Ayaz leaned back on his pillows and raised his arm, his breath ragged as the pain of it tugged at his ruined muscles. I was too shocked, too frozen to force him to stay still. I watched, mesmerized, as he reached toward my face, his rage twisting his features into an ugly mask. A well of emotions flooded up inside me. All I wanted was for him to wrap those strong arms around me and pull me into a hug. All I wanted was his lips on mine, his fingers tangled in my hair, his heat enveloping me.
All he wanted to do was kill me. And I didn’t blame him.
At the last moment, Ayaz snapped his fingers back, his mouth twisting – not in rage this time, but confusion.
He reached up to his own face and tugged off the mask. “Who are you?” he demanded.
My whole body trembled. “You know who I am.”
“I don’t! They told me that you were a dangerous bully who had to be stopped, that you were trying to destroy this school. That you were something evil and wrong and… and last night I saw it with my own eyes. But I get thisfeelingwhen I’m around you—” he scrunched up his face and jerked his head like he was trying to shake me off. The movement made him cry out in pain. “I’m going fuckingnuts.”
Seeing him suffering like that, not trusting his own mind while he fought against the injuries I inflicted, made me long to pull him against me. I stepped toward him, but he glared at me with those dark, untrusting eyes.
Ms. West did something to him. I know it.
“They lied to you – about me, about us, about Zehra, about everything. I don’t know why you believe them over your own best friends.” I nodded to Trey and Quinn in the corner of the room. “Maybe if I stayed away from you in the first place, none of this would’ve happened. But it’s okay. I have to believe it’s okay that you forgot me, forgot everything. You don’t even remember that night in my room.”
The stumped look on his face revealed the truth. Rage bubbled up inside me.They’ve already taken everything from Ayaz. How dare they take that, too?
Heat rocketed down my arms.How dare they rip away the tiny shreds of happiness we eke out of this hellhole?
“It’s probably a blessing that you don’t. It might be keeping you alive. You think Ms. West gives you the truth, but she’s the biggest liar of them all. You think Vincent Bloomberg is like a father to you, but you’re wrong,” I spat, fighting to control the fire beating against my palms. The fire had already burned too much already. “Everything you heard tonight is true – Vincent is the architect of Derleth. He chose to sacrifice you all. Do you know what he’s doing with all that info you gave him about the god’s prison? He and the Eldritch Club were planning to kill you all so they can free the god.”
“How do you know about that?” Ayaz demanded, his shoulders tensing as he struggled against his internal demons. “How can you—”
Ayaz tried to roll toward me. He winced as he put weight on his arm, his body convulsing with pain.
“Don’t move.” The fight fled me at the sight of his pain. I placed my hand on his chest, shoving him back down. Where our skin connected, a wave of heat sailed along my veins, touching every part of me with sizzling warmth. It took everything I had not to wrap my arms around Ayaz and press myself against him.
I closed my eyes, tried to draw my hand away. Warm fingers clamped around it, holding it in place. My eyes flew open.
Ayaz.My beautiful dark King. My artist with the brilliant mind trapped in a world where his talents held no value. My man of myth and opium from across the sea. In the corners of his eyes, the faintest flicker of his former self danced.
“That was a hell of a fireworks display you put on last night,” he said. “When I first came to America, Trey took me to a Fourth of July display in New York City. We sat on a million-dollar yacht and watched the sky burn. You made that look like kiddie shit.”
“It had to be done.” I tried to make myself sound confident – more confident than I felt. Ayaz must have been able to see my heart pounding against my chest, my whole body poised. After he let me walk away with Parris’ book I thought there was a chance he might remember me. But just yesterday he handed the Eldritch Club everything they needed to fuck over the world, so now I couldn’t be sure. “You all had to know the truth.”
“You used Tillie’s own sister against her.” His words dripped with hate. I had a feeling he wasn’t talking about Bianca, but about Zehra.
Zehra, who’s still locked in the gym, with only Greg and an army of rats for company.
It was on the tip of my tongue to blurt out where she was, but Ayaz probably knew. After all, I was pretty sure he betrayed me to save her. I couldn’t hate him for it – just the opposite. I missed him more than ever.
“I didn’t want to, but it was the only way. It’s more important for me to show you the truth than for you to… to remember me.”
“You’ve explained to me, at least twice, what I am to you,” he said, his voice hoarse.
“Don’t speak.” I shook my head. “Not if it hurts. Focus on getting better. Youwillget better.”
“My body will heal from this, as it has from all wounds. My heart, on the other hand… what I’m trying to say is that I still don’t remember you. All the evidence I’ve seen is that you’re here to destroy us. You broke into my room. You burned me. You know things about my sister that you’re not telling me. You have the students enraged and the teachers afraid and you’re bitter enemies with the man who’s treated me as his own son.”
I dared a smile. “You’re not allowed to write my obituary.”
“Ever since the day I saw you, I’ve been drawn to you. It’s like…” he looked puzzled for a moment. “My body remembers you, even though my mind draws a blank. You’re imprinted up here.” He tapped the side of his head, then winced. Apparently, he’d momentarily forgotten he’d been burned over most of his body. Lifting his arm over his head was a no-no.
My mind cast back to the first time Ayaz and I spoke after he’d forgotten me. I snuck into his room to steal Parris’ skin book and discovered Ayaz’s sketchbooks filled with drawings of me.
He must’ve been thinking of them, too. “Last time I came to in the infirmary, near the end of second quarter, Ms. West handed me a fresh sketchbook. She said that I’d been horsing around with Trey and Quinn and had a bump on the head, that my memories may feel fuzzy and disjointed, but drawing was something I loved and it may help me to transcend my confusion.”
