‘From ending up like Lukas!’ he shouts. His words hit me like a physical blow, knocking me back a step.
My throat closes around a sound that doesn’t quite make it out. My brother’s name settles like ash in the air between us. Hearing him say it – it’s suffocating.
‘He was my best friend, and this place took him from me. It took him from you too, and the second I saw you in the Grand Hall, trying to hide inside of your robes, I knew I had to do something –anything– to make sure it didn’t take you as well.’ His fists clench like he’s still holding backmore words, and Stars, I want to scream at him to stop holding back on me, because I can take it.
‘That wasn’t your decision to make! My safety isn’t your concern. I knew what I was walking into when I came here.’ I stab a finger at my own chest as my voice raises an octave. ‘I knew people would hate me because of him. It isn’t up to you to decide whether I should be here or not.’
‘So what? I should have just stood back and done nothing?’
‘Yes! Because that’s better than the alternative.’
‘Which is?’
‘Hurting me and making me hate you.’ Emotion clogs my throat. Because that’s what he did. He made me look at him differently. He tainted the memories I had of him and replaced them with a person I don’t know. I thought he might be a safe place for me to fall once I arrived here; I thought out of everyone he would understand the pain I’ve been through and could help me navigate what to do next.
‘Ria.’ His voice falls to a soft whisper that’s almost buried by the wind. But even if it was, I’d know the shape his lips make when he says my name like that.
‘I’ve spent this whole time hating you,’ I tell him honestly. ‘For every cruel word. Every time you’ve looked at me like I don’t matter, like I’m worth nothing. That’s how you made me feel, Sebastian. Like nothing. That’s why I don’t want you close, that’s why I’ve pushed you away each time you’ve pried down my walls, because I can’t stop replaying the look you gave me when I was rejected from the gates. It was just like him—’ My voice dies off.
Him. My father. He looked at me just how my father does each time I failed to bring my magic forth. Like I was an embarrassment to the family. Unworthy.
Sebastian’s face falls. I don’t have to elaborate. He knows who I’m speaking of, he’s seen it firsthand. A few kisses and an orgasm after a near death doesn’t wipe that kind of betrayal away.
Though in the moment it felt like it could. It felt like his lips and tongue could kiss and lick all my wounds, insideandout, and I’d be cleansed. Made brand new and moulded in whatever form he desired. And that scares me, which is why I need space to gather my thoughts, to decide how I feel about this revelation. Because at the moment I don’t know if learning it was all a fabrication – the way he spoke to me, the taunts and jabs that were just a ploy to get me to leave – is better than if it were all true and he did, in fact, hate me.
I also don’t know where this leaves him and Lukas. And while I know I should be questioning him about it to learn more, I know to my very core that I can’t handle whatever his answer might be right now. I’m not equipped to hear it, not yet anyway. There’s still a lingering wave of guilt on standby, ready and waiting to swallow me whole for my own treacherous thoughts from earlier. Where I started to blame Lukas, started to harbour anger for him when I know deep down it’s not his fault. None of this is his fault. I just needed something – or someone – to blame for my own misfortune. To make me feel less shitty about myself for a moment.
‘I need to get back,’ I say and walk away, putting distance between us.
FORTY-ONE
Sebastian follows silently behind me. I can feel the tension radiating off him in waves. He’s angry. I’m angry. He’s hurt. I’m hurt. Fucking hell, we’re a disaster.
I can feel his eyes on the back of my head for the entire walk back to the Grand Hall. His footfalls are almost silent, as if he’s been trained how to walk within a forest without making a noise. My feet crunch on leaves and bark, kicking rocks out of the way, and I even slip once or twice, when I’m not focusing on my path because I’m preoccupied by my thoughts. I feel like a uncoordinated monster lurching through the trees, wreaking havoc, while he’s my shadow: silent, quiet, but in the right lighting, he’s everywhere, stretching larger than I am.
Safe. My mind tries to tell me.Watchful, it says.Protective.
By the time the domed ceiling of the Grand Hall and the four towers that spear through the sky like swords come into view, I pick up my pace, attempting to put more distance between us.
I need to get up to my room and attend to my scratches. They’re stinging, but it’s only surface level. I have enough healing balms in the box beneath my sink to deal with it, so the infirmary isn’t necessary. Plus, I’m sick of being in that place. I feel like I’m in there every week.
I’m walking across the grassy clearing between the Training Centre and the Grand Hall when I feel him at my back.
‘I can walk the rest of the way on my own,’ I say over my shoulder.
But he doesn’t reply. He just keeps walking slightly behind me, and when I check after a minute to see how close he is, the intense look in his eyes has my head whipping back around. I get a sudden flashback of his face between my legs, where I looked down and saw that same intensity in his gaze as now.
Stars, is that what he’s thinking about right now? I’ve been trying to block it from my mind but it all comes rushing at me with full force. His lips, his tongue, the throaty groans that spilled out of him … his fingers.
No! God, Aria, get a handle on yourself.
I reach the Grand Hall and I’m about to turn for Malachite’s gate when I spot Tilly walking out of Opal. Her hazel eyes lock onto mine as if she could sense me coming. She takes all but three seconds to scan me from head to toe, eyes homing in on my torn shirt, before she’s marching over. Her short legs move rapidly, her arms waving back and forth and suddenly she’s pushing past me to shove at Sebastian’s chest. He barely moves, but his brows rise so far they may as well be part of his hairline.
‘What did you do to herthistime?’ she hisses at him as if she were a six-foot -five mammoth of a man, and not a five-foot curly haired healer.
Sebastian’s hands raise beside his head in surrender. And I swear I see the corner of his lips kick up. ‘I didn’t do a thing she didn’t ask me for.’
My head whips in his direction. The glare I send him is deadly, and he returns my cold expression with one of his own.
