Chapter 8 #3
I will myself to fall asleep before he retires beside me, but I’m wide awake when he slides in, and the moment he settles, it’s as though we’re plunged under a new kind of hex. One filled with awareness.
Although we’re not touching, warmth seeps from his side of the bed.
Every rustle of the sheets makes my blood pressure spike.
When I shift, the glide of cotton against my bare leg feels too smooth, too soft, reminding me how exposed I am, how it would only take one small movement for it to be his hands running up my calves instead.
His elbow brushes mine, and I almost jump out of my skin.
A duck quacks.
This time, I do jump out of my skin. I go ramrod straight, and it takes all my willpower not to sit upright.
I take it back. This inn deserves no stars.
Why are the ducks awake? What if one wriggles inside?
What if it’s waddling towards us on its spindly, ducky legs, placing its webbed feet on the walls and simply walking up the brick to my window, where it’ll tap, tap, tap with its beak and it’ll come inside with its wings and they’ll –
‘Why are you shaking?’ Astin huffs. ‘It’s not cold.’
‘I’m not shaking.’
‘Then why is the bed vibrating?’
‘You have an overactive imagination,’ I inform him with a sniff. ‘Go to –’ Another quack sounds. Was it closer? It was definitely closer. ‘Go to sleep.’
‘Fuck’s sake,’ he mutters. ‘This is about the ducks, isn’t it?’
‘Of course it isn’t,’ I shoot back. ‘They’re outside. I know that. Obviously.’
Even in the dark, I can sense the slight roll of his eyes.
He does shuffle closer though, and my flesh prickles at the proximity.
Heat pools low in my belly. Inches lie between us now, our arms grazing with the slightest movement.
Every touch feels like a collision. The next quack barely fazes me, not only because I’m incredibly distracted, but because this tiny change in position is enough to tell me no matter how ridiculous he finds my fears, he’s here.
I’m not alone. He wouldn’t let anything harm me.
That warmth spreads into a happy kind of glow.
‘A healer,’ he says in a low voice. ‘That’s the answer to your question. What I wanted to be, before . . . I wanted to help people, until I learned there’s no point. They all die anyway, and I had no interest in watching it happen.’
That glow sparks out, washed away by a wave of sorrow. ‘Astin . . .’
‘It’s fine. I did lots of odd jobs after Mum died, and then Liv .
. . well, her death solidified I was right.
So I left town, stumbled across your inn and never left.
I like it there.’ He clears his throat while I grin into the pillow.
It’s the highest of compliments, coming from him.
‘Even if I do have to deal with the chickens. Why are you afraid of birds, anyway?’
I hesitate before facing him. Moonlight creeps through a gap between the curtains, illuminating his profile in a pale glow. ‘It’s not the birds themselves I’m afraid of. Not really. It’s their wings. It reminds me of the worst day of my life.’
He exhales sharply. ‘Let me guess. The day we got hexed.’
‘Yeah. The day Michael died.’ My throat burns with unshed tears and fury about the unfairness of everything that happened that night.
Astin’s hand finds mine. He entwines our pinkie fingers, the smallest of gestures bringing a fragile kind of peace, easily ripped away. But it’s something.
It’s more than I’ve had in a long time.
‘He’d been hexed to grow wings,’ I say. ‘They were pure white, but when he moved, they’d catch the light and he looked magical.
I thought it was barely a hex at all, but .
. . he was devastated. He hated heights.
Said the wings hurt his shoulders. And then .
. .’ I shudder. My voice cracks. ‘His expression turned pained. And his wings, they were beating and beating and beating, faster and faster, feathers spilling on to the ground, and . . . and then he keeled over, and they never beat again.’
I let out a pained gasp and pull my hand away, rolling on to my back. ‘Birds have scared me ever since. Which I know is irrational. But I can’t help it. Every time I see them, I think of that night and I can’t breathe. I can’t . . .’
‘I get it,’ Astin says in a low voice, barely louder than a whisper.
He shifts, readjusting his pillow, and when he settles again, he’s close enough his arm permanently presses against mine.
‘Olivia had a ribbon in her hair when she died. Scarlet red. It was the sole colour left on her after she . . . I can’t look at that colour any more. Or ribbons, for that matter.’
He’s trying to sound glib, but he can’t hide the tremor in his voice. I make a mental note to discard any and all ribbons in the inn.
‘One thing I’ve never understood though. What killed him? Because he wasn’t withered like Liv . . .’
I tense. ‘I’m not sure. Maybe it was a delayed reaction, like the man in the woods today.’
I’d like to think Astin wouldn’t judge me for what happened – the one thing I’ve told myself over and over again to assuage my guilt is that it wasn’t my fault.
Hexmarks don’t come with a warning label, explaining their consequences.
Besides, Astin must have a far higher body count than me.
What’s one accidental death compared to all the Souleaters he’s killed?
But I’m afraid even if he doesn’t blame me, he’ll change around me.
That he’d flinch at the sight of me. Maybe he’d leave the inn, not wanting to be near someone who could kill him by the slightest tilt of her head, the same way my family have kept an extra measure of distance since it happened.
Three feet in case I get Souleatery, a few more in case I get kiss-happy.
I can’t let that happen with Astin. I’d be lost without him.
‘I’m glad you came with me,’ I say softly. ‘I wouldn’t have wanted to go on my own.’
The resulting silence is so long I think he may have fallen asleep, but then he says, ‘I’d follow you anywhere, if it meant you were safe.’
‘Oh.’ My chest tightens to the point it might burst. ‘Well. Thanks.’
I squeeze my eyes shut, trembling with the knowledge he’ll never, ever be mine, and I hate how badly I wish he was.
My pulse flutters as fast as Michael’s wings before he died.
Astin’s breathing slows, oblivious to the effect his words have on me, and eventually my breaths draw parallel, the unfamiliarity of the situation falling away to the familiarity of being near him.
As drowsiness takes over, I have one final moment of clarity: perhaps the magic of being in one bed doesn’t come from it making people fall in love, but in the realisation that for one night you’re not alone.
Even when my mind drifts to the memory of the man with the knife downstairs, I’m not scared. Not with Astin next to me.
I risk a glance at him. His face is smooth for once, no crease between his brow or worry dragging down the corners of his resist the urge to brush it away.
My fists clench. I can’t. I mustn’t.
There may be a kind of magic in sharing a bed, but I know better than anyone that magic comes at a cost.
And it’s never one worth paying.