I felt the lines of my face harden as I stared after them into the shadowed entryway. Four days. My fingers dug into the plush fabric along the arms of my chair, leaving deep scratches in their wake. It only took four days for all of them to realize how useless I am. A swarm of familiar faces floated out from the darkness in my mind and watched me in silent judgment. Whether it was Halvaar’s chiseled grimace, Val’s emotionless mask, or Lia’s encouraging smile, their eyes all stared through me with the same careful, piteous look, as if a single misplaced word or sidelong glance would shatter my broken body like a stone through glass. Is this what the rest of my life is, now?
My thoughts turned to the offer Halvaar had given me before he left, but the possibility that had once given me a spark of hope was now an even deeper pool of bitterness. No. The rest of my life is pretending that I’m okay. Learning to walk again like a fucking child. Maybe, if I’m lucky, I’ll run, too. What a blessing. I should thank the Primes whenev—
My self-loathing was interrupted by a sudden spike of pain that raced up from my missing leg and wrapped around the base of my spine. I writhed in place in a vain effort to escape the sourceless torture, but the movement only brought a second bout of suffering worse than the first. The firelit chambers around me flashed away, replaced by the emerald-tinged weave of voidglass bridges suspended somewhere deep beneath Doram. A perfect mimicry of my manasteel sword pinned me in place as my Mimic sneered down at me and rocked the blade back and forth.
“This is the price of borrowed power,” the Mimic said in a horrible, gurgling whisper. A flash of emerald light burst out from his core, instantly transforming him into a towering monstrosity of rippling flesh and billowing flame.
“NO!” I threw myself backwards as hard as I could to escape the writhing beast. My stomach flipped as the world disappeared, leaving me to tumble end over end through an all-consuming darkness. An impact against the back of my head snapped me back to the real world, and I found myself lying upside-down on the stone floor of our chamber, my plush chair overturned beside me. I groaned as a dull ache in my head joined the lingering spasms in my missing leg.
The soft scuffle of hurried footsteps approached me from somewhere on the opposite side of the room. “Lux, are you alright?” Tyr’s face appeared upside-down above me, her face shadowed by her dangling black-and-silver hair and spiraled onyx horns.
“Oh, I’m great,” I spat. An automatic flare of mana activated the Pain Reduction rune etched inside my ring and began to soothe my aching leg, but I was dismayed by the impressive amount of sustained energy it took to fully nullify the pain. “Just thought it would be fun to lie on the floor for a bit.” I rolled over and tried to push myself up onto all fours, wobbling awkwardly when my missing leg failed to provide the needed leverage to maintain the position.
A small set of hands looped under my armpits. “Let me help you,” Tyr offered, tugging me into an upright position.
“I’m fine,” I said as I attempted to wiggle out of her grip. “I’m probably too heavy to—” My thought was interrupted as Tyr hauled me upright almost entirely on her own. I let my arm fall naturally around her shoulders as I struggled to keep my balance during my rapid ascent. “O—oh. Uhm, thanks,” I mumbled, turning my face away when I finally relented and accepted her support.
“Siv is a deceptively heavy child,” she laughed. “I think she’s grown past the age where I should be carrying her around, but I can never say no when she asks. I suppose it’s been a good way for me to stay in shape.” Her gaze turned to the far wall and stared straight through the stone at her tiny family. “With Marin around, that’s not much of an issue anymore, though—she’s more than happy to carry Siv around.” She smiled at the thought in silence for a while, then shook herself out of her daze and tightened her grip around my torso. “I’m sorry, Lux—you probably want to go sit down, don’t you?”
The warmth of her hand-sewn woolen clothing against my bare skin made me realize how cold the air was and sent a shiver down my spine. “Actually, I should go get dressed. If we’re going to keep getting visitors, I should at least be wearing clothes when they show up.”
“Of course,” she answered, inclining her head towards our destination before we began our tandem trip across the room. I was acutely aware of the weight I put on her shoulders each time I took a hopping step forward, but she showed no sign of any strain on our way to the bedroom. Once we were inside, she helped me to the edge of my bed, then began to rummage through the chest of drawers on the opposite wall. “What would you like to wear?”
