Chapter twenty
We watch films.
We play games.
We talk.
The days begin and end. Wherever or whatever this cabin is, the sky outside of it functions as it regularly would; the sun rises and sets, the moon appears in phases, and on and on it goes.
At first, the passage of time is hardly noticeable; the food restocks itself, the trash disappearing an hour after I take it out. Truthfully, and maybe by Jaegen’s design, there is nothing to concern myself with but Aris.
I learn this new Aris; he learns me, and the world, but, to him, there is little difference.
We discover the intimate, sensitive parts of each other, each stroke and kiss feeding the hungry thing growing between us. And finally, that thing gestates, and I feel comfortable enough— trust him enough—to take my shirt off, revealing the two sigils burned into my back.
The night that I show him, Aris studies the marks silently. Watching him over my shoulder, brows pushed together, I can tell that he doesn’t know what they mean.
For whatever reason, I tell him. Maybe it’s guilt. Maybe I hate myself and don’t think that I deserve happiness. Whatever it is, it brings me to tell him it. All of it.
It was me; I worked with Jaegen. I’m why he’s like this.
His head tilts to the side, pausing in his stroking of my head, but he soon resumes. I keep staring, waiting for something—pulsing shadows, lightning, rage.
“Aris?” I push. “What do you think about that?”
“You expect ire,” he notes, then shakes his head. “To the contrary, I am impressed. I was nearly omnipotent, and you found a way to stop me—a human, with no power.”
The praise takes me aback, and I hardly notice his fingers trailing to the sigils, lightly tracing the lines.
“Jaegen put these on you?” he asks, hand falling abruptly when I turn around with tears in my eyes .
He blinks. “What’s wrong?” Something occurs to him, and the glint of anger I’ve been waiting for finally mars his expression. “Did he hurt you?”
I can’t speak, the memory striking me—how Jaegen kept me still and I couldn’t move, how I knew he wouldn’t stop, even if I begged. Because I did beg, and he still did it a second time.
Taking in my expression, Aris’ rage leaves, because he knows that anger isn’t what I need.
Aris takes me in his arms, rocking me while I cry.
Sometimes it astounds me—almost shames me—to think of how much comfort he brings. I know what he is, what he’s done; I’ve never forgotten. But he is a completely different person now.
He is everything I’ve ever needed.
Some nights, the energy that crackles between us is as tangible as the furniture that smashes, the shelves toppled and knocked over, as we push and pull at each other. Some nights, the seriousness in his eyes surprises me. I’m so used to his dubious questions and uncertainty, but, when he straddles me, he looks every bit the dominant king he has forgotten he is.
“Lay down,” he states.
Inarguable. An order.
I comply, yearning, ready for him, laughing and gasping as we move together, stretching and expanding.
It is bliss.
And we watch films.
And play games.
And talk.
And talk. And touch. And talk.
Bliss turns to boredom.
And boredom turns to resentment. Not toward each other—never at each another. But we’ve been counting, and it’s been months. The seasons are changing. How long must we stay?
The four corners of the cabin grow smaller each day. The rooms feel compressed each time we leave and enter again—stifling us, trapping us. Even when we go outside, just on the grass and far from the dark forest, there is still the feeling that we’re in a fish bowl. And a tiny one, at that .
We don’t want to stay. It’s starting to feel like we can’t stay, even; sometimes my head aches and spins when the front door shuts behind me. I become immobile, feet covered in cement, and I sink further into it, like quicksand.
It’s becoming harder and harder to pull myself out of those moments.
At length, we’ve discussed our options: summoning Jaegen, trying to leave on our own, practicing his abilities.
For every way forward, there are consequences to set us back. If Jaegen comes, he could strike out, act against us; he is so volatile. Even requesting new films or reading materials might set him off (“You want more?” he’d sneered once, when I asked for magic). If we tried to leave, we’d have no idea where we’re going. The woods might go on forever, and there’s no telling what lurks in its depths. If Aris summons his chaotic, world-ending power, what if he can’t control it? Worse yet, what if it triggers his memory and he reverts to who he was?
So, we continue on in limbo.
We discover that the TV has cable, suggesting that we’re still on Earth. There’s access to a variety of channels, and we often watch the news—which is essentially just hours devoted to bashing Aris and praising Jaegen.
With Aris’ disappearance, Jaegen has replaced him, the peaceful foil to his brother’s terror, the deus ex machina of mankind. On the surface, it’s a good thing. Jaegen is giving people hope; he’s fixing Aris’ chaos. But resentment stirs and grows the more that we watch Jaegen and his efforts. People are going back to normal; lives are slowly but surely resuming. Why can’t we be out there, too? Why do we have to stay locked away when we aren’t even a threat?
We aren’t the only ones unhappy with Jaegen.
“Here is someone who is above our ways, who will not bend to our laws, and yet you are keen to worship him. What happens when he decides, just as Aris decided, that we are beneath him?”
