Page 117 of How to Entice a Fiend

“Yes.”

Ender is quiet, and once the rest leave, the overbearing silence suffocates the room, but I refuse to even look at him.

“Do you need help?” he asks.

I ignore him. If he thinks I’m insignificant and not worth living for, then so be it.

I set to work, and this time I have enough ingredients to make a large batch of antidote. It takes longer because I’m making so much, but it’s better to be safe.

“I’m sorry,” Ender says. “I… don’t believe what I said was wrong in any way, but it must have been, so I’m sorry.”

Like he thinks I should forgive him after that shitty-ass apology.

“Mads, I know you can hear me. And I know you can talk while you make this. You chatted away while making a bomb last time.”

Still, I ignore him.

“I said I’m sorry, what more do you want?”

I set the liquid to the side to cool before turning on him. It needs some time before I can keep working with it, so I might as well get this all out in the open now. “Use your brain.”

Then I head into the supply closet. I don’t expect him to follow me, but he does.

“Why do you think I should risk everyone else’s life?” Ender asks.

“Why do you think you going alone is better than working with others?”

“You want me to ask the VRC, all of whose lives I’ve made fucking miserable… you think I should ask them? Apparently, not only did I toss Finn off a fucking bridge, I killed some fucking happy village Marcus loved with all these innocent happy people in it.”

“They weren’t too innocent if they were sacrificing people. You can’t tell me that tradition went on for that many years and the villagers had no damn idea when most of the village was involved. You said there were people standing on the street watching it like it was a spectacle. How the hell could they be considered good people?”

“I can do this alone. I can kill him, and I don’t need to involve anyone else.”

“Yeah? Yeah? You’re just going to do it all alone? Definitely don’t need me.”

He looks pained. “I need you.”

“Ohhhh, just to make shit for you, yeah?”

“No… Why are you mad at me? I didn’t realize how fucking sick I was of everyone being mad at me until I met you… and it seemed like no matter what I did, you still saw the best in me. But now I’ve even managed to piss you off.”

“Because I want you to appreciate your life, not just… run off and want to toss it away because you’re being stubborn or thinking that you’re going to do everything alone. Stop making yourself out to be the monster and do something selfish.”

“I feel like everything I do is selfish! I just hurt people and take and destroy, and what have I done in return? If I could kill Abel, then maybe that’d be one thing I could do? Then maybe people wouldn’t think that all I do is shitty things?”

“If that’s how you’re planning on doing things, have at it. I’m done talking about this.”

Ender rushes up and grabs my arm before turning me around to face him and pressing me against the table in the corner of the supply closet. “Don’t be done.”

“Why not? You’ve decided that you might as well throw your life away. You might as well decide this.”

“I decided that I want you in my life. I decided that you’ve made me a better person. You’ve made me see myself in a whole different light. I’ve decided that I can’t do it without you.”

I stare at him as I try not to let his words get to me. I shouldn’t let him win. He’s being stubborn and impossible to deal with, when all I want to do is care about him.

He presses against me until his body is flush against mine before his hands slide up into my hair. “I’m not letting you go. I’ll become a monster and keep you by my side if I have to.”

“I’m not going to be with someone who tosses their life away,” I warn him as I try my hardest not to get pulled in byhis lips or the way his hand feels as it cups my cheek. I can’t be swayed by any of his nonsense.

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