I held my head in my hands and let out a long sigh. “I appreciate the effort, Tyr, but I think I can handle dressing myself.”
“Oh, it’s no trouble,” she replied with upbeat enthusiasm. “How about these?”
My nostrils flared as I turned my face up to glare at her, but my temper died the instant I saw her gentle smile above her offering of a blue and black flannel shirt and gray pants. “Yeah, that’s fine,” I answered, biting down on my tongue as punishment for the half-dozen cutting remarks I had intended to hurl in her direction. “Thanks.”
“Perfect!” She laid the clothes out beside me on the bed and extended a hand in my direction. “If you stand up here with me, I can—”
“No,” I cut her off, snatching my pants with an exasperated huff. “I can do it myself.”
The full weight of Tyr’s sad, sightless eyes bore down on me as I shimmied around on the edge of the bed, drawing my pants up around my remaining leg with aggravating slowness. A relieved sigh whistled out from my pursed lips when I finally managed to fasten the button at my waist, but my satisfaction was short-lived; I only managed to slip one arm through the well-worn sleeve of Marten’s hand-me-down shirt before my audience’s presence got the better of me. “If there’s something you want to say, just say it,” I grumbled, folding my unevenly clad arms across my chest.
Her eyebrows shot up at my sudden demand. “Oh, I, uhm…may I sit down?”
I fought back against the sudden tension in my shoulders and motioned to the spot next to me. Despite her careful movements and gentle demeanor, a seed of annoyance took root in my chest and began to spread throughout my body; I could already see the pitying hesitance in her eyes as she stared down at her clasped hands, and a half-dozen cloying sentiments echoed in my ears before she started to speak. By the time I actually heard her voice, an automatic retort already sat prepared on the tip of my tongue.
“Lux, I’m sorry that I failed to get to know you better during your time here.”
“I don’t nee—wait, what?” The unexpected apology caught me entirely off-guard.”
A rare frown darkened the well-worn laugh lines at the sides of her mouth. “I know this may sound disconcerting, but I’ve been watching you ever since we met. It’s not that I made a concerted effort to do so—quite the opposite, actually. In spite of my best efforts, I’ve never been able to…close my eyes, as it were.”
My latent mana immediately reminded me of a sensation I had long since learned to ignore: Tyr’s silver energy covered the whole of my body, nearly invisible against the light of my own overwhelmingly radiant reserves. “Right,” I breathed. “I meant to talk to you about that. Sorry.”
“Please, don’t apologize,” she said quickly, placing a delicate hand on my shoulder. “That’s what I’m trying to do.”
I managed to crack a small smile. “It’s not like it was your responsibility to talk to me, Tyr. I should’ve made an effort to get to know you better, too.”
Concern creased her brow as she chewed on her lip. “That’s not exactly what I meant.” She slid closer to my side and tightened her fingers around my bare shoulder. “I can see how much you’re struggling, Lux. Ever since the day we met in Jor, I’ve watched the turmoil growing inside of you. I wanted to speak with you about it sooner, but…I didn’t know how to bring it up. I always convinced myself the timing wasn’t right.”
My chest constricted as she began to tug on the mental threads I had done my best to bury. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I murmured. “I’m fine.”
“I know that isn’t true,” she persisted. “You’ve carried such a heavy burden for the entire time I’ve known you, but you don’t need to carry it alone. Even if it’s simply talking about what’s troubling you, I’ll be here to listen.”
“I said I’m fine,” I snapped, my breath coming harder and more ragged by the second. “I don’t need your help.”
“Okay,” she replied with a gentle sigh. “I won’t force you to tell me anything you don’t want to, but…I pray that you’ll talk to someone about it. I know how difficult it can be to deal with grief on your own.”
“How could you know wh—” I cut myself off mid-sentence as I realized my mistake a second too late. “Tyr, I’m sorry,” I started, hanging my head in shame. “I didn’t mean to—”
She pulled me down by the shoulder and wrapped me in a tight embrace. “It’s okay,” she whispered, rubbing gentle circles across my back. “Today has been extraordinarily unfair to you. You have nothing to apologize for.”
The comforting embrace tore through my mental barricades and unleashed the full force of my anxieties, both new and old. I slumped into her arms and rested my chin on her shoulder, using the entirety of my remaining strength to fight back against the lump in my throat.