The reporter nods, then turns to her other guest, who is something like a priest of Jaegen’s. He’s wearing a vomit yellow robe with a collar that glitters orange from citrines woven into the fabric .
The man is vehemently shaking his head. “So we do not offend his ways. It’s that simple.”
“And how are we to—?”
The screen goes black, and I glance at Aris beside me. He’s sneering, nostrils flared, lips curled.
I sit up straighter.
“I cannot listen to this,” says Aris, setting the remote on the coffee table. While doing this, I see that his hands are shaking.
I’m not exactly surprised by the reaction. He’s been getting more agitated lately, especially after I showed him the marks on my back. Every mention of Jaegen is like another nail hammered, another brick piled. Contempt constructed piece by piece.
“What would you like to do?” I ask.
His shoulders fall as he takes me in. “I don’t know if…” Aris starts, then pauses, looking away.
This, more than anything, disturbs me. He always tells me what he’s feeling. He is never evasive.
“Aris?”
“I don’t know if I can stay here much longer,” he says finally, still not looking at me.
I gently reach for his jaw, turning his face in my direction. “Why is that?” I ask carefully.
“You are testing me,” says Aris, wounded. “Depending on what I will say, you will think I am resorting to how I used to be.”
“Shouldn’t I keep something like that in mind?” I say after a moment. I don’t like hurting him. Not anymore. Still, I will always be vigilant.
His mouth sets. “I am not the same.”
“Tell me the truth, then. That’s something you wouldn’t have done before.”
Aris pulls back, rallying himself. For a moment, the hand I had on his face stays in the air, waiting for his return. But he keeps his distance. Finally, my fingers curl one by one and I lower the hand back to my side.
His eyes dart to my hand before refocusing on my face, expression determined. “I don’t want to leave so I can conquer, if that’s what you want to know; I just want to leave. He controls us, and it drives me mad. I feel the walls closing in on me. My skin itches when I think of him watching.”
I look away, discomfort creeping in at the thought of Jaegen observing us being intimate. The thought has crossed my mine more than once. He said he’d give us space, but there’s no way to know if that’s true or not.
“And I know now…” he starts, redrawing my attention. His brows are furrowed, expression twisted with regret, and my heart begins to hammer.
“What are you saying?”
“I am trying to tell you that I want to leave.”
I pause, then murmur, “I thought that you were happy here.”
With me.
He grabs my hands. “I am. I am ,” he says firmly. “I want you to come with me. You want to go, too, yet you’re afraid of him. But there’s no reason to be, Mary.”
My lips purse. It’s easy for him to discount Jaegen; his orifices don’t bleed when Jaegen gets annoyed. His mind cannot be read or controlled.
“Taking him out of account, we’ve been over this,” I say, nodding toward the drawn curtains and the woods beyond. “We wouldn’t know where to go, or what’s out there.”
“I will risk it.”
“You would risk me.”
Aris’ lips press together, annoyed. “ No . I feel my power. I have kept it out of reach, as you asked me to, but it is there . If something were to happen, if I needed to protect you, you would be safe.”
He hasn’t mentioned this before, unsurprisingly. We don’t talk about his power; he knows it makes me nervous.
“And what if using it makes you remember yourself?”
Aris pauses, and says, “Then I will remember myself.”
I splutter, mouth falling open. “ Sorry ?”
“Surely, I will be different after my experiences here,” he says quickly, trying to save grace. “With you.”
“That’s a hell of an assumption, Aris!”
His jaw sets. “Like I said, I cannot stay here. ”
I stare at him. I know he’s made up his mind and I can hardly be angry—I’ve been thinking the same things. Still, he’s saying that he would leave me, that his interests outweigh my own.
Something twists in my chest, a fissure rocking my heart. He is as he always was.
He’s made his decision; he will go. Either I come with him and try to police and cull him, keep him tame as he has been, or I stay and wait for Jaegen to return and punish me.
“Please, don’t look at me like that. I want you ; I want to stay with you. And I want you to be happy. Certainly, you want me to be happy as well?”
I just stare. Is he trying to help me understand, or is he manipulating me? I hate that I’m uncertain.
“We are isolated here,” I say slowly. “If we left, others could find us: the Following, the mages, Jaegen— humans . It isn’t safe out there.”
“You aren’t hearing me: I will keep you safe.” His eyes flash, cold certainty reminding me of the eldritch terror he is beneath this suit of flesh. His tone is almost sinister. “Do you not believe me?”
A flush of dark power rushes through the room, halting my response. The shadows tremble in response, a dog’s ear rising to the call of its name, and my hands burn from the sudden cold. I feel I am a candle before a hurricane.
I take a slow breath to compose myself, properly intimidated.
“Mary,” says Aris. His tone is a little gentler, but his expression is no less fierce. “Nothing will take you from me; I would not allow it.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about.” The uncanny blackness of the forest strikes me again, and I amend, “Not really, anyway.”
