Four
Alara
A sudden noise wakes me. My eyes peel open to the sight of guards dragging Rohan back into his cell and reattaching the chains.
I rub my eyes, watching as they kick him one final time before they lock the door and leave, laughing and talking about heading to a tavern without sparing me a glance.
Rohan groans. The sound is rough and pained, and my head snaps toward it instinctively.
It’s so odd to hear him like that, so I gingerly sit up, moving my knotted hair out of my face.
He’s facing the bars that separate us, laying on his stomach.
He coughs, the sound wet, and he spits out blood, his lips smeared with it.
My stomach turns with discomfort at the sight, and I bite my lip, hating the feeling.
He sighs, and then slowly, he pushes himself up off the ground with a growl, breathing heavily until he leans against the cell bars, his dazed eyes glancing over at me while mine widen.
He’s hurt. Really hurt.
His left eye is swollen, there’s a cut on his cheek and lip, under his jaw. There’s dried blood all over him. I’ve never seen him look so… human before.
Of course, he is more than that, he bonds with a dragon, and he’s always seemed larger than anything, untouchable, formidable. But the sight of him in this state shows me that he too, can be harmed.
Made to bleed. Why did he let himself be hurt?
He holds his stomach and turns toward me, growling under his breath as he leans his head heavily against the bars with a sigh.
“Are you okay?” he asks, voice gruff.
My brows furrow.
Am I okay?
He looks me over, and I do the same to him, noticing blood dripping from underneath the ribbons he always has wrapped around his forearms. I swallow roughly.
“They didn’t come into your cell, did they?” He stills before straightening, eyes flashing with pain like he hates the thought. “Alara, did they? Tell me, please.”
His haunted eyes lock with mine, and for some reason, I can’t refuse. Not when he’s hurt, when he’s grunting in pain, not when panic flashes in his eyes.
Slowly, ever so slowly, I shake my head.
He sags in relief, eyes closing.
“Thank Morana,” he breathes, touching the hair on his wrist—my hair that I gave to him.
The sight makes my chest ache, and tears burn the back of my throat.
He stares down at it for a long time, running his fingers over it gently, and then he relaxes into the bars, and his breathing evens out, eyes closing.
I check him over again, noticing how he puts one hand through the bars like he’s reaching out to me and for a moment, I want to take it. I want to feel his touch, his comfort.
I want him to tell me we’ll be okay.
That he can fix this.
But it wouldn’t be real, would it?
Blood trails down to his palm from somewhere, and it’s hard to ignore the way my stomach rolls and my heart aches.
How I soften when the way he took care of me flashes through my mind.
Real or not, he cleaned me and helped care for my wounds. He put cream on them, wrapped them in bandages, stayed with me for days while I had a fever, made sure my wrist was seen to and healed correctly.
I look down at my wrist now, my fingers running over it.
“Eat, Alara.” I startle at Rohan’s voice, glancing his way. “You need your strength to get out of here when you have the chance.”
I blink at him, and my disbelief has me scoffing at his words before I can stop it, which has his eyes flashing open at the sound.
“This is what you wanted,” I tell him quietly, speaking for the first time, my throat scratchy.
“No, it’s not,” he croaks out, eyes filling with pain. “This is never what I wanted.”
A little bit of anger fills me, fire spreading through my stomach.
“You must have all been making fun of me behind my back.”
“It wasn’t like that.” He tries to turn to face me fully, but grimaces.
I look away, trying to not let his pain affect me.
“Did everyone know?”
Silence.
So they all knew?
The knife of betrayal lodges deeper in my back.
Or is it my front and I was just too blind to see it?
I shake my head at myself. “I’m so stupid.”
“You’re not, don’t say that.” He groans as he sits up more. “Listen to me.”
“To your lies?”
“Alara—”
“Was it all just a game to you?”
“Never,” he says vehemently.
“I’m just a pawn to you, aren’t I? A means to an end.”
“You’re not. You are so much more than that.”
“Liar,” I say harshly. I don’t recognize the tone of my own voice. I’ve never spoken to someone like this. But I’m hurt, so, so hurt. And angry.
At him, at myself for falling for it all.
“You need to let me explain.”
“About what? How you made a deal to give me to your father?”
Silence.
“We hadn’t met yet,” he says quietly.
My face scrunches. “And the weeks we spent together? The time I spent in your bed with you inside of me? That wasn’t enough for you to tell me?” Another thought comes to me and I want to be sick. “Did you… did you sleep with me just so I would do as you asked? To keep me close?”
“What we have has nothing to do with the deal.”
“Had, Rohan.” He flinches. “What we had was a lie.”
