Page 47 of Spark of the Everflame

Fight.

It was a creature of its own, thisthinginside of me. It was a lit match that eternally wavered above the pile of kindling that was my shredded soul, a drumbeat that called my temper to arms at every provocation.

Henri rubbed at his face. “I don’t want to argue with you, but it’s safer if you don’t know.”

“I don’t need you to protect me. I’m not going to break.”

“Are you sure about that?” he snapped. “You haven’t exactly been stable lately.”

Fight.

Words bubbled up in my mouth. Awful words. Unforgivable words. Words that would break us in irreparable ways.

And it wasn’t just words. The thoughts that were raging through my head struck true fear into my heart, even as they grew louder and more insistent.

Fight.

My eyes squeezed closed.

I... I wanted tohurthim. Break his bones. Claw his skin until he bled.

The thought horrified me.

Captivated me.

Purredto me.

“Go back downstairs to your friends,” I forced out between clenched teeth. My quivering hands flexed and fisted, over and over.

The anger deflated out of him. “Wait, Diem, I’m sorry.” He stepped forward and reached for me. I jerked away and staggered backward, my panic coming out as disgust. Henri looked as if I’d slapped him, but I was terrified I would do worse if he stayed.

So much worse.

Fight.

“Now,” I snarled at him. “Go!”

He stared at me for a few seconds, heartbreak in his eyes, then turned and walked out of the room.

ChapterTwelve

If anything was worse than fighting with Henri, it was the awkward tension that came next.

At some point in the night, Henri returned to the room and fell asleep beside me, but even after we rose at dawn and gathered our things to travel back to Lumnos, the silence between us remained. Occasionally his eyes would linger on me, his muscles bunching as if he was straining against a pull to speak, but he held his tongue, and so did I.

As we stood outside the inn readying our horses, two of the men from the previous evening stopped to bid us a safe journey. I gave them restrained smiles and a polite enough thanks, but when one leaned in to whisper in Henri’s ear, Henri’s eyes met mine and my smile vanished.

We made our way back onto the wide, desolate path of the Ring Road. Our horses marched alongside each other, the thick silence punctuated only by the drum of their steady hoofbeats.

I’d wanted to hurt him.

The thought wouldn’t stop haunting me. This loyal, kind-hearted man who had always been my closest friend... In that moment last night, I’d wanted to break his heart, and then break his bones.

The worst part was that I wasn’t sure I wouldn’t have done it. If he’d stayed longer, if he’d come closer—I couldn’t shake the feeling that I wouldn’t have been able to stop myself.

I’d always been a spitfire, and proud of it. An unbreakable spirit in a world that wanted me to be quiet, small, subservient. But no longer was that spark manifesting in courage or innocent mischief. Now, it had become something destructive. Something deadly.

And if I couldn’t learn to control it soon, I feared it would destroy me—or the people I loved most.

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