When Tyr spoke again, her voice was soft and low in my ear, lilting like a long-forgotten melody of motherly love. “I lost myself when Brandt passed away. It felt as if the best parts of me had died along with him, but life refused to allow me any time to heal. The world carried on outside the walls of our apartment long after mine had ceased. Each acquaintance that came to give their condolences only served to push me further into isolation. How could they possibly understand what I was going through? They were still alive, and I was dead.”
My eyes pooled with tears as she continued to speak, suddenly so quiet that I strained to hear her whispers just inches from my ears. “And all the while, Siv continued to live, too. She’s too young to truly understand what death means. I knew all of that somewhere, buried at the back of my mind, but even so…I resented her. I was so angry that she could still find joy in the world after her father was gone.” A soft sniffle momentarily interrupted her story, but she managed to continue on with a strong, even voice. “I loathed myself for it, but that didn’t make the feeling go away. All I could think to do was hide, but being alone with those thoughts…it was dangerous. I had all but given up on the world when Audun came to find me. He said he’d grown worried when I hadn’t returned to work. I said some…truly awful things to him that night—things I wish I could take back—but he never left. He’s the only reason I…survived.”
A light tug on my shoulders pushed me back until we were sitting face to face. The hazy, featureless pink discs of her eyes stared straight down into my core, following the autonomous circulation of my mana as if it were plain to see. “Lux, I can see myself in you. The resentment, the isolation, the fear…I’ve seen it ever since we met, and it’s grown stronger every day.” Her drawn brow accentuated the jagged scars that cascaded down from her ebony horns, mirroring the marks I knew had finally reached my face as well. “Please don’t let it consume you. I know you’re strong, but it’s not something you can do on your own. Please…let someone help you.”
The knot of repressed feelings she had pulled loose raged unchecked in my head, mixing old fears with new despair; my all-consuming focus on my missing leg was immediately shunted to the side as my deep-rooted terror of the void forced its way to prominence. Tyr’s advice resonated back through my memories, echoed in a half-dozen different voices that all pleaded for me to accept their aid, but visions of blood, death, and black fire burned them away in turn. My blood turned to ice in my veins as I watched Lia die for the millionth time, reminding me of the truth of my existence. This is what happens to people who help me. My senses failed one by one until I found myself fully embodying the memory, trapped in the endlessly repeating loop of torture and loss. The scorching pain of the void wove itself into Lia’s screams as my darkness flooded through our mental link, knocking her down into a spasming pile in the dirt.
“Lux?”
A barrier of dense static separated me from my physical form, but I could hear Tyr speaking to me from somewhere beyond the veil, her voice competing with an angry, high-pitched whine in my ears.
“Lux, are you okay?”
Twin pinpricks of light sparked to life at the center of my vision. The bloody crater in Lia’s chest began to distort behind the expanding spots, dispelling the endless expanse of emberwoods that had become my mental prison. Shadowy trunks and Serathid corpses wavered and fell into shadow, replaced a moment later by smooth, seamless stone walls and hand-carved furniture.
“Lux?”
I returned from my dissociation to find the room slightly different from how I had left it. Tyr knelt on the floor in front of me, cupping my face in her hands while she continued to call my name with growing concern. The sudden lack of mental noise upon returning to my body left me feeling uncomfortably empty; I blinked down at Tyr in confusion as I attempted to fill what was an obvious gap in my mental timeline. “Tyr? I, uhm…I’m…fine.”
Her eyes widened when I finally responded to her distressed calls. “Lux!” she cried out. “I’m so sorry, Lux, I didn’t mean to…I shouldn’t have pushed you like that.” She lunged to her feet and cradled my head against her chest. “This was too soon. I’m sorry.” The usually calm aura of her extended silver mana twinkled vibrantly as intense bursts of comfort and care flooded through the energy in an instinctual effort to keep me safe.
I did my best to retread the path of our conversation, shielded from the worst of my returning anxiety by her protective aura. She might know. Out of everyone…she might be able to help. The thought of including Tyr in my struggle with the deathly voices in my head was enough to send my heart into a panicked, arrhythmic beat, but the sudden hope of finding relief from my isolation was too powerful to ignore. “Tyr,” I started, leaving my forehead pressed against the tip of her sternum to hide from her watchful gaze, “when you have your…headaches, do you hear any strange voices in your head?”