He shakes his head. “What I feel for you isn’t a lie.”
How I want to believe him, how I want to remember all the nights he held me and forget everything that happened after the feast.
“You took me just to give me away.”
“I was fixing it.”
“I belong to him now, I don’t think your fixing it worked.”
“You will never belong to him, you belong to me!” He roars, bloody hands gripping the bars, eyes wild, panicked.
“No,” I say quietly, turning my back to him. “I don’t belong anywhere, just like always.”
“Little Whisperer, that’s not true.”
“Of course it’s true.”
My sister sent me away, then even my ma–Emerish, had enough of me and sent me to The Pit. And then Rohan, a barbarian, a Dragorie, didn’t even want to keep me.
“You belong with me in the Wilds, with the clan, the dragons.”
“I thought I did, hoped I did, but you have lied to me since the moment we met.”
He’s quiet for a moment, hands dropping to his sides. “I never meant to hurt you, it was the last thing I wanted to do.”
My fingers scratch at my wrist. “Yes you did. That was your plan.”
“The plan changed.”
I shake my head and turn to look at him, my heart breaking.
His eyes are sorrowful, and he shouldn’t look that way after what he did. He got what he wanted out of me, after all.
And yet, out of everything that has happened to me, this has been the worst because he gave me hope.
He began to help heal something inside of me that I didn’t know could exist until he showed me.
I was happy for a time, even with Darcia bullying me, I felt I had purpose, a place…
like I was actually wanted for the first time other than to be used in some way.
“I really did think…”
He swallows roughly, eyes bouncing between mine. “Think what?”
“That you were different, but in the end…” I say, a traitorous tear falls from my eye. “You hurt me too.”
His face crumbles. “I didn’t mean to.”
“Every moment where you could have told me the truth, was a moment you chose to hurt me by not telling me.”
I swipe at my stupid tears.
“Every touch, every hold, every kiss, it was all a lie.” I shake my head. “What did I ever do to deserve this?”
“Nothing,” he mutters, eyes full of guilt. “Absolutely nothing.”
“My very existence is a stain upon the land,” I say, chest heaving. “You should’ve left me in that Pit.” I cry as his hands grip the bars, knuckles whitening. “You should’ve left me alone! Why couldn’t you have left me there?!”
His tormented eyes bore into mine, his forehead meeting the bars.
“I just couldn’t.”
“Selfish.”
“I am,” he says, taking a deep breath. “I did take you for a reason, but I quickly realized that I couldn’t give you up, Alara.” He shakes his head. “I couldn’t give you up.”
My throat tightens, and I lay down and roll over, hoping sleep finally takes me. And I’m bitter about the fact that it does because he’s here, and my traitorous body relaxes around him despite what he has done.
Somewhere in the night I must have shifted unconsciously across the cell, because when I open my scratchy eyes, bars greet me.
I blink, confused, but as my vision clears, I see him, Rohan, right there, lying awkwardly. His arms are through the gaps, one over my waist and holding me close, while his other arm is below my head, allowing me to rest on it.
Tears sting my eyes at the warmth I feel with him surrounding me, despite the cool touch of his chains, the hard ground below me.
I quickly pull away, rolling over, trying to get away from him, but his hands grip me almost instinctively, holding me back.
“Alara?” My name is ripped from him, gruff from sleep, but after a moment, his arms release me. I mourn the loss even though I refuse to seek comfort from him like I used to.
Gods, I knew it was all too good to be true. I don’t get what I want, I know this, and yet I fell for it anyway. And the price was my heart, it hurts in a way it never has before. Broken in a way I never thought possible.
I sniffle, the sound too loud for me to hide it as tears sting the backs of my eyes again.
“You’re crying.” His voice sounds wrecked. “Please, come here.”
I stay quiet.
“You’re crying and I can’t fucking stand it, Alara. I can’t get to you to make it better.”
He bangs on the bars, a growl spilling from his lips.
“Fuck, please, come here, let me hold you.”
“Your hold feels like thorns, Rohan. I will bleed if I go into them again.”
The tension in the air rises, the silence thick and heavy.
“Fuck,” he says softly, almost to himself, sounding hurt. “You can’t mean that.”
I nearly cave at the way his voice sounds at the end, like it was scraped out of his throat, but I won’t fall for it or his lies again.
There are no more words said between us after that as I stare at the damp wall, tears trickling down my face.
Rohan bangs on the bars some more, his breathing harsh, the chains rattling.
No one comes, no food is given, and when hunger pains start to cramp my stomach, I wince, but it’s alright, I’ll learn to be hungry again.
Rohan breaks the silence a long time after.
“I need you to listen to what I have to say next, Little Whisperer.”