I hesitate.
“Like I’m something that needs fixing.”
His expression twists. “I never—”
“You do,” I cut in. Not harsh. Just honest. “I eventually decided I’d rather you look at me like that than me tell you the truth, then you…change.”
“You’ve literally tried changing me my entire life.”
“No. I…” I pause and take a deep breath. I attempt to take my Binder’s sage advice and put myself in his shoes. “I know it comes off that way, but I’m not trying to change you. Anytime you would do something that could be dangerous or bring you danger, I just tried to redirect you.”
“I’m not a pet you can train.”
“Why not?” Creed asks him. “You trained my power like a pet.”
“I did not.” Riven shoots back. “I didn’t even know what I was doing at first.”
“Then why not tell me once you realized it?”
“Would you or would you not have shut it down like everything else you don’t like? Did you really want to hear that it was your power leaving marks across my back when there wasn’t shit you could do about it?”
“That’s not—” Creed cuts himself off, jaw tightening. “That’s not fair.”
“No,” Riven mutters, “none of this is.”
Silence presses back in, but it’s different now. It’s tense but not hostile. It’s almost…vulnerable.
Kyzen finally moves.
Not toward any of us. Just forward enough to plant the sword fully into the floor, like he’s done holding it up on his own.
“I didn’t know how to do this differently,” he says. No one looks at him right away. “I kept all of this to myself every time one of you asked me to or every time I’ve figured something out myself because every option ended with one of you getting hurt. So I chose to carry it instead.”
My throat burns when I swallow my blood-tinged saliva.
“We’ve never given you much of another choice. You’ve always been our constant,” I say, peering over at him. He glances at his feet as soon as our eyes meet.
He’s trying to wrangle in the darkness lurking in his mind.
For a second, no one has anything to say.
Then Creed exhales, long and slow, dragging a hand down his face.
“We’re all idiots.”
A breath of a laugh escapes Kyzen before he can stop it.
“Yeah. That tracks,” Riven mutters and shakes his head.
It’s a small comment, but it breaks something open.
I believe survival mode has left all of us in a position to want to protect each other but carry the burden of that on our own.
Ridiculous.
We were created together. We’ll always be stronger together.
I shift a step closer to Kyzen. Not much, but enough that it doesn’t continue to appear like it’s us against him.
