Page 142 of Of Flames and Fallacies

“Wait.”

I turn, slow. Each breath a staggering weight in my chest.

Cole stands rigid, a torrent of sadness drowning his features. “Don’t leave. Not yet.”

I don’t say anything—I’m stuck.

He takes a few cautious steps toward me. “I know you don’t want to hear it. I know I’ve hurt you. I’ll beg for your forgiveness and mercy before I beg it of any god. But, please...just give me this one last chance to tell you how sorry I am, before you go.And then, you can go—” His voice wavers, tears glistening in his eyes. “I…I will let you go.”

I nod, tightness constricting my throat.

The way he fidgets, he’s dying to touch me. But he restrains himself. My emotions swirl around me, threatening to pull me under into a whirlpool of despair at the extent of how damaged we are.

He sighs, his shoulders sagging in relief that I’m giving him this last chance. “I’m not in love with her, Kat. Not like I am with you. I didn’t agree to it because I loved her.”

“Then why did you?” I whisper.

“Gods…I killed myself every day for not fighting for you when you told me to leave you alone back in Padmoor. I wanted to respect your wishes, even if I didn’t want to let you go so easily. But I did. And it was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. Nothing makes sense when you’re not next to me—it feels like a life left wasted. When you broke things off with me to take your mother to Stoneshire for the blue flame, my father was injured at work. He was forging a sword, and the sparks exploded into his eyes—blinding him.”

I gasp.

He nods and takes another step closer. “He had to sell what little weapons we had left in the shop, but it wasn’t enough. We only had enough to sustain the eight of us for maybe a few weeks. I was trapped and desperate for a way to support us, so the girls wouldn’t starve. And then word of the draft came. Willard told me you were still in town and that you never left for Stoneshire. I went to your house, scared you’d be angry I wasn’t honoring your wish to leave you alone. But I went anyway. I saw a flicker of movement near the window after I knocked on your door, but you never answered. I took it as your sign that you didn’t care to talk to me. So I left and took the opportunity to join the King’sarmy. The military pays well, and if I could work my way up in the ranks, I could send money back to him and my sisters.”

My gaze settles on my boots. It wasn’t me not answering his knock—it must’ve been my mother. And it must have been the day I fell asleep at the river, just as I told his sister Vivian back in Padmoor.

“And then you met Celeste,” I finish quietly.

“No. I trained for a few weeks at a different outpost. But every day I regretted not staying to fight for you. So I left.”

My eyes widen, searching his. “What? What do you mean you left?”

“I came back for you. I went back to Padmoor. I couldn’t live a life without you anymore.” He pulls out his mother’s ring from his pocket, his thumb brushing over its gleaming metal. His voice wavers as he stares down at the ring. “And then my worst nightmare came true. You were gone. I dug through the ashes of your home, desperate to not find you. I asked around Padmoor, and everyone told me the same thing. I even asked Willard, practically begging him to say it wasn’t true, desperate there had been some mistake. But he confirmed it—you and your mother had died in the fire. And I felt my heart shatter at that very moment. It broke something in me. Ever since then, I’ve struggled with who and what I am. I should’ve stayed with you, I should’ve fought harder because in my mind, maybe I could’ve saved you. That guilt never ceases to haunt me. I returned back home, and when my father learned I deserted my position in the King’s military he—” He shakes his head, biting into his lip to keep tears from spilling.

A half-hearted laugh shakes his shoulders. “I have to stop saying that, but it’s a habit. He’s not even my father.”

“What?”

He glances up at me. “When he found out I dishonorably left the military, he admitted I’m not even his real son. When hewed my mother, she was already pregnant, and had sworn him to father me. To raise me as his own. But I was such a disgrace in his eyes, he couldn’t possibly be associated with me. Not to mention the repercussions if he housed such a treasonous bastard. He told me to never return, and that I could never see my sisters again.”

“Cole...I’m…I’m so sorry,” I murmur. My own heart aches, knowing how much his sisters mean to him. And then for them to be ripped away from him, in a single moment, completely outside of his control. Ripped away as if they were torn from him by the currents of a river.

Ripped away,all because of me.

He continues, “I didn’t know where to go. I tried to go back to my original squad, knowing they’d execute me for desertion. I didn’t have you, and I didn’t have my family, so they’d at least put me out of my misery. My original squad sent me to Arterias for a trial. I had two options: execution, or I could serve out the rest of my life as captain of the most northern squad. This outpost is where they send those they can afford as collateral. They know we’ll be the first ones to die in rebel attacks. But I wouldn’t get paid for it—which meant my family would die if I couldn’t send them something.”

He takes a shaky, heavy breath. As if this has been weighing on him for months. “And then I was offered a proposal. If I married Celeste, I would be wed into a wealthy family. I’d have a handsome dowry, and I could send that money back to my family. My life sentence would be lifted so I could be with her.”

“How is that possible? How could they just lift the sentence so easily?”

“Apparently, since her father was Jurrock, they still have the favor of the King. But Kat—I don’t love her. I’ve never touched her or kissed her. I’ve never felt about her like I do you. If I had known you were still alive…” He grabs my hand in his, pleadingfor me to listen to him. “I wouldneverhave agreed to it. I just wanted to take care of my family, can’t you see that? I would take a lifetime of poverty and pain with you, than riches and prestige without you. I doubted your ability to work through the hard things, thinking if I told you I was engaged without a solution, you’d leave. But you weren’t the weak one—I was. The fact is, you are so much stronger than I think. Than you think. You are single-handedly the strongest person I know. And I’m not saying that because I’m madly in love with you. Or because you’re my friend. But because it’s true.”

He retrieves something tucked into his jacket and presents it to me. “Here...I want you to have this.”

I take it slowly with a blink and pull open the scroll. A map. At a loss for words, I tuck it shakily into my satchel.

“And this.” He pulls out another item and holds it out to me. A dark brown...journal.

My father’s journal.

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