I may have lied to the rebellion guards when I’d promised not to go beyond the fence which ringed the farmhouse where The Burrows were concealed, but I hadn’t gone much further. The barn was still safely within the wards surrounding it to protect us and I really needed to be truly alone with my thoughts for just a few minutes.
I sighed as I took in the deep silence out here, leaning my back against the rough wood of the barn door and looking at the stunning view beyond. It was the dead of night, but the full moon was bright and cast the world in silver tones which made the sweeping mountain range look unearthly beautiful with its coating of pure white snow.
My feet were bare and the snow bit at the exposed skin, but a rush of Phoenix fire coursing through my veins banished the sensation fast enough.
I blew out a deep breath, watching it fog and sail away as I focused on thoughts of Lionel and smirked to myself as I considered many colourful ideas for his agonising death without once feeling the urge to save him from that fate.
My fingers trailed over the smooth skin of my arm which had once been branded by the Aries mark that bound me to him, and I closed my eyes as I wondered for the millionth time how the hell it was possible that the Guardian bond had been broken.
And that wasn’t the only bond that had been broken today either…
I hadn’t let myself think about it much yet, but I knew I was in for a world of freaking out when I really accepted that the Star Crossed bond was gone too. The mirror in the bathhouse had been dimly lit, but even so, I’d stood staring at my newly green-again eyes for several long minutes. All the while my heart had raced a million miles a minute, but I’d refused to so much as consider the possibility that our curse could really be gone.
Because if I let myself believe that, only to find out it wasn’t true, I wasn’t sure I could survive it.
I needed it to be real. Needed to be able to touch and kiss and caress him as much as I wanted without a single thing standing between us. And yet the idea of that terrified me too. I’d let myself feel all the things for Darius Acrux which I’d always sworn I’d never allow myself to feel, and that had been fine when there was no real chance of us ever actually being together. But now… I was a barely functioning fuck up of a girl on my best days. I was snarky and abrasive, stubborn to the point of self-detriment and damn rude more often than not. I was the girl no one wanted. Unloved came easy to me. But Darius had made it more than clear to me that I wasn’t the unwanted girl to him. In fact, if there really wasn’t anything keeping us apart anymore then I was pretty certain he wouldn’t want us to be apart ever again.
And the thought of that lit me up from the inside out and made me wanna dance naked in the rain, screaming that he was mine and cutting any bitch who might dare to glance his way… But it also scared the fuck out of me.
I didn’t know how to be someone’s everything. I was pretty sure I wasn’t even my own everything. Without Darcy I was just some jaded bitch who consistently fucked up and didn’t apologise for it. And I couldn’t shake the feeling that if there was nothing keeping Darius away from me anymore, he’d figure that out all too quickly and then he wouldn’t want me at all. How was I supposed to accept that if I let myself fall for him any more deeply than I already had? How was I supposed to survive him if he finally drew back the curtain and realised the Fae hiding behind it was nothing but a scared, little girl with no clue how to be the woman he wanted me to be?
I took in another deep breath and closed my eyes as I tried to centre myself, forcing my mind away from the fire in my limbs which reminded me all too clearly of the Dragon I kept daydreaming about and allowing myself to drift in a little bit of nothing for a while as I tried to clear my thoughts.
But as the dark pressed in on me, it was impossible not to feel myself returning to that room on Christmas Eve where Lionel had strapped me to a chair and set his twisted pets against me.
Bile caught in my throat as I relived the feeling of Clara driving that blade into my stomach over and over again, of my blood spilling hot and fast across my skin as my screams filled the air and Vard forced his way into my mind.
“Who do you love, Roxanya?”
Over and over again those same words hissed into my ears as I thrashed and snarled and bled out all over the plush carpets of the room which should have belonged to my father. But this time I hadn’t given up the answer they’d been trying to force from my lips. I hadn’t said the words Lionel was trying to command with his torture as he watched my suffering with heat and lust in his eyes. He might have been getting off on my pain, but I’d refused to relinquish control of my heart to him.