Page 126 of Daughter of No Worlds

I realized, all at once, who sat beside me.

I lifted my face to see the ghostly outline of Max’s face in the darkness, those bright, unnatural eyes glistening. The sight of him drew a dagger from my gut up through my lungs.

My fingers tightened around his. Real. He wasreal.

I choked out, “They all— They are all—”

“I know.” A low, pained whisper. “You talked in your sleep.”

I let out a cry that scraped from deep inside of me.

And I felt arms encircle me, pull me into an embrace that I craved, even though it made me so, so sad.

“You should not be here,” I wept against his skin. “You were not supposed to be here.”

Fly away,I wanted to beg. Even as I, ever the traitor, pulled him closer.Fly away from all of this.

I felt his back shudder with a broken inhale.

“They have nothing holding you anymore,” I said, between sobs. “There is nothing— nothing to make you stay.”

“Don’t.” His whisper was raw and throaty. And I felt his tears mix with mine, hot against my cheek as our bodies folded around each other. “Don’t be stupid.”

Chapter Forty-Three

Max

Ihad made it approximately thirty-seven minutes before I realized that I was lying to myself.

A week ago, I had stormed out of the Towers convinced that I had no choice but to sever myself from all of this. I refused to become a part of the Orders’ scheming, and I refused to help them take advantage of Tisaanah more than I already, unwittingly, had.

I returned home. And I stood there at the edge of my property, staggering from my anger and despair and the addled disorientation of Stratagram travel, just looking at it. My little stone cabin, and that wild, overgrown expanse of flowers. It had been a beautiful day — sunshine, a gentle breeze, flitting butterflies and all.

Idyllic. A bastion of peace and tranquility.

And in that moment, Ihatedit.

After the deaths of my family, I lost years to drugs, wine, and aimless wandering. A slower kind of suicide, perhaps. And when I finally clawed my way out of that self-destruction, I built a cottage too far away from the world to be bothered. I planted hundreds upon hundreds of flowers and told myself they were all the company I needed.Better than people anyway,I’d mutter to myself.Simpler to care for. More predictable. And much prettier.

And, to be fair, the flowers hadn’t done what Tisaanah had. They just sat there, swaying in the wind, with no intention of up and selling themselves to the organization that ruined my life. I didn’t have to run around beggingthemnot to make blood pacts with Zeryth Aldris.

But they were also static and silent. They were simpler, yes, but they wouldn’t whisper stories of lost lands at night, wouldn’t joke or laugh. They were more predictable, but they had no dreams for a better future, no ambitions, no hope. And they were pretty, but they had nothing on Tisaanah’s lively beauty, the kind that changed a little each time I looked at her, as if I were discovering a new breathtaking facet with each of her expressions.

I just stood there, and all at once, I was struck by my own self-absorbed cowardice.

I’d spent years so smugly certain that I was somehow morally superior for opting out of a world that was cruel and imperfect and complicated.

Morally fucking superior. Me, sitting here alone with the flowers, while Tisaanah suffered. Me, living in this cottage that had become her home just as much as it was mine, going back to a meaningless life and telling myself,“Well, it’s the only thing I can do.”

I sank to my knees. And for thirty minutes, I sat there, coming to terms with what I was about to do.

When I stood up again, my decision had been made.

Now, Tisaanah lay heavy against my chest, sleeping. Though, I remembered enough about my time with Reshaye to know that it was really more like losing consciousness than “falling asleep.” Every so often my fingers would drift down to the inside of her wrist, relief in the warm beat of blood beneath fragile skin.

It had taken me a week to put my affairs in order, gather the supplies I needed, tie up loose ends. In some ways, I had been dreading coming here. But there was another part of me that felt an odd, primal sense of relief in the weight of her against me. Like some missing puzzle piece had been restored.

I’d been surprised at how much Imissedher. And here, in this moment, in the blur of my exhaustion and the pre-dawn silence, it was so unnervingly easy to forget why we were here.

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