Page 4 of Break Her Heart
“Bronwen!” I jumped at the sound of my name, ripping my hand away from the hearth. I was so lost in my thoughts that I hadn’t realized that the flames had crept up my arm, searing the fabric of my sleeve. Adar’s voice had never sounded so much like Papa’s.
He sat in a small wooden chair behind me, daylight peeking behind him through the windows. I had brought us to thecoven’s cabin and immediately sank to the floor in front of the fire. Now I realized I had been sitting here for hours. Had he been talking to me?
He stared at me, unmoving. His eyes looked glassy, like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. He dragged a hand through his hair once, then again, before his knuckles whitened against the armrest. Then he erupted.
“You told me nothing! Trust you? I did. I followed you blindly and we killed the fucking king! But that wasn’t the worst part. Your littleboyfriendis one of them! Bronwen, what did you do?”
Tears pooled in my eyes.
Adar took a breath, but I flinched as he shifted forward. My whole body tensed, instinctively pulling back like I expected him to lash out. He froze, his brow furrowing at my reaction, and that made the shame hit even harder.
“Tell me what you’ve done,” he said, steadier now, but with an edge that scraped like ice.
And I did.
I told him everything. I watched his face shift with every detail, and with each passing second, the distance between us grew. I hated how hollow I sounded. Like I was narrating someone else’s story, not mine.
I told him about the night I was marked—how I let it happen, how I convinced myself I could handle it. I told him about the nightmares and how real they felt, how they tore pieces of me away one at a time. I told him how many times August and I tried to kill each other, and how I started to forget why we stopped.
I couldn’t meet Adar’s eyes when I told him about the journal. About the witches. About Lowen and his friend. I saw something shift in him when I got to the part about the Legion soldiers. His mouth opened slightly, maybe to interrupt, but he didn’t say a word. He just listened.
And when I finally told him about meeting the king—about how I didn’t know it was Carrow, how I let myself get close—I felt the final crack split wide open inside me.
“I didn’t know his father was Carrow,” I said, barely above a whisper. “I should have. All the signs were there, but I was too blinded to see them. Too stupid. And now they are dead.”
I waited for him to say something. My pulse pounded in my ears, drowning out the crackle of the fire. I braced for him to yell again, to walk out, to tell me I was as twisted as August. The silence felt like standing at the edge of a cliff, waiting for the wind to shove me over.
“Please. Say something.”
He didn’t look at me. Instead, he kept his eyes on the ground. I thought this was it. That he had shut me out. I wouldn’t blame him if he did.
And still, a part of me feared it so deeply I couldn’t breathe.
He pushed himself out of the chair and knelt in front of me. “You went through all of that. Alone.” He grabbed my face, pain painted across his own. “No more secrets. No more lies. We only have each other, and I—I can’t lose you.”
I nodded, wishing this was it. That we could move past it all, run away and start over. But it wasn’t.
The numbness hadn’t lifted. The guilt still dug into my bones.
“He said I didn’t really kill him.”
“What?”
“He wasn’t making sense, but he said that on the next Blood Moon, Carrow will take over his body.”
Adar closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “He could be lying.”
I nodded. “I know. But I need to see him. To see if he’s telling the truth.”
“Then I am going with you.”
“No. He won’t hurt me.” Not physically at least. Emotionally, probably. “He had the chance, and he didn’t.”
“Do not keep me in the dark anymore. Let me take this burden on with you. Please, B.” His voice cracked, his eyes searching mine with desperation.
“He won’t talk if you’re with me.”
“Oh, he’s going to talk,” Adar growled. “If he wants to fucking live, he’s going to talk. Besides, I have something that will make him talk.”
