Chapter 28 #2
Clearing his throat, Dominic stepped into the room and kicked the door closed behind him.
Adara gently closed the book, stood up, and placed it in her rucksack inside the chest. Her eyes finally met his, and he hated how his breath caught again at the sight of those eyes, gazing at him with something other than contempt.
He wished she’d go back to fixing her harsh glare on him.
It would make it easier to keep the heat from rising to his face, because all he could look at was her eyes, stark against the light blue satin of her gown.
Irises like a sapphire gemstone glittering under the sun.
An ocean he would dive right into and gladly drown in.
A symbol of her raging fires that burned so bright, drawing him in, completely disregarding the thought of being burned.
“You look . . . ” he started, stumbling over every word in his vocabulary to find a compliment that wouldn’t even begin to describe her beauty.
Adara peered up at him with raised brows.
“Stunning,” he said, unwilling to make himself resemble some lovesick fool. Then again, maybe Adara would enjoy him pining after her, enjoy it enough to fall for him.
She blushed and replied softly, “Thanks.”
The mattress dipped beneath his weight as he sat on the bed next to her and placed the tray of breakfast between them. It wasn’t much—some eggs, bacon, and fruit he’d swiped from the tavern downstairs before the morning rush could beat him to it.
“So,” Dominic started, taking a bite of the eggs. “Is there anything special they do on the last night of the festival?” He wasn’t used to it all. The decorations, the people, the gifts. Everything about holidays was foreign to him. Especially holidays surrounding the celebration of a god.
His family had been too poor to decorate or purchase gifts for one another.
His father had always said these festivals were a waste of time and money.
They were days that distracted you from reality and filled your head with nonsense.
It was better to keep your feet on the ground and your head out of the clouds.
As a kid, Dominic didn’t understand. He believed that those days were the ones that kept people going.
The days that brought light after the storms.
But as he grew up, he acknowledged that his father had been right. They were a distraction from reality. Sure, they brought joy and fun, but all that would be ripped away the next day when everything returned to normal. It was better to skip through it like nothing ever happened.
Dominic’s family had also never worshipped the gods.
But the way Adara’s eyes lit up when mentioning the Goddess of Life intrigued him.
Whatever she felt for Elysian and this festival in her honor ran deep.
He’d be a fool not to see the longing in her eyes.
The longing for a home she couldn’t return to.
Swallowing her food before answering, Adara responded, “Usually, today is when everyone exchanges gifts and has a feast with their family. And at night, most people go out for a night in the town, hopping from tavern to tavern, drinking and dancing with friends, doing whatever makes them feel alive. But during the day, some people do things they’ve feared most of their lives.
They go on epic adventures, seeking out thrills.
Ones that are risky so they’ll appreciate life.
It’s whatever people want to make of it.
It is, after all, the festival of life. People celebrate life in many different ways. ”
He wondered what Adara would usually be doing during the festival. They’d already had too many near-death experiences to count. Would she want to find another thrilling adventure? Or would she usually be the one having a nice feast with her family before going out and celebrating with her friends?
“And what do you celebrate it for?” Dominic asked, looking up from his plate of food.
She glanced down, chewed on her bottom lip in thought as her fingers danced over her blue and silver ring. Perhaps it was a family heirloom. “It’s hard to say when I’ve been surrounded by so much death my entire life,” she admitted.
He didn’t miss the way her hand absentmindedly trailed up to the thin chain around her neck that held the key tucked safely against her heart. Whoever it was, she had loved them dearly. But whoever it was wasn’t her soulmate. Did that make it easier or harder for her to get over it?
“I guess I celebrate that I’m still alive.
” She shrugged, her eyes still downcast as she used her fork to push her food around her plate.
“Still fighting for all those whose lives have been lost because of me. Still living so they didn’t die for nothing.
” She let out a heavy sigh, brows knitting together.
“It’s difficult to celebrate Livisian now when I’m only celebrating my life.
I celebrated it for the lives of the ones I love.
Celebrate it now because even though their lives ended long before they should have, at least they had one to begin with.
At least, I got to spend a part of mine with them. ”
A single tear slid down her face, steam rising from her skin.
Adara noticed and took a deep, steadying breath, letting it out slowly.
Her emotions couldn’t have gotten too high because when Dominic lifted his hand to brush away her tear with his thumb, her skin was warm and soft, not scorching like the raging fire that flowed through her when she felt something extreme.
He wouldn’t mind melting into her touch.
“Don’t cry, love.” His voice came out as a gentle murmur, a sound he wasn’t sure he’d ever heard from himself before.
“I don’t want to see you in pain.” A lie.
He’d love to see her suffer at his hands.
He needed that key—needed to see the pain and heartbreak in her eyes when she realized all he’d ever done and ever would do was an act.
But something inside his chest ached at the sight of her torment.
It was a strange, deep pain that he couldn’t place.
“They wouldn’t want to see you cry,” he offered gently.
“I don’t want to see you cry.” Because crying shows weakness, and I do not want to be stuck with a coward when we travel to the Ruins.
There went that pang inside him again. “They’d be happy to know you are alive and well, still carrying the memory of them with you every step of the way. ”
Although Dominic was merely putting on an act, he hoped his words were true.
He couldn’t live knowing Valen watched over him from some afterlife and was possibly praying for his downfall, hoping Damon would avenge him.
Dominic hoped his friend knew how terribly sorry he was for playing a part in his death.
He hoped Valen knew that not a day went by that Dominic didn’t think about him. Or Saige.
Adara nodded, that hard exterior coming back into place, walls building higher and higher, a fortress he could only infiltrate if she let him. He wondered if it was all an act on her part, too. Dominic let his hand fall away from her face.
Folding her hands in her lap, Adara regained her composure. “What will you celebrate life for?”
He stiffened, his posture going rigid. What would he celebrate? No one had ever asked him such things.
Dominic’s life had never been worth celebrating.
Born into a barren land of poverty and disease, his mother died of illness, and his father was an abusive drunkard who had dealt the death blow to his sister.
He’d sailed to Andreilia and barely survived with his friends only to have one die at his hands and the other despise him for the rest of his miserable, practically immortal life.
He’d manipulated countless others into loving him so he could steal the magic and life from their key.
He’d left Andreilia and had something so terribly painful happen to him that he’d ripped out his heart, tossed it into the Plagued Sea, and made a potion to wipe his memories rather than live with whatever it was that caused him so much suffering.
How could she believe in the gods that had taken so much from her as well? How could anyone be grateful for this life when so much went wrong?
Dominic shook his head slowly, hating the pain in his chest, loathing the way his eyes moistened. “My life is not worth celebrating.”