Her hand froze at the midpoint of its intended path through my disheveled hair as she sat in quiet consideration. A painful eternity of silence passed until she resumed the soothing ritual, scratching her fingernails gently across my scalp. “No, I don’t think I’ve heard anything like that before,” she murmured. “The only voices I’ve ever heard that weren’t my own have been from you and Marin.”
My stomach sank when I heard the answer I dreaded. “But what about…have you ever felt…” I trailed off and pulled away from her protective embrace, unsure if I should continue. As I stared down at my mismatched hands, the corrupting weave of black scars that covered my right side stole my focus, reminding me of how far my dark influence had spread. “Has it ever made you feel angry? Or hateful?” Billowing banks of black flame filled my vision as I was momentarily thrown back into my memories, forced to relive my torture of Kari and Kord and the unbridled glee I had found in the dark acts. “Has it ever made you want to hurt somebody?”
“No,” she answered more confidently than before. “The only thing my episodes have ever made me feel is fear. Fear, and pain.”
I felt myself physically deflate as my foolish hope broke apart as quickly as it had formed. It’s just me. The words boomed back and forth in my emptied mind, growing louder with every repeated echo until I was forced to accept the truth I had desperately fought to avoid. Amaya was right. My thoughts grew quiet as the words etched themselves over and over again along the surface of my soul, permanently ensuring I would never forget them again. Amaya was right. There’s nobody else like me.
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Tyr caught me by the chin and turned my face up, forcing me to lock eyes with her. “You’re okay, Lux,” she reassured me, her tightly pursed lips and firm brow betraying the doubt she attempted to hide behind her kindness. “Stay with me. You’re okay.”
A wave of disgust crashed over me as I stared back into the murky depths of her wide, glistening eyes. Enough. Every sad stare I had seen since waking up in my newly broken state coalesced into a single, burning knot in my stomach. Enough of this fucking weakness. A white-hot flash of anger caught the fraying edges of my unbound anxieties and buried them deep within my core, instantly silencing my inner turmoil. I don’t need your pity, and I don’t need your help. I’m stronger than that—I have to be.
I forced a weak smile and sat up under my own power. “Thanks, Tyr. I’m okay now, I think. Sorry if I worried you.” I took what felt like my first truly deep breath since I had discovered my new injury, finally freed of its suffocating presence by the furious determination radiating through every cell in my body. I don’t care how many injuries it takes. This is my burden, and I’m handling it alone. I’m the only one who can.
“You don’t need to be sorry,” she said with a sigh of relief. “You also don’t need to be okay. Nobody expects you to—”
“Really, Tyr, I’m fine,” I repeated, cutting off her motherly doting. “This was…really helpful. Thank you.”
“I’ll always be here to help, no matter what,” she answered, pulling me in for another tight hug. “All of us will. You don’t have to deal with this alone.”
Yes, I do. “I don’t think I’m ready to talk about it yet, but I promise that I will eventually.” I felt bad telling such a blatant lie after everything she had done for me, but the satisfied smile that spread across her face was well worth my momentary discomfort. “For now, I’ll be happy if I can finish dressing myself and make it back out to my chair before Lia and Val get back with our dinner.”
“Oh, of course!” She released me from her loving embrace and waited as I fully donned my shirt, then knelt beside me and helped me up.
When we exited the bedroom, a pair of suspicious olive eyes stared us down from beneath a voluminous shock of red hair. “What have you been up to?” Marin asked from the common room. Her rounded, fuzzy ears were pressed flat against the top of her head as she directed the entirety of her wariness in my direction.
“Tyr was helping me get dressed,” I smirked, prodding at her clearly flaring jealousy.
The verbal dagger landed perfectly on target, but Tyr spoke up before Marin could form her flustered noises into words. “Your sister should be back with dinner soon, Marin. Would you like to join us?”
Tyr’s casual smile melted the sneer from Marin’s face. “I was coming to ask if we were eating yet,” she admitted, following us back to my still-overturned chair at the center of the room. “What happened here?” she asked as she pulled the seat back to its proper place.
