behind his head and into his hair. Harder, he pressed against me. My lips throbbed as he sucked and dragged. He groaned into my mouth, his breath filling me. And I breathed him in, my throat full of his cravings.
With unyielding desire, we swam into the dark waters. We drowned. We suffocated.
Together, we were breathless.