Alaric…
I wanted him, there was no doubt in my mind about it.
We don’t belong together.Then why did it feel like I’d lose so much of me once he walked out the door?
I went into my bedroom and changed into clean clothes, then returned to the settee and clumsily began braiding my hair. It was getting caught on the bandage on my shoulder, and that annoyed me.
“Here, let me do it.” Alaric didn’t even hesitate to braid,and it was such a sweet thing, such atenderthing to do, I melted inside.
“You’re hiding something,” he said, and I didn’t flinch. Instead, I traced the burns on my arms.
“Everyone hides something.”
He waited, just as he always did, and it caused more forbidden feelings in my heart.
“It happened five years ago when they came to my home,” I said. “They were starving, lost, unwanted. So I fed and took care of them as my own.” My vision grew blurry again.
“They tried to kill you?”
“They did kill me.” My fingers tightened as I now looked at the flames in the fireplace. I don’t know how Alaric started it so quickly. “At least, the person I was before.”
Alaric studied me for a long time. Then he placed his arm behind me and gently scooted me closer to him, so my head rested on his chest. I could stay like this forever.
“You’re not a monster, Malia.”
“To others I am. I amthatwitch, Alaric. The one they say who eats children…”
“It’s the reason Sereth started the witch hunt…” Alaric eyed me. “And that’s why you’ve been hiding here in Corallure?”
“Prince Elias knows the truth about me,” I confirmed, and the whaler visibly tensed at the mention of Elias.
“It’s not like that,” I said, then drew closer to Alaric, shivering even though he and the fire were warm. I clutched his shirt and he rubbed my arm. My eyes fluttered as the poison’s effects were so intense, I wondered if I might pass out.
“Stay with me, Malia.”
Stay withme,Alaric…I begged to say it, but I couldn’t ask that of him.
“They say you put the boy in a cage and felt his finger to see if he was fattening up,” Alaric said, the distaste in his tone obvious. “And when you reached into the cage, he put out a bone for you to feel. What actually happened?”
For some reason, my heart was racing. Nobody hadeverasked me what happened. Ever! Would he believe me?
“I put a makeshift gate so they couldn’t get out of their room until I was awake. Niko would get very upset about little things. I think it was because of their parents abandoning them. He didn’t trust me. He didn’t trust anyone, and I didn’t blame him. But he kept running away into the woods and, at the time, there were a lot of ruffians in the woods. I didn’t want him to get kidnapped. Lilo helped me around the house while I sometimes put Niko behind the gate because he was getting too out of hand.” I sighed. “I felt so bad, but I was terrified he’d end up in the hands of the ruffians.”
“Sereth took care of those ruffians as best as she could,” Alaric said. “But I took care of them for good. Took them all and changed them into whalers.”
I closed my eyes, knowing this was true. Alaric had single-handedly cleaned up the kingdom more so than Sereth. In fact, he seemed to have cleaned up both kingdoms in the land.
It was why he was so well known. He took orphans and all the unwanted. He took the homeless and the outcasts and made them into something. People adored him, admired him, even honored him. His whaling empire had truly become even more powerful than Sereth the queen and her rule.
“I couldn’t see them–” I hesitated. “I can’t see anything,really. So I’d ask them if they were eating enough. They were both so skinny–they still are.” My heart saddened for them. They were obviously still serving Sereth as witch hunters, which is what they became after they fled from me and ran to her. But did she feed them? Care for them? They looked exhausted.
“They handed me twigs just because they wanted more food. I would’ve given them all the food in the world.... I was so sad for them.”
“Why did they try to kill you?”
I hesitated, now knowing he wasn’t aware of the apple, the poison, andher…I swallowed hard.
“They thought I was a bad witch, so…” I swallowed hard. “They threw me in the furnace. I managed to open the door and get out. I was burned. My house burned to the ground, but… I survived. Their father tracked me down. He was ashamed for abandoning them in the woods. He thanked me for taking care of them, and then I escaped. I hid until Prince Elias left Sereth and that’s when I spoke to him. He granted me full citizenship in this kingdom.”
