“No.” Her gaze slices into me, ablaze with fury. “Don’t youdarecompare yourself to him.”
She’s so fucking beautiful when she burns.
She breathes, ragged and trembling. “I never thought—I never expected to feel so—”
Disgusted.
Repulsed.
“Enraged,” she hisses, eyes fixed on our joined hands. “Your father… thosewomen… Ezekial...” Tendrils of her darkness curl around us, binding our hands.
She’s fire incarnate, and I’ll kneel in the ash.
“It was a long time ago—”
“It doesn’t matter!” she snaps, before softening her gaze again. “It still happened. It shouldn’t have, but it did.”
We sit in more silence, but she doesn’t remove her hands, her heat now a pulsing warmth. I can’t help it if my fingers uncoil from their tight grasp. If just one brushes her palm in the briefest touch.
“The Dark War,” she begins, her voice a quiet query, “that was...”
“My father, yes.”
“And you ended it. You and Ezekial ended the war.”
I lower my voice. “Not all creatures of the dark deserved my wrath that day. I slaughtered everyone in that realm. Everyone. Innocents… children—”
“You were a child.” She slices through my words with another hiss and a scowl, firing that gaze directly at me. “A child who was manipulated and assaulted. You were hurting. You weren’t in control. You may have killed innocent beings, but by doing so, you also ended a war. A war that’d already killed millions of innocent creatures. You stopped even more genocides by killing him and his army.”
“Not all.” I brush her palm again. I’ve never felt anything so soft. “Some fled. But I’m still hunting them. I’ll find them.”
“Why?” Her voice is almost a whine, so small, but filled with disbelief.
When she shakes her head, another tear escapes, strands of red curls sway with the motion. I wonder how soft they would be—
“Why are you still punishing yourself?” It’s not anger in her voice, it’s something softer. And it stings. “Why waste any more of your life chasing shadows?”
She sounds so much like Ezekial that I almost smile. Almost. But the ache in her voice, her tears, they sink straight into my chest
“My darkness has a sense of justice. It doesn’t let me forget. It seeks vengeance. Retribution.” I lower my voice. “Redemption.”
This is all about redemption, and my immortal life is my punishment.
Making me someone’s bond was another.
Because seeing her, being near her, touching her, and knowing I can never allow myself such a thing—that I will never be worthy of it. Of her.
That is the cruellest punishment of all.
I will never sully her with my darkness. Not like my father did.
“What do the others think?” she asks, voice tighter now. “Ezekial, Julien, Sai? Do they think you still need to atone too?”
I don’t answer, but silence speaks louder than confession. A silence that’s interrupted by a soft, insistent vibration. One I try desperately to smother in my pocket.
She nods her head towards the sound. “Is that them?”
“Most likely,” I mutter, debating whether to crush the infernal thing.
