The air stills.
Pain twists into anger.
Anger turns to shock.
Shock gives way to numbness. Cold, unyielding numbness. Worse than when the ice was about to kill me before Riven stripped me of my free will.
I knew he was guarded, devious, and calculating.
But I didn’t realize he was this cruel.
No. None of this is true. This isn’t him,I remind myself, but as much as I try to convince myself, it doesn’t make it any less painful.
Then, he does something worse than standing here saying these horrible things to me.
He shakes his head, turns away, and checks on the progress of the sap. As if he’s growing bored with me. As if he’s wasting his precious time by talking about this with me.
But after what he said to me, he’s not the one who just wasted his time.
Iam.
After all, actions are what’s really important here. He’s not going to remember his love for me simply because of my words.
Which he stops me from saying, anyway, because he turns back around to face me—his eyes just as cold—to get in a few final blows.
“Now, if you’ve decided you aren’t ready to accept the truth of what thisreallyis and have some fun together, might I suggest focusing on why we’re here in the first place?” he says, and with that, whatever hope I had inside me snaps.
I don’t care that my words aren’t going to trigger his memories.
I have to say them, anyway.
“When you made that deal, I knew you’d probably forget that you loved me,” I tell him, still praying that none of this is real, even though I know it is. “But I didn’t realize you’dhateme.”
“Hate?” He laughs, a hollow sound that chills me to the bone. “This isn’t hate. If I hated you, then you wouldn’t be able tostand right now, let alone speak. You should be thanking the gods themselves that I don’t hate you. As it is, I’m tired of this conversation, and the sap is almost ready. So, let’s make like a tree, and get out of here. Where did you say the duskberry is?”
“I didn’t,” I tell him, so jarred by his sudden shift in attitude that I can’t gather my thoughts, let alone my feelings.
“Did your star goddess tell you?” he presses.
“She did.”
I can barely bring myself to say more than two words to him at a time. If I do, he’ll probably use it as an opportunity to say more cruel, horrible, heart wrenching things. He’ll use them to crush my soul.
And then, miraculously, his expression softens.
“Look, Sapphire,” he starts, running his fingers through his hair in the way he always does when he’s getting exasperated. “I’m sure this is hard for you. But we made that deal with the dryad because this potion is bigger than you or me. So, take a few seconds. Center yourself. Then we can focus on what’s actually important.”
When he says it like that, reality hits me like a ton of bricks.
He doesn’t love me.
He doesn’t hate me.
He just thinks my feelings… aren’t important.
And, as I watch him now, I know this isn’t the moment I’m going to get through to him. And Iwillget through to him. It’s just going to take longer than a few minutes. I can’t give up aftera few minutes.
Our love deserves better than that. It deserves every minute until the end of my possibly immortal life.
Plus, he’s been a jerk to me many, many times. I got through it then, and I’ll get through it now.
But he’s right that our end goals are important. Saving Zoey, restoring his father’s sanity, and making sure the Night Court,the Blood Coven, and Ambrogio don’t turn into Revenants and destroy the world.
As we work together to make that all happen, he’s going to fall back in love with me. He’s going to see and feel everything that made him fall in love with me the first time around. All of those feelings will flood back to him, and he’ll bethanking mefor not giving up on him. Which Ireallyhope is how this will play out, because when this is done, he’s going to owe me a lot more than one single favor.
I have to believe it’ll happen.
If I don’t, I’m afraid my entire heart will shatter, and that I’ll lose the pieces forever.
