Chapter 5 Svenn #3
I stare at them. These creatures of darkness and hunger, bound to my soul through blood and suffering. They all chose restraint over hunger.
They all chose her.
The demons retreat to their salt circles one by one. My monsters fade but the casket remains, sitting in the center of my mind like a promise. I approach it slowly and place my hand on the cold stone lid. The bond has gone quiet but I can feel his dark presence.
The cavern feels colder and emptier now. I pull my hand away and take a step back. The bones scattered across the floor remind me of everything Lilith sacrificed to create me. All the lives she twisted and bound and broke.
I am the sum of those sacrifices. A collection of horrors with a face.
Rhianelle loves me anyway.
The thought should bring comfort but instead it feels like a dagger between my ribs.
Because she loves the version of me I've shown her. What will she think when she sees the rest?
I step back from the casket, chest heaving. My hands are shaking. The echoes of the bond's laughter fade into the cavern's silence.
"Hello, brother."
The voice comes from behind me, familiar and impossible. I spin around.
Ruth stands at the edge of the torchlight. He looks exactly as I remember, with my same dark hair but softer features. His eyes hold that gentle kindness that once made me believe he could never hurt anyone.
"You're not real," I say, but my voice wavers.
"Does it matter?" Ruth steps closer, his boots silent on the bone-scattered floor. "You're already talking to demons and monsters. What's one more ghost?"
My hands curl into fists. "Why are you here?"
"I wanted to see you." His smile is sad. "It's been so long since we spoke, Arescaine. Did you ever think about me?"
Rage slams into me, sudden and violent. "You betrayed me! You put me in that dungeon.”
"I did it for love." Ruth's voice doesn't rise. "The same love that makes you lock pieces of yourself away to protect your wife.”
I take a step toward him. "Don't you dare compare what you did to—"
"To what? Your desperate scrambling to keep Rhianelle safe from yourself?" Ruth tilts his head. "I tried to resurrect Lilith. I failed. But at least I fought for the woman I loved instead of caging myself like a coward."
The memory slams into me.
Morsvyenn's throne room. Centuries after we'd locked Vlad in his casket to stop his rampage. Bas and Han had left to travel the world, to escape the weight of what we'd become. It was just Ruth and me then, trying to hold our kingdom together.
"I need to show you something," Ruth had said, his hand on my shoulder. "In the lower chambers. It's about the enchantress."
I'd followed him down. Down into the dark. And when the cell door slammed shut behind me, when the silver chains wrapped around my wrists, I'd seen the truth in his eyes.
"I'm sorry, brother," he'd whispered. "But I need your blood. Your power. It's the only way to bring her back."
I shake the memory away, focus on the phantom in front of me.
"You loved an enchantress who twisted us into monsters,” I spit the words. “Lilith who sacrificed innocents to create the Rhunhraefn and turned us into weapons."
"She gave us power," Ruth counters. “Lilith gave us immortality. She loved us in the only way she knew how."
“We were just her fucking tools."
"And Rhianelle isn’t using you?” Ruth's eyes gleam in the darkness. "What is she to you? A tool to feel human again? A pretty light to chase away the dark?"
"She's nothing like Lilith.”
"Don't you see, Svenn? You're doing the same thing I did.” Ruth's voice finally rises. “You’re trying to hold onto something that was never meant to be yours. The only difference is you're too afraid to admit what you really want."
“Shut up.”
“I know what you truly want.” Ruth laughs, and it sounds too much like the bond's laughter still echoing from the casket.
"You want her consumed and so tangled in you that she can never leave.
That's why you cage the parts of yourself that would devour her.
Because deep down, you know if she saw all of you, she'd run. "
"Stop." I growl.
"I loved Lilith the way you love Rhianelle. I would have burned the world to bring her back. And you, Bas, Vlad, and Han imprisoned her. You took the only thing I ever loved and locked her away in a realm I couldn't reach."