“I, uhm…I tried to stand up on my own,” I lied. “It didn’t go so well.”
“Well, maybe stop doing that, then,” Marin quipped, lounging back on the couch across from my chair.
“Marin!” Tyr scolded. She helped me into my seat before hurrying to the couch beside Marin and staring at her with stern eyes.
“What?!” Marin held up her hands in defense as she shrank back from the disapproving look. “I didn’t mean it like that! I just meant that, well…we were right in the next room! I would’ve helped you up if you’d asked!”
The onslaught of grief and self-pity that would no doubt have overwhelmed me only minutes earlier was nowhere to be found while I considered Marin’s words, perfectly repressed by a focused anger that burned out from the center of my chest. I’m done being pathetic. I need to be stronger than that—for their sake.
I sucked in air through clenched teeth and held it until my anger subsided, then let it out in a casual chuckle. “It’s alright, Tyr. Marin’s right—well, partially right. I should probably ask for more help to get around, but I don’t think it’ll be an issue much longer—Halvaar told me he could make a prosthetic leg that would let me walk on my own. If everything goes well, I should be back on my feet in no time.”
“See? It’s all fine!” Marin exclaimed. A wide smile spread across her face as she slid an arm across Tyr’s shoulders and pulled her close. “Lux knew what I meant.”
The grimace faded from Tyr’s face while she repositioned herself in the crook of Marin’s arm, but the concern in her tightly drawn brow remained. “That’s excellent news, Lux,” she said cautiously, “but it may take some time for you to get accustomed to a prosthetic. We’ll be more than happy to help you for as long as that takes.” She arched an eyebrow in Marin’s direction. “Isn’t that right?”
“Oh, of course!” she said with a placating smile. “As long as he doesn’t want to walk too far.”
Tyr frowned at the playful jab, but her attention turned to the foyer before she could complain. “It looks like our dinner is here,” she said, motioning to the door.
Lia and Val entered on cue, each pushing a serving cart stacked with shining silver cloches. “We’ve got dinner!” Lia announced as the pair rattled their way into the common area. “They had a bunch of—” Her explanation cut off suddenly when she caught my gaze, and her amber eyes widened in surprise. “Lux, you’re…dressed,” she mused, tilting her head to one side.
“Tyr helped me out after you left,” I nodded. “I thought it might be rude to have dinner in my underwear.”
A dazzling smile flashed across her face. “I’m glad to hear it,” she said with a quick bow of her head to Tyr. “Now, who’s hungry? We found plenty of food!”
You look better. Lia’s voice sounded in my head while she and Val wheeled their carts into the common area. How’re you feeling?
The liquid gold of her mana poured over me and brought an automatic smile to my face. Better, I agreed. Tyr and I talked for a bit while you were gone. It was…helpful.
Marin and Val pushed a pair of writing desks together to create an impromptu dining table, which was quickly populated by trays of fresh, steaming food. Oh? What about?
My thoughts immediately turned to the multiple dissociative episodes I had experienced in the short time Lia had been gone, and I let out a soft sigh in thanks that our deepened bond had ended. She told me about what she went through after her husband died, and how she got through it, I told her, carefully choosing my words to avoid telling an outright lie. She wanted me to know that I’m not alone.
She’s right about that, you know. With our meal set out before us, Lia wedged herself into her spot in my chair, taking a moment to nuzzle her head up under my chin. We’re all here for you.
The warmth of her body pressed against mine sent an electric shiver down my spine. A bittersweet swell of emotion filled my chest as I planted a kiss on the top of her head; my unconditional love for her further strengthened my intent to keep her isolated from whatever darkness lived within me, but pangs of guilt and regret over what that isolation would bring with it tainted the otherwise tender moment. I know you are, I told her silently. I love you.
I love you, too.
After a final pause to savor her embrace, I reached for the nearest tray of food and served myself a large portion of battered fish and blue tubers. “I’m not sure about the rest of you, but I feel like I haven’t eaten in days,” I grinned, snatching a pair of still-steaming dinner rolls. “Let’s eat!”
