Page 79 of Of Sockets Of Stitches
Or not.
There would never be confirmation one way or another. I must give in to my heart on the matter. The heart that pulsed with his. There was the simple answer, so shrouded in my fear of relenting to what I could interpret as weakness and my own desperation not to be alone for eternity.
But I was not the weak king confessing to love.
Iwas not desperate and hopeless in romance, and never would be, because there was a great reason that I felt such surety of surviving further betrayals from See. Because I was only desperate and hopeful for the survival of monsters. That was my lens of looking at every choice now.
Monsters came first.
We must come second.
So we would betray each other time and again. Whether ten days went between betrayals, or centuries. There would never be another moment like the one we shared in this chamber on that night.
But what remained could be informed and towering and powerful. If we employed irrational belief in each other’s loyalty and radical forgiveness. If we believed in the shared thumping of our hearts.
Was I convincing myself of what I also yearned for?
Yes.
Did I fear?
Yes.
But if See was correct about this lesson we both learned, then this first betrayal would sting the most. Like anything in monsterdom—power, or connection, or knowledge of self—the beginnings were abrupt and uncomfortable. The endings, sure and hard-earned. Now I was grateful for the beginnings that had come before.
Because I understood how new things presented to a queen. Romance, the most abrupt and uncomfortable beginning of all.
A tidal wave rumbled in me, a decision of my heart both preordained and unprecedented.
The tidal wave towered high, and I stood before it and under it in the full knowledge of how the weight of water would soon crash upon my head and then rip at the world.
I blinked, then peered up at See. I lifted a hand to his face, and he stilled under my touch.
His breath hitched.
Such hope in his eyes.
My heart beat in tandem with his—a mindless and infinite pulse. Ancients must possess a sense of humor, for they sent a message in this as they did in all. I must be mindless and infinite in romance. And See in return.
That was our fate.
I forgive you.
I did not speak the words aloud. I must practice them silently a few times.I forgive you,I thought again.
He nodded in encouragement, sensing the three words that I did not say. “Please speak the words, my darkness.”
And more irony, for I had begged him to say three words, and now he was begging me for three words too.
I parted my lips. “See?—”
Pounding footsteps speared through See’s princedom, and I jerked my hand away from See’s face, only for See to snatch it back, a growl ripping from him.
I stared at his grip, then at him. He was white-lipped, jaw clenching, and unbreathing.
See closed his eyes and released me. For we came second.
I met my pawns at the door. “What has happened?”
