Chapter 17 #2
By some miracle, I find mirrored hope in his eyes too. Just a fraction of it. Enough to cling to, and I simply can’t resist. Everything is falling apart around me, and I’ll snatch up anything to keep me upright.
For a minute, I think it might work. For one fleeting second, I feel stable.
But then I hear the words, “Who is your father, Lucina?”
All that hope shatters.
I flinch, shrinking into myself. Wishing I could vanish entirely. My magic even flees the question, scrambling to hide itself away. Fresh tears well in my eyes, and when my mouth opens, no sound comes out.
I can’t.
Panic flares in Callan’s eyes. “Lucina…” A warning.
Before he can press further, the screen door to the cabin opens, and Callan’s attention whirls to the hall.
“Boss?” Devon calls, and I hear the shuffle of feet. Low voices. Cabinets opening and closing. All of them are here.
Callan doesn’t answer him. Instead, he looks back at me, brows drawn tightly together. He waits, giving me another chance to speak.
I don’t.
“We are yours now, Lucina,” he tells me. “And you are ours.” Callan’s hand finds mine, and I flinch at the touch, his fingers warm as they slide through my own. “No matter what.”
A tear spills onto my cheek.
Callan pivots, tugging me towards the door.
I dig my heels into the ground. “Wh…What are you doing?”
He turns back to face me, and his somber expression slackens my jaw. “I’m going to stand beside you,” Callan says softly, “while you tell your coven the truth.”
I’ve felt fear before. True fear. The rush of adrenaline right before I jumped off the plank in Albatross.
The rapid shutdown of every organ in my body when the Ashvine ripped through me.
The shrinking of my lungs when my cabin caught on fire.
My racing heart as I crept up behind Alaric, King of Rogues, reaching out for the Eldral.
But standing here, before the six men whom I’m bound to for life, with a truth so heavy it’s splitting my insides…fear is a taste in my mouth. I’ve never felt it that way before. It’s bitter and dry, and my throat swells around it.
Phoenix and Easton are sprawled on the couch, the latter straightening at whatever he sees on my face, while the former remains lazily reclined. In the kitchen, Hunter and Pax pause mid-pour of their whiskeys, and Devon is leaning against the wooden beam between the two rooms.
“What’s going on?” Pax asks, cautious eyes darting from me to Callan, who is still holding my hand. The connection is there, but he couldn’t feel farther from me. Physically, we’re close, but mentally…we aren’t even in the same vicinity.
Maybe it’s the strength of his touch, or the courage he has to stand beside me, given what he knows, but my voice comes out steadier than I feel.
Callan is right. My coven deserves to know. “There’s something I need to tell you.” Pax’s head tilts, and I chew on my bottom lip as I nervously scan the room. “All of you.”
Defect.
Mistake.
Callan squeezes my hand when fresh tears prick my eyes.
I know he isn’t okay. I know that like I know my own heartbeat. And even though it’s him who needs it, he’s offering me support. Still putting me first even though I don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve any of it.
Defect.
With all eyes on me, I take a full breath and slowly let out my exhale. “The threshold is fifty percent; half Rogue, half Sol.” I wasn’t sure where to begin, but this feels safest. “When the blood is mixed evenly, it’s null against the ward,” I continue, my gaze darting to Callan.
I hadn’t had a chance to tell him this part, but maybe if I had led with it, things would have gone a little smoother. Maybe he could have seen me as a solution instead of a problem. An answer instead of a monster.
He doesn’t look at me.
Pushing on despite that sting of rejection, I tell my coven, “Good news is we have it.” Realization dawns on him then, and Callan’s hand goes slack in my own, the color in his cheeks fading. “Bad news is it’s mine.”
My words catch in the air like a record scratch. Shrill in an already silent room.
It’s Devon who breaks the silence, straightening off the beam like a tall pillar of stone. “What? What do you mean it’s yours?”
It’s impossible not to wince at the way he’s looking at me. The way they are all looking at me. I almost don’t find the words to continue.
“I mean…my heart pumps it.” A wave of something cold sweeps over my skin, and I welcome it, letting it numb how terrible this is. How dirty and wrong and monstrous I feel to be standing here before them with a confession this heavy. “My blood is null because my father was a Rogue.”
There’s some cursing and some sharp inhales of breath, but I’m too dissociated from my body to pinpoint who it comes from.
But when Callan mutters, to himself mostly, “You can cross the Ward.” The room falls silent again.
I nod, my attention snapping to the kitchen when a glass hits the countertop. Pax hadn’t even set it down that hard, but with how quiet it’s fallen, it might as well have shattered.