Ruth's face twists with old pain and rage.
"So yes, brother. I betrayed you. I tried to resurrect her with your blood and your power and I failed. But at least I was honest about my obsession. At least I didn't pretend to be noble while hiding a monster in a casket."
The words hit too close and too deep.
"Didn't Lilith deserve her champions' loyalty? Didn't she deserve our love after everything she gave us?"
"She made us into this!" I roar, lunging forward. "She twisted us, broke us, bound demons to our souls—"
My hands close on empty air.
Ruth is gone.
I stumble forward, grasping at nothing. The cavern is empty except for the casket, the salt circles, the scattered bones.
He was never there.
Shit, I’m losing it.
I stare at the space where Ruth stood and I realize the bond is not the only thing I need to cage.
My own guilt. My own ghosts.
They're all waiting for the eclipse too.
I turn away from the casket and begin the slow journey back to consciousness. The cavern folds in on itself, walls dissolving into mist and shadow until there's nothing left but darkness.
Returning from dormancy is always disorienting. I'm caught between worlds momentarily, neither fully in my mind nor fully in my body. Then I open my eyes.
Cottage walls settle into focus around me. The physical world returns piece by piece. First the warmth of the fire, then the weight of blankets, then the soft sound of snow against glass.
Rhianelle sleeps beside me, exactly as I left her. She hasn't moved. Her breathing is slow and even, her face peaceful in the dim light. I reach out slowly and trace the line of her jaw with one finger.
The bond stirs beneath my skin, satisfied by this small claim.
I pull my hand back.
Rhianelle deserves the truth. She deserves to know what's coming and what I'll become during the eclipse. I should wake her now and tell her everything. That would at least give her the choice to leave while she still can.
But I'm a coward.
I'm a monster who's found something precious and I can't bear the thought of letting it go. Even if keeping her means she'll see the worst of me.
I'll tell her tomorrow, I promise myself. When the sun rises and she wakes in my arms, I'll find the words and make her understand.
The lie sits bitter on my tongue.
Because I know I won't. Tomorrow will come and I'll find another excuse, another reason to wait.
I close my eyes and try not to think about it. There's no point in worrying her when I might find a way to strengthen the chains before the eclipse. Hrolf promised he would help me forge chains that cannot be broken.
The bond's laughter echoes in the back of my mind. He is waiting patiently. He has waited centuries already. What's a few more nights?
Rhianelle shivers slightly in her sleep. I pull the blanket higher over her shoulders, tucking it around her carefully. She settles again with a soft sound, burrowing deeper into the warmth. Her hand finds mine beneath the covers.
Even in sleep she's drawn to me.
The thought breaks something in my chest. All the fear and longing pour out from the cracks.
Rhianelle's fingers tighten around mine in her sleep, holding on like I'm her anchor.
"I'm sorry," I whisper to the darkness.
The eclipse is coming.
When it does, there will be nowhere left to hide.
Soon every carefully constructed lie crumbles and Rhianelle will see the monster I really am.
I bury my face in her neck, breathing in her water lily scent.
I want to wake her with kisses, want to pull her beneath me and show her everything the bond whispered about but gentler and more careful than that hungry thing could ever manage.
Rhianelle suddenly moves.
She slips from the bed so quietly. If I were mortal, I would have missed it entirely. Her bare feet make no sound on the wooden floor. This preternatural silence is how my wife survived the forbidden forest of Astefar.
Through slitted eyes, I watch her pull on her robe. The fabric whispers against her skin as she ties it closed. My wife is not heading toward the bathing chamber or the kitchen. She's moving toward the entrance.
The door opens with barely a whisper of sound. Cold air floods in, carrying the scent of fresh snow and pine. She steps out into the predawn darkness without looking back.
Where is she going?
Give her space, I tell myself. But every instinct screams at me to protect and keep her close.
I pull on my breeches and count to ten before following.