Page 74 of Exquisite Monster
“Like what?”
Angry. The emotion flooded my system on all fronts, though I tried to hold it back.
I was angry at everything.Everything. Even them. I hadn’t truly admitted it until this exact moment.
My whole life had been nothing but a masquerade of pretend choices. Forced to be a princess and a political pawn by accident of birth. Forced to marry someone against my will. Forced to survive when they tried to kill me. Forced to fight when I wasn’t strong enough.
The only choice I’d evertrulymade was them.
Learning potions with Taia and Baris had been desperation. A means of protecting myself and having somethingotherbecause of everything else in my life. Choosing to poison my own womb was to protect myself against a monster.
They were my only true choice.
I had no regrets, but I was so fucking tired of not being able to choose.
“Let it out,” he whispered.
“I can’t.” Because if I let it out then it felt like I’d never be able to put it back again. If I let it go, then I was weak, and Icouldn’tbe weak. Not when the whole world needed me to be strong. The Heirs of dragons could not have a weak mate.
Endre’s hands gripped my arms from behind. “You’re angry at us.”
“I’m not.”
He kissed the back of my neck. “Yes. You are.”
Hot tears gathered beneath my lids. “I don’t want to be.”
“So let it out.”
“What do you want me to say?” I pulled away from him and stalked across the clearing toward the line of trees and shadows. “Nothing I feel makes sense, and because it doesn’t make sense, I don’t want you to see it. I don’t want to hurt you.” My chest ached. “You’ve already been hurt enough because of me.”
The dark clothes Endre wore reminded me of the clothes he’d worn when he first came to visit me in the cell, and I wasn’t sure whether he would kill me. And now, that same air of darkness clung to him.
“You think I don’t know what it means to be angry?” He asked carefully. “You think I don’t understand what it does to have that inside you, rotting, the feeling lashing out at everything you hold dear, including the people you love?”
In my chest, our bond changed and sharpened. I felt the depth of his soul and the darkness of it. The places he hid from everyone and everything and theragethat lived beneath his skin.
“I have been angry for three centuries, Lena. And there are days when it still breaks me. Do you think I’m weak for it?”
A tear spilled over because I knew what he was doing, and it was working. “Of course not.”
“Thenlet it out.” His voice rose. “Scream at me if you have to. Trust me when I say that you can be angry at someone and still love them. You are my mate, and there will be times of anger because that’s what it means to be alive. Emotions don’t care who’s at fault for something.”
I shook my head, hoping he would stop speaking the truth, but knowing he wouldn’t.
“The only reason I’m still here is because Sirrus and Zovai forced it out of me. It would have eaten me whole. So don’t think we can’t take it.”
“Endre—”
“Let itGO,Katalena.”
“ALL I WANTED WAS YOU.”
Silence fell along with every tear I’d been holding back. “I’ve never done anything for myself. Not really. Not until you. And I didn’twantany of it. I didn’t want to be a princess. I didn’t want to be a queen. I didn’twantto be strong or have to make choices because my life somehow affects thousands of others. I didn’t want to be someone who has to save the whole fucking world.”
I choked, but I couldn’t stop, pain spearing through my chest like a physical thing. “I never wanted to know what it feels like to have someone want to kill you. Not just once but over and over again. I don’t want to be hated. I didn’t want to have to prove myself to a dragon just to stay alive. I didn’t want—” I shook my head. “I’m soangry and I don’t know what to do. I’m angry at my father and Andaros and the Elders and every single dragon in Doro Eche. I’m angry at Gleym and Idroal and you.”
My voice was barely comprehensible. I never wanted to say it out loud. “I’m angry at you. I’m so angry at you, and it doesn’t makesenseand I don’t want to be but it’s all I can fucking feel. I’m so tired of feeling it, Endre. I’m so tired of having to take things in stride and pretend that I’m strong when I’m not. I’m so tired.”
