Page 78 of Destroyer

“It’s none of your business,” she said at last.

They stared at each other, wide-eyed as if neither understood what had happened. Ru remained unsteady, her mind foggy with the artifact’s insistence, that fog reflected in Fen’s gaze.

“Be honest with me,” he said at last. “I’m trying to protect you.”

“What from? The Children? The artifact? Yourself?”

“Pick one.”

Ru didn’t know how to respond to that. With every moment, the artifact’s effect diminished. And as Fen rubbed his face, stepping back slightly, blinking, she knew his senses were clearing as well.

As she stood there, trying to think of a way to respond, a half-truth that would appease him, she faltered. But as her faculties returned, a chill fell over her. The pain in her head was growing, and with it came the memory of what she had done in the dungeon. She remembered only snippets of it, her guts in turmoil, as though she was remembering a night of heavy drinking. Everything was jumbled, hazy.

But even through the fog of memory, one detail burst suddenly into harsh, breathtaking clarity: darkness, rising from the surface of the artifact. A millimeter, maybe less. But she had seen it,feltit, like a wave before the crest, and the next thing she remembered was her vision going dark before the fall.

Ru felt as if a fist closed around her lungs at the realization of it, stopping her breath at the source. She had almost done it again. First the dig site, now this. And all she had done was ask a question.

The last of her energy fled at once. Stumbling, Ru lowered herself onto the bed, staring into the middle distance, biting back a sob.

“I could have killed you. All of you.”

The heavy truth of it fell on her like a hammer, and she chewed her lip until she tasted blood. She hadn’t even touched the artifact. She had only spoken three words.

Fen went to her side then, settling wordlessly on the bed, a safe distance from Ru. As he did, she realized with a jolt that the room was cold, uncomfortably so. No fire was lit in the hearth, and one of the windows was open. She shivered slightly, both from the cold and the fact that she hadn’t felt it until now. She had been too overcome with madness, that wild draw toward Fen, and she couldn’t help but think he’d been overtaken by the same.

But it made no sense. Ru’s breath came fast and shallow, her hands grasping at the bedcovers, tightening into fists. She had lost control again, in the worst way.

Beads of sweat dotted her forehead. “If I hadn’t lost consciousness…”

“But you did,” Fen said, softly. Soothing. “Nothing happened.”

Nothing happened. She felt sick, the bile of self-loathing and the remnants of fear rising in her throat.

For a while, they sat in silence, until Ru’s heart slowed its pace, her breathing settled, and her fingers loosened on the bedclothes. They were safe. No one had been harmed.Nothing happened.

But the two words rankled, stuck to Ru like a burr. She had seen the artifact’s reaction, seen that almost imperceptible sheen of darkness. That wasn’t nothing. Her thoughts drifted to the dig site, the researchers, Lady Maryn…

“I’m sorry,” Fen said, breaking the silence. “I should have stopped it. The Children pushed you, and I could have stopped it. I’m to blame.”

His words brought Ru back to the present. “No,” she said, voice soft as if hoping that Fen might not hear her. As if his not hearing would make it easier. “It was my fault. I spoke to the artifact. Not just with my words. I… reached out to it, with my feelings. And it answered me.”

He turned to her, studying her, his lips parted slightly in wonder — or fear. “I saw something in your eyes after you fainted in the dungeon. Something that scared me. I thought you might have been poisoned by the artifact somehow. I’d suspected, thought maybe there was more to it. Something you weren’t telling me.”

“What do you mean?” said Ru. She pressed her fingers to either side of the bridge of her nose, stifling the headache that wouldn’t give her peace.

A series of facts flitted through Ru’s mind — Fen had encouraged her to control her emotions near the artifact. He believed sincerely that it was magic. He was first to react when she fainted in the dungeon, hiding her blindness, the reality of what had overcome her.

She stared at him in disbelief as the realization washed over her. “You knew all along.”

CHAPTER27

Outside Ru’s room, a summer sun crept slowly upward, arching across a cloud-flecked sky. Bees hummed and darted between colorful flowers in the Tower courtyards. Academics strolled between fruit trees, lounged on stone benches, and walked the hallways of the Tower, windows drenching the corridors in sunlight.

And in that moment, perched on the edge of her bed with a thousand thoughts and questions clawing inside her for purchase, Ru could have been in another world entirely. All that existed to her was Fen. He had known about the artifact, her connection to it, all along.

“I guessed,” he said, his chin angled down in slight contrition. He looked up at her through dark lashes. “Extrapolated. It’s not as if there’s a way to prove that someone is communicating telepathically with an inanimate object.”

Despite the maelstrom of emotions that threatened to consume Ru, relief crept through her, melting tense muscles one by one. She no longer had to lie to Fen. And with the lifting of this weight, in the wake of the artifact’s intoxicating effect, came a strange sense of emptiness. No, of being untethered. As if the world Ru knew had changed, by even one molecule, altering its course forever.

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