“What is it, then?”
“You want more,” I say quietly, raising my hand to stroke his cheek. We are the same temperature, which he notices is dangerous, and the room starts to warm.
His hand captures my own, squeezing my chilled fingers. His eyes bore into my own. “And?” His voice is quiet now, too .
“What happens when we leave, and you want more? And more still? What if it isn’t enough?”
“What if I want the world again someday,” he says, smiling at the sentiment like it’s ridiculous. “It won’t happen. I am asking only to leave the confines of Jaegen’s prison, a creature who betrayed me and tortured you. When it is just us, I will want nothing more than you.”
“And how can I hold you to that?”
His fingers tighten on my own. “Because I won’t risk losing you. One world is not worth that.”
I swallow thickly. It’s a good line. If this were one of my romance novels, I’d be swooning. But this is the real world, where men, and certainly gods of chaos, do not put women first. Not over power. “Tell me that you mean it. Tell me, Aris.”
His thumb slides over my knuckles. “I mean it.”
To solidify the promise, he seals it with a kiss, and, as kisses do between us, it deepens—hands fisting hair, scratching at skin, pulling each other tighter, closer. My brain shuts off as base desire takes over, my blood humming and bones shaking from his electric grip.
I want to believe him. I want it so badly.
He pulls away suddenly, panting, resting his forehead against mine. “We will be free, you and I,” he says, with such weight that it could be nothing but a promise. He pulls me into an embrace. “But Mary…”
“Yes?”
He pauses for a long moment, his hold on me tightening. “Once we leave… you wouldn’t have to stay with me after.”
My brows furrow, and I pull back. “What?”
“I want you to be truly free. I want you to have the life that you want.” He takes a moment, jaw working. “What is it that you want, Mary?”
The question stumps me. It isn’t something I’ve thought about.
“I…” I start, then pause, intrigued to find that he’s listening intently. As if he cares. As if it matters what I want.
Could it?
I look down, lacing our fingers together. “I will never have a normal life,” I tell him quietly. “I will never have friends like I could’ve before. I will never go to a discount store and pick out things for my dorm room. I’ll never be a vet or own a home. I’ll never be… a person.”
“I have power; I can do those things for you,” he argues. “I would find a way.”
I don’t doubt it. He could change my face or the way others perceive me. Maybe he could erase the world’s memory.
But.
“And you would leave me alone?”
Aris blinks. “I…”
“That’s what it would take to have a normal life. Normal means normal , as in, no chaos gods lurking around.”
He swallows, throat bobbing, and he squeezes my fingers. “If you wanted that, then…”
“Yes?”
“Then I would leave you be. If that was what you wanted.”
I watch him closely, unable to find a lie in his expression. “You really mean that, don’t you?”
Aris nods, eyes tight and creased with pain. He looks like a man on the wrong side of the barrel of a gun—braced and terrified, waiting for his end. “Yes.”
Letting out a breath, I lean back. “That’s good to know.”
He blinks. “What?”
“I think you really have changed. Well, you’re still you , but you’re… different. You never would’ve said that before—said it and meant it, I mean.”
His fingers flex and loosen, his hold on me uncertain. “Mary?”
Aris’ face is so wounded and confused that I take pity on him, smiling. “I don’t want those things anymore.”
“What,” he begins hesitantly, then pauses. “What do you want?”
I sigh and take a moment. Once I say the words, they’ll be out there, and my feelings will be real. Part of that scares me, the risk that I’m making a horrible mistake. This is everything I’ve ever wanted, served steaming on a silver platter. I’d be an idiot not to take it and run .
But if I ran from Aris, I would always be running. I would never feel right.
“I think I’ve actually lost my mind, because I want to be with you.” My voice is unsteady; I really am dumbfounded, and sort of frustrated with myself. “And not to watch you or to play some part, but just to be with you.”
Aris lets out a long breath, then gives me a harsh look. Still, his hold is tender, gentle. “You were messing with me just now. That was a mean joke.”
I shrug. “I needed to see what you’d say, and now I know: you actually care about me. As a person. You respect me, and value me, and I don’t think you’d ever willingly hurt me. So I’ll go with you.”
Without preamble, he pulls me flush against him, my nose flattened against his shirt. This close, it’s obvious how deeply he’s breathing, betraying his relief. “Never do that again,” he says firmly, but without malice.
I manage to get my arms around him, holding Aris with just as much desperation. “Never again,” I say, squeezing tightly.
One good thing about being with a god, is you never have to worry about being gentle. My grip doesn’t hurt Aris; he just laughs, and it successfully distracts me, my shame giving way to wonder.
If I could, I’d bottle the sound. It’s so… airy and simple.
Happy.
I try to mimic him and it comes out well enough that Aris pulls back to grin down at me. And it’s his smile, not his laugh, that clears my black mood.
I smile back at him, stupid enough to hope that our joy will last.