Though my well-emptied stomach protested against the first few bites of food, I pushed through the initial discomfort and indulged myself in the impressive spread. I sampled each of the dishes over the course of the following few hours, passing the platters back and forth across the table until each tray was picked clean. The rich food and friendly company was enough to make me forget about my infirmity and enjoy the night without restraint; with my missing leg hidden beneath the desk, the casual looks from my companions lost the forlorn quality I had come to expect from them, allowing me to exist as the person I had been only a few days prior.
Unfortunately, my glory was short-lived. When our trays were packed away on their carts and the desks were returned to their proper places, I felt the cautious, crushing weight of my friends’ eyes return. “Is there anything else you would like us to get for you, Lux?” Val asked, readying the serving carts for their return to the kitchen.
“No, thanks,” I sighed, leaning back to rub my overstuffed stomach. “I don’t think I’d survive another bite.”
“We should’ve been eating like this the whole time we’ve been here!” Marin lamented. She laid herself out across Tyr’s lap with a satiated groan and closed her eyes. “I can’t believe we were actually going out to eat when we could have had it delivered.”
“You’re welcome for that, by the way,” Lia scoffed. “Halvaar said we have access to anything the castle has to offer, so you’d better take advantage of it as much as you can—there won’t be any food carts bringing you fancy dinners once you’re back in Lybesa.”
A frown darkened Marin’s placid expression. “That’s true. Hana doesn’t have access to all the ingredients they have here, but her cooking is still great. We’ll ha—”
“Hey!” Lia lurched forward in our shared seat. “You better not be expecting my mother to cook all of your meals for you!”
“What? Of course not!” Marin laughed. She peeked an eye open and looked in Lia’s direction with an amusedly cocked eyebrow. “But she’ll definitely make some of them. You know how much she likes to cook for other people!”
Lia grumbled and rolled her eyes, but she sat back without further comment. I gave her a gentle pat on the hip as I laughed at their bickering, drawing her attention back to me.
“How’re you feeling, Lux? Are you tired at all?”
“After a meal like that? Absolutely.”
I fought back a grimace when Lia immediately hopped up in response and offered me her arm. “I think a real night’s sleep will do us both some good,” she smiled down at me, waiting for me to take her outstretched hand.
No more. The silent vow steeled my determination as she helped me to my feet. “Come to think of it, Val, there is something I need,” I said, catching her before she left the room. “Can you get a message to Halvaar for me?”
Val spun toward me, already bowing. “Of course.”
“Tell him I’d like to take him up on his offer—as soon as possible. Tomorrow morning, if he can.”
“I will tell him at once,” she replied.
Lia’s brow creased while she watched Val exit the room. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” she asked. “You don’t have to rush into anything if you aren’t ready. We can spend as much time here as you need to recover.”
“I’m ready, Lia,” I assured her. “Besides, I’m guessing it’ll take a while to get the thing made, and even longer to learn how to use it. Better to get started early, right?”
“It’s for the best, Lia,” Marin chimed in, lazily rolling her head to the side in Tyr’s lap. “The sooner he gets his new leg, the sooner you don’t have to carry him around anymore.”
Lia’s head snapped to the side to confront Marin, and I felt her shoulders tense beneath my arm. “You have no right to joke about that,” she hissed, drenching every word in unexpected venom. “If you had any idea what he had to go through down in—”
I placed both hands on her shoulders and spun myself around in front of her, physically interposing myself between the pair. “Enough, Lia.”
Her jawline hardened as she leaned to the side and scowled over my shoulder. “Fine,” she muttered after a tense moment of silence, turning back towards our bedroom.
I heard a sharp series of whispers behind us as we made our way to the hallway. “I’m sorry,” Marin grumbled just before we reached the door. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her seated at the far end of the couch she shared with Tyr, glowering at the stone beneath her feet.
“Thank you,” I said, nodding to acknowledge her clearly forced apology. “Goodnight, you two.”
“Goodnight,” Tyr answered for the pair.
Lia guided me into the bedroom and forcefully closed the door behind us without saying a word. Our arrhythmic footsteps thundered off of the stone walls while we made our way to the bedside, only further accentuating the palpable silence. Once I was seated securely at the edge of the mattress, she walked to the opposite side of the bed and stared at the far wall, bouncing in place as she tapped her foot.
