Page 37 of The Unseelie War
Ava felt tears prick at her eyes. “I was angry. I lashed out. I’m sorry. I just don’t understandwhyyou have to kill everyone, if Valroy is the problem?—”
“He is a symptom, not a cause.” Serrik shut his eyes. “He was not the one who disfigured me, Ava. He was not the one who exiled me, who tortured me, who hurled invectives at me from the earliest age. The fae are thetruemonsters,do you not understand? They have been stealing, eating, tormenting your kind since the dawn of time! Moreover I…” He let out a long, wavering breath. “I do not know that once I begin, I will be able to stop myself.”
“What do you mean?”
“My true form, Ava. I keep it hidden for areason.I have worked for thousands of years to keep that part of me controlled. Restrained. It comes with…its own impulses. Its own hungers. And now, for the first time that I find someone who might see me as someone else…she asks me to become exactly what they believe me to be?”
“I’m not asking you to become a monster.” Ava stepped closer to him, her own anger flaring. “I’m asking you to help mefixthings!”
“They are thesame thing!”The words exploded out of him so suddenly she jumped back in surprise. “Do you not understand that? I cannot beyoursavior without beingtheirmonster. I cannot save anyone without destroying everything I touch. And you will hate me, all the same.”
“That's not true?—”
“It is!” His form flickered, the human glamour slipping for just a moment to reveal glimpses of chitinous skin and too many eyes. “You've seen what happens when I lose control. You've felt the terror I inspire. You know what I'm capable of.”
“I’ve also seen you create something beautiful," Ava gestured at the golden threads around them. “I’ve seen you protect people. I've seen you love.”
“Aberrations. All of it.” Serrik's voice was bitter. “Moments of weakness that mean nothing in the face of what I truly am.”
Ava stared at him, feeling her heart break. “You really believe that, don't you? You really think you're incapable of being anything but a weapon.”
“I know what I am.”
“No, you know what you were told you are. There's a difference.” She moved closer, close enough that she could see the pain hidden behind his carefully controlled expression. “Serrik, you were a prisoner for two thousand years. You've spent all that time alone, with nothing but your own thoughts and the echo of other people's fear. Of course you believe the worst about yourself.”
“And what would you have me believe instead?” He laughed, cruel and angry, pointed entirely at himself. “That deep down, I am noble? Kind-hearted? How adorably naïve.”
“I’d have you believe the truth.” She reached out slowly, giving him every chance to pull away. When he didn't, she placed her hand on his chest, directly over his heart. “That you're complicated. That you're capable of both creation and destruction, just like any other person with the power to do both. That your nature isn't fixed, and your choices matter more than your origins.”
Serrik's breath hitched at her touch. “Ava…”
“I know you're scared," she continued softly. "I know the idea of facing Valroy terrifies you, not because you might lose, but because you might win. Because winning means becoming everything you've tried so hard not to be. Because winning might mean you have tochoose to forgive.”
“You don't understand?—”
“I understand perfectly." She looked up into his golden eyes, seeing the centuries of pain reflected there. "You're afraid that if you let yourself become the weapon you were designed to be, you'll never find your way back. You're afraid that the monster will consume the man.”
Serrik was quiet for a long moment, his gaze searching her face. “It will.”
“And I’ll still be here with you if it does.” She met his gaze unflinchingly. “Because you’d be right there with me if I was lost to the Web. Wouldn’t you?”
Serrik raised his hand to cover hers, his touch gentle despite the sharpness of his nails. “You ask too much of me,” he whispered.
“I ask everything of you,” Ava replied. “Because you're everything to me.”
“Ava...?”
“I love you.” Her words came out in a rush. “I know it's complicated, I know the circumstances are fucked up beyond belief, I know we haven't known each other very long in the grand scheme of things. But I love you, Serrik. Not despite what you are, but because of it. All of it.”
Serrik stared at her, his expression cycling through disbelief, hope, and something that might have been terror. “You do not know what you are saying. If this is a ploy?—”
“Shut thefuck up,you stupid seven-legged spider. I know exactly what I'm saying.” She stepped closer, close enough that she had to tilt her head back to maintain eye contact. “I’m saying that I choose you. Monster, spider, bastard, exile, everything, or something in between.I love you.”
“Even if I lose myself? Even if I become something you can't recognize?”
“Then I'll love whatever you become, and I'll fight to bring back whatever remains of who you are now.” Her voice was steady, certain. “That's what love means, isn't it? Staying even when things get impossible?”
Serrik's carefully constructed composure finally cracked completely. His shoulders sagged, and for a moment, he looked every one of his nearly two thousand years. “You ask me to risk your love. And that love is all that matters to me.”
