Chapter 38 #3
Then the four paws became two arms. He hit the dirt chest first, causing the Rhodias jar to shatter even more. He was just about to reach back for his sword when a curtain of blonde hair obscured his vision.
“Anya?”
He rolled on to his back, staring up at Anya, her chest heaving every breath.
She nodded, lip quivering slightly. He reached up and tucked her hair behind her ear, revealing her misty, glowing eyes.
“Why?” he asked, voice trembling. “Why did you come back? You should—”
She silenced him with a kiss, relaxing her entire body against his. Her warmth, her deep breaths against his chest, the scent of nature and moonlight and cool night air, the caress of her claws as delicate as rose petals against his nape overwhelmed him with delirious joy.
She pulled back gently, their lips parting with a soft pop. A loon’s tremolo echoed in the distance. Crickets sang in the bushes beside them.
“How could I ever run without my mate?”
“Who?” He could hardly choke out the word in his shock. His mind swirled. What had he missed? Who was she talking about?
She rubbed her cheek on his, treating him to the gentle shift of her rising smile.
“He’s a knight,” she whispered.
“Brave.”
A brush.
“Honest.”
A caress.
“Strong…and the most selfless, caring man I could ever ask for—with fangs I will never get enough of.”
She punctuated the word with a kiss.
“Anya, I”—he turned his head and sighed—“I am none of those things.”
“Now is not the time to be humble.” She tipped his face back to meet hers. “You saved me. You’ve sacrificed so much for the children, the crew, for me. I—I love you.”
His heart surged. Love. Love. He was dreaming. He was dreaming, and so he should hold onto her and those words and never let go. And perhaps he would, if she felt the same after what came next.
“Anya, my mind—it’s a thorny place. I would never forgive myself if you got stuck in it alongside me, or worse. I can’t bear to hurt you again.”
She held his gaze in earnest, pressing her hands into his chest, as if to impress her words beneath his skin. “Then I’ll cut through the thorns. I’ll free you every day.”
He sighed. “I wish it were that easy.”
He sat up and fished out the shattered pieces of the Rhodias jar, fingering through them to find one of the tiny white flowers.
“This”—he held it up—“is Rhodias flower. There was a time in my life where I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat.
I neglected my duties and shunned my subjects, weighed down by voices in my head.
This helped. So I took it for the better part of a year.
It helped me face each day, smile and play the part of Valeria’s greatest knight, a dutiful son, the Centarians’ hero, whatever I needed to be. ”
“So why did you stop it?” Anya pinched the flower between two claws, examining it close.
“In my folly, I thought it was making me a worse version of myself. I blamed this little flower for making me the insufferable, self-absorbed rake you met during the evacuation. It put a mask on me, I told myself. That if I stopped it, all would be well. That even if my mind tormented me, what was that compared to the plight of my people?”
She cupped his cheek, shifting the days-long scruff. “I should have never said that. I didn’t know you then. I thought I did. But I was so wrong. So delightfully wrong.”
“No. You were right. It wasn’t the Rhodias.
It was me. The Rhodias helped—but it was me that was hiding.
A flower couldn’t solve it all. I thought I could handle it on my own, that enough confidence and charisma could carry me through.
But the day that I screamed at you was the day I cracked under the pressure.
The voices got the best of me, and I can never tell you how sorry I am.
I can’t trust a flower to protect you from that side of me.
What kind of man needs a flower to maintain his faculties? ”
“This helps you. It’s no different than Lady Rowan’s salve, or witch hazel on a wound. You have nothing to be ashamed of.”
She said it so plainly, there was no room to doubt her sincerity. It gave him the courage to finally tell her about the Cockatrice Club.
“Before the Rhodias, I sought relief at a place called the Cockatrice Club. That was where I honed my hand to hand. The pain brought me closer to my people, and would silence the voices and dull the thorns, if only for a few minutes. Then after, the revelry—the anonymous, alcohol-fueled, sexual delirium—reduced me to just a man driven by baser instincts. It was the only place I could be less than a knight and more than a Centarian in sheep’s clothing. ”
Anya’s eyes searched his, shifting from confusion, to shock, to something like…understanding? Pity? His stomach twisted under her appraisal, so tried to answer for her.
“So you see, this body isn’t fit for a princess. I am every bit the disgusting rake you took me for.”
“Roderick.” Anya forced him down, pinning him to the forest floor with a thump. He looked away, certain he couldn’t bear the sight of her disgust for him.
But then she pinched his chin with two claws, forcing his gaze back to her eyes. “Why do you think I went to that stars-forsaken masquerade?”