I took a deep breath and attempted to collect my thoughts, but the noise was enough to alert Lia of my intentions. “You don’t have to say it,” she grumbled. “I know I shouldn’t have snapped at her.”
My held breath escaped in a chuckle. “Oh, good. I won’t say it, then.”
Her shoulders slumped as she fell back onto the bed. “She shouldn’t be joking around like that, though. Not today.”
“That’s how Marin shows her affection for people. You know that,” I chided gently.
“It’s just…” she trailed off with an aggravated huff. Without warning, she spun in place and scurried to the edge of the bed beside me, taking one of my hands in hers. “I’d carry you around for the rest of my life if you needed me to—no question.”
I don’t need your help. I instantly smothered the thought, but I felt my stomach begin to churn over the fact that I had thought it at all. “I know you would,” I said, leaning in to kiss her forehead, “and I love you for it. That, and about a thousand other reasons.” I paused for a moment to bask in the warmth of the smile that spread across her face. “Everything’s going to be okay, Lia. I promise.”
“It doesn’t need to be okay, Lux,” she countered. “Not right now. You shouldn’t be okay after what happened—nobody is expecting you to be, except for you.” A burning wave of amber energy flooded over me, imparting a muddled wash of concern and love. “After everything that happened over the past week, there must be so much going through your head. I…I wish I could help you.”
A chill raced down my spine at the thought of Lia’s consciousness merging with my own. “The only way I’m going to get through this is by moving forward. Sitting around to wallow in my self-pity would only make things worse.” I pressed my forehead against hers and held her hands against my chest. “You’re already helping me—more than you know. All I need is you at my side. If I have that, everything else will work itself out.”
“Then that’s where I’ll be,” she murmured. “Forever.”
“Forever.” I held her close to my chest in comfortable silence, which was broken eventually when she let out a long, squeaking yawn. “I suppose we should get some sleep.”
“It’s been a long day,” she agreed, rubbing her eyes as she stood up and began to undress.
I followed her lead, shedding the shirt that Tyr had dressed me in only a few hours earlier. My eyes remained transfixed on Lia throughout the entire process, absorbing every inch of her body as her clothes fell away. I have to be stronger. The thought filled my mind as soon as the black weave of scars covering her chest and shoulder appeared from beneath her shirt.
My lingering gaze brought a soft flush of pink to her face, lending a spark of life to her otherwise exhausted countenance. “Something on your mind?” she asked as she climbed into bed.
“Mhmm.” I finished the unwieldy task of disrobing and crawled up to take my spot beside her. “How’re you feeling?”
“Tired,” she sighed, sinking into the downy embrace of her pillow.
“Fair. I meant more…big-picture, though.” I draped my arm over her shoulder and pulled her in close. “Everyone’s been reminding me that it’s only been a few hours since I woke up, but that was four days for you. I know how hard that waiting is, Lia—and I had the benefit of snooping through your journal to keep my mind occupied when I did mine.”
“I’m…fine. Better, now,” she admitted, curling up against my chest. “It didn’t feel like four days—it all just kinda blurred together. I was scared for a while, but there was a part of me that always knew you were going to wake up, because if you weren’t, you would’ve…disappeared.”
Though her face was hidden, I heard her sorrow laced through every quiet word. “I’m sorry I put you through that,” I murmured as I stroked her flowing braid. “I promise that it’s not going to take me again—not without a fight.”
“And I promise that if that day ever comes, I’ll be there to keep you safe,” she vowed.
A grimace tightened the lines of my face while I tried to find a response that wasn’t a lie. When it was clear the task was insurmountable, I reached out to the bedside and shuttered the small oil lamp that served as the sole lightsource for the room. “I know you will,” I whispered, thankful for the darkness that concealed my dismay.
It took less than a minute for Lia’s exhaustion to catch up with her, slowing her breath to a gentle, measured rhythm. The delicate rise and fall of her chest in my sheltering embrace set a fire burning deep in my core and filled me with renewed resolve. I’ll never hurt you again, Lia. No matter what that means. I closed my eyes and buried my face in her hair, doing my best to ignore the strange, weightless feeling of my missing leg. If that day ever comes, I’ll keep you safe. From me.
***