As soon as I do it, a memory smacks me in the face: Sephran doing the same thing to him this morning.Time to wake up, Archer.
That throws an icy dart right in the center of all my warmth.
“Jax,” I whisper, and he clenches his fingers into the muscle of my thigh in a way that nearly makes me forget everything I wanted to say. Especially when his tongue finds the skin of my neck.
“Why— why—” I inhale deeply and force my thoughts to organize. “Why does Sephran hate me?”
He goes still so abruptly that it feels profound. His hands are heavy against me, but it’s like he’s frozen. I draw back to look at him, and he straightens, pulling his hands back into his lap. My eyebrows knit together.
Jax frowns, then looks down. When he speaks, his voice is small. “Sephran doesn’thateyou.”
“Jax.”
“Hedoesn’t.” Then he grimaces. Exhales. “Well . . .”
“But . . . why? I know he’s upset about Malin’s rank, but that’s not my doing.”
“No.” Jax is quiet for a moment. “Though . . . maybe that’s some of it.” He hesitates. “Sephran has been a good friend. I was so . . .” His voice goes soft. “Alone.I was so alone. I don’t know if this makes sense, but he . . . he saw it. He saw my sadness.”
That tugs at me and makes me think of Malin, who sawmysadness. “It makes sense,” I say. “But . . . why does he hate me?”
Jax’s eyes glitter in the darkness, and his mouth twists. I watch him battle with what to say.
And in his silence, I think of the hair tug this morning. That quiet tone when Sephran speaks to him. The way he carefully translated after I was so sharp, or the way he saidsamewhen Jax ordered tea.
The way Jax went so still when I mentioned his name.
“Ah,” I say softly, drawing back farther. Something inside me curls into a painful knot. “He’s notjusta friend.”
“No,” Jax says sharply. “Tycho. Stop. Heisa friend.”
Maybe I’m a complete idiot, but this is a conversation I didn’t see coming— and now that it’s here, I’m reevaluating every moment, every glance, everyword. “He touched your hair. He ordered the tea.”
“We had . . . we had a misunderstanding.” Jax draws a frustrated breath. “He wanted more, but I didn’t.”
I’ve instinctively pulled away, but Jax grabs my arm, and his grip is tight, his fingers digging in. “Tycho.” His eyes are dark with censure, holding mine. “Sephran was a friend when I hadno one. He was here when you werenot.”
That hits me like another blow.
In his voice, I hear the depth of his pain. I see a shadow of how difficult those months must have been.
The worst part is that I understand it. I remember my first months in Syhl Shallow, when no one trusted me. I didn’t speak the language, and I had no friends. I was miserable and lonely and scared, and I spent every moment I could hiding in the infirmary with Noah.
He was here when you werenot.
And now Sephran resents me for it.
It doesn’t take the sting out of it, but it shifts. Changes. A dull ache instead of a stab.
Until I fixate on the rest of what Jax said. I tilt my head and peer at him in the shadows. “What do you mean, you had amisunderstanding?”
He’s pulled his legs up to sit cross- legged on the step, and now he’s fidgeting with his bootlaces, his expression fully in shadow.
My heart feels like it’s plummeting through my chest, but there’s nothing to catch it. I cannot believe the sheer spectrum of emotions I’ve gone through in the last fifteen minutes. I let a breath out through my teeth and stare back at the darkened road again. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know what Iwantto say.
Honestly, I don’t know if I have a right to say anything at all.
Because I did leave. It wasn’t my fault, but it wasn’t his either.
