Page 179 of Lana Pecherczyk
Cloud gripped River’s wrists, claws piercing skin, oozing blood, and snarled, “You said it first. We’re not family.”
Lightning split the sky, momentarily illuminating Cloud’s face. River saw it then, the same face looking up at him on the day they’d met—stark eyes filled with hopelessness, bloody nose dripping.
“What’s the point?”
“Fuck your dad. Do what you want.”
“It’s not that easy.”
“Everything’s easy with someone to watch your back.”
River sheathed his claws, fell to his knees, and slumped his shoulders. Breathing heavily, they stared each other down, just inches apart between two caravans in the darkness. Distant voices traveled on a breeze, concerned, wary. Ash must still be holding them back.
“Just tell me why?” River whispered, shaking his head as he looked down at the fine scars on his torso. “Why?”
“Because you weren’t fucking listening!” A roar. A bellow of anguish that shook the earth. “You didn’t get it!”
That flicker of emotion in Cloud’s eyes fled. He rose to his feet, a dark stain against the stormy night sky, until lightning flashed again. This time, it began inside his eyes, turning the blue white. Electricity skipped across his skin, zipping through oil-slick tracks on his body, lifting each strand of black, wavy hair.
Stand.
Get up and face him head-on.
But River couldn’t get up. Maybe he deserved this.
“I was begging for you to tell me!” Air heaved into his lungs. “I just wanted to help.”
“Help?” Cloud’s laugh was cruel. “You wouldn’t know the meaning of the word.”
“I was there for you when you were broken. I nursed you back to health.” River gaped. “And do you know what? You never even thanked me. Not once.” The buried and festered words exploded out. “Months I spent, pulling you back from the edge. Watching you scream in your sleep. Cleaning youractualshit because you couldn’t fucking move. Not. Once.” His eyes stung, his throat clogged, but what was the point in pretending he didn’t feel this way? “Maybe I don’t fucking know all the answers, but I just wanted to help.”
Cloud exhaled.
His head dropped.
The raw fury binding them together seemed to lessen, replaced by exhaustion.
“It was an accident,” he whispered.
Chapter
Fifty-Five
An accident.
Cloud’s confession echoed in River’s head. He stilled, letting it soak in. Letting himself understand. Forgiveness, a fragile, impossible thing, hovered.
Then exploded.
“A fuckingaccident?” His fist struck out, rising with an uppercut, connecting squarely with Cloud’s dipped jaw. He never saw it coming. Bone crunched. Head snapped back. Staggered. Body slumped against the side, against the caravan’s cracked panel. But River wasn’t done. “Five years! Five fucking years of silence, and that’s your excuse?” Another hit. “An ‘oopsy’?” Fingers around his tattooed throat, pinning him against the caravan’s wall. Rage, clean and absolute, surged back. “An accident wouldn’t have kept you away for so long. An accident wouldn’t have made you ignore me! Ignore us!”
Cloud’s brief submission evaporated. He snarled in River’s face, pushing against the stranglehold. “Grow some wings and get over it.”
“I can’t! Youruinedmy wings, fuck face.” Unhinged rage magnified in River’s veins, trembling his grip, pushing his thumbs deeper into soft flesh. One twist. Snap. Silence theghosts. End the pain. His muscles screamed, tensed for the final act?—
“Manfri!”
Blake’s voice. Sharp. Terrified. His name. Hisbirthname, not the Guardian’s.
