Page 68 of The Jester

I feel completely exposed. He has seen every part of me – my body and my soul. And I thought I had seen every part of him. But, this entire time, he has been lying to me. “Was it all fake? Were you just using me because Eldrion told you to? Trying to get close to me? Manipulate me?”

Finn sighs loudly and shakes his head. “Alana, I can explain if you’ll let me.”

The anger is back. Fury begins to gnaw at my bones. I stand and put my hands on my hips, ignoring the tug of pain the movement draws from my back because it is still stinging with the memory of his wings. “Then explain...”

“Eldrion did send me to watch you. That’s true.”

Hearing him say the words out loud forces the breath from my lungs. I clutch at my chest and then try to regain some sense of composure.

If he has lied to me all this time, if he doesn’t truly love me, and if everything was fake, I will not give him the satisfaction of seeing me crumble.

“How long?” I ask.

Finn presses his lips together as if he is battling the urge to answer my question, knowing that when he does, everything will change.

“Since the last centennial,” he says, looking down at his feet. I almost laugh because it is so ridiculous.

“One hundred years.” The words taste like lies on my tongue. “You have been watching me in secret for one hundred years?”

Finn gives a small shrug that makes me almost wild with rage, as if it’s perfectly understandable, as if it’s nothing outrageous, as if one hundred years go by in the blink of an eye, and who can blame him for not telling me?

“Not all the time,” he says. “Once we found you, I came every few years, gave him updates. That’s all.”

“Updates on what?”

“I didn’t really know,” Finn says, “and that’s the truth. You can search my mind, and you’ll see.”

“I don’t want to search your mind. I don’t want to know anything about your mind,” I snap.

Finn reaches for me and then stops, as if he knows that is the last thing I want.

“He didn’t tell me why, I swear. Just that there was a girl who was special and that I was to find her, keep watch over her, and then...”

“Kidnap her.” I step closer, looking straight up into his eyes, hoping that he sees defiance in mine.

“He didn’t tell me that part until –” Finn pinches the bridge of his nose.

For the first time since I saw him without his mask, I wish he would put it back on because right now, I do not want to be looking at his face.

“Did he also tell you to fuck me?” I ask, and now I can’t hold back the tears anymore. They roll down my cheeks treacherously, and when Finn folds me into his embrace, I want to fight him, but I don’t.

“No, he didn’t tell me to fall in love with you either.”

I shake my head and try to pull away, but he holds me still.

“I fell in love with you, Alana. I loved you before I’d ever spoken to you.”

“And yet, you would have given me to him anyway.”

Finn steps back, rubbing his upper arms. His wings droop a little, and those chimes that used to send trickles of arousal to my core now only send sadness to my heart. “I had no choice,” he says.

“There is always a choice,” I snap back. “What else haven’t you told me?”

“Nothing,” he says. “I swear it.”

He takes my hands and presses them to his chest. “Please, search my mind so you know I’m telling you the truth.”

“I shouldn’t have to,” I breathe, snapping my hand back and wiping the tears from my cheeks. But I do it anyway.

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