The Things we leave behind
The air in the room felt heavier than usual — thick with the residue of magic, fear, and something even worse: silence. Rheon’s awakening had been like a thunderclap, ripping through the fragile calm we’d been pretending to live inside.
Seori was gone. And now we were going after her.
I shoved another dagger into the sheath at my thigh, my hands moving faster than my thoughts. I couldn’t let myselfthinktoo hard. Because every time I did, I saw his face.
Taeyang.
That stupid, brooding demon with rage in his eyes and silence in his soul.
He hadn’t even said goodbye.
Not really.
Just that one sharp word.No.
“No.” As if it was a weapon. As if I were a danger he couldn’t afford to care about.
No, I couldn’t go.
No, he wouldn’t explain.
No, I wasn’t meant for anyone.
Not even you?I wanted to scream. But I didn’t. I just stood there, blinking too fast and pretending it didn’t matter.
I tightened the straps on my boots, letting the ache in my chest pulse behind my ribs like a wound I refused to press on. Maybe it was better this way. Maybe it had all been in my head. The way he’d looked at me like I was more than a nuisance. The way his hand had brushed against mine for a second too long.
I’d imagined it. Right?
Because no one likehimever wanted someone like me.
“I’m not meant for anyone,” he’d said.
Fine,I thought, stuffing a healing salve into my satchel.Then I’m not waiting around to be chosen.
The floor creaked behind me. Minji stepped in, pale and silent. She didn’t ask how I was doing. That was the thing about best friends — they knew when not to ask. She simply nodded and reached for her gear.
“Do you think they’ll be okay?” I asked, voice thinner than I intended.
She paused.
“They have to be.”
And I guess that was enough. We didn’t have time for fragile hope. We only had the bond between us, and a promise: to bring Seori back — no matter what we had to walk through to do it.
As we moved toward the gate with Rheon’s shadow magic gathering like a storm around him, I let myself look back — just once — to the last place I’d seen him.
No sign of him now.
Good,I told myself.He doesn’t get to matter anymore.
But I still felt it.
The mark on my chest — quiet, aching.
And I hated myself for wishing he felt it too.
