Page 39 of The Gargoyle's Captive

Her mother is responsible for the death of everyone I’ve ever loved. Even knowing that Grace didn’t come here for the same purpose, how does someone move past a hurt like this? Some mountains are too high to fly over. “What is there to say?” I laugh, the sound harsh in my throat. “Maybe my people are right. Maybe my family is cursed. I can think of no other explanation for me finding the person my soul connects to most, only to discover the body of violence that means we can never be together.”

“Bram.” Grace still hasn’t moved. It’s like she thinks that if she shifts too quickly, she’ll drive me from the room. I’m not sure she’s wrong. “This is a shock for me, too. I don’t...” She shakes her head and lifts her chin. “Please don’t say anything that you can’t take back. I’ve meant every single word I’ve said to you. I care about you. Hell, I’m falling for you. I have set aside my entire purpose for being here in order to spend more time with you. I know this is fucked up—”

“Fucked up,” I echo. “Fucked up doesn’t begin to cover it. I just summoned the nobles to this castle. What do you think they will do when they find out I have the daughter of the monster who killed my family, in my bed, willingly? They won’t follow me. I can’t even blame them for that.”

Grace’s eyes seem too large in her face, her pale skin blanched. “That’s what you’re concerned about?”

I don’t know what I’m concerned about. I don’t know what I’m feeling. I should’ve seen this coming, and the humiliation that I didn’t is almost too much to bear. Azazel knew. Ramanu too. Were they laughing at me behind my back? Poor, foolish Bram, too shortsighted to realize he had an enemy in his midst. And “fool” doesn’t begin to cover the fact that I have fallen in love with this woman.

I don’t know how to reconcile how I feel about her against everything that now stands between us. “I need time.”

“I don’t know a single person who said they need time who has ever come back.”

I don’t either. It’s usually the beginning of the end. “I need time,” I repeat. “You wanted answers from Azazel. I’ll send you back to the bargainer demon territory to get them. After I meet with the nobles here, we’ll talk.”

“Sure we will. Whatever you say.” The fire inside Grace is dampened. She’s being bathed in the pale blue of sorrow threaded with the violet of resolve. I watch in silence as she stands and pulls on her clothes. This feels like the worst goodbye I’ve ever had to say, and I don’t know how to stop it. I do need time. But I don’t know if it will result in me talking myself into being with her... or out of being with her.

Grace stops in front of me, and for one breathless moment, I think that she’s going to tell me she loves me. I saw that color in her energy earlier. I know I did. Instead she stares at the center of my chest. “I would like to leave the room.”

And I’m standing in her way.

I step to the side, and she walks past me without another word. I tell myself to go after her, to tell her that it doesn’t matter what the past holds because we choose the future. I don’t move an inch. Not until I’m sure she’s gone back to her room. Only then do I fly to my study and pen a summons to Ramanu. I’m not ready to face Azazel yet. Maybe I never will be.

No, that’s a coward’s thinking. I will face Azazel. I will certainly ask him why he chose to send Grace to me. Yes, he protested, but not that strongly, and he never told me why. It’s almost enough for me to think... I shake my head sharply. Grace is no assassin sent to kill me. I may not be certain of much, but I am certain of that. This situation is fucked up but not that fucked up.

I write the summons, and it’s only a few seconds later when Ramanu arrives. They walk through my door as if they arrived here by mundane means instead of teleportation. “You called?” Their tone is irreverent, but their energy gives them away.

“Why are you worried, Ramanu? Is it possibly because Grace is the daughter of the woman who killed my entire family?”

They eye me, and their shoulders drop several inches. “In my defense, I already told you that I argued against it.”

“Yes, you said you were against it... but not why.” I turn away. “Take her.”

“Excuse me?”

“Was I not clear? I don’t want Grace here right now. If I change my mind, I will come retrieve her.”

Ramanu is silent for so long, my curiosity and frustration override my good sense and I turn to face them. They are studying me with a strange look on their face. “You love her.” I don’t feel like they’re laughing at me. “Why are you sending her away if that’s how you feel?”

We are not friends. We never will be. But in this moment, I give them honesty when I can barely be honest with myself. “It’s because I love her that I’m sending her away. I don’t know if there’s a path forward for us through this, but there definitely isn’t if I don’t have time and space to work through this revelation. I don’t want to hurt her while I’m in pain.”

“I see.” They nod. “Very well. When you come to retrieve her, send a warning to us.”

I don’t know whether to be grateful or frustrated that they have no doubt I will come for Grace. But then, they’re right, aren’t they? I might not see a path through, but I didn’t see myself getting to this place either. There has to be a way. But I can barely think past the betrayal and pain wrapped around my throat.

Hermother.

The specter that haunts my nightmares, who left her fingerprints on all my trauma, is the woman who birthed Grace. The mother who taught her everything she knows. The one Grace loved enough to search for by bargaining away seven years of her life in a realm filled with monsters like the ones she spent her life hunting. They are the same person, and I don’t know how to reconcile that. I don’t know if it’s possible.

I swear I sense the moment Ramanu takes Grace from the castle. It shouldn’t be possible to feel her absence with this much space between us, but I do. I’m sure of it. I don’t know if I’m making a mistake. I don’t know anything at all.

* * *

Days pass without answers.It doesn’t matter what path my thoughts travel; they all end up in the same place. Grace and I were doomed from the start. No matter what our intentions were, the circumstances are simply impossible. Fuck if that doesn’t hurt, a new scar to add to my collection. I don’t know how to be with her, but if I can’t figure it out, I’m going to spend the rest of my life missing her.

It’s almost a week to the day when there’s a rough knock on the door to my study. I know who’s on the other side. There’s only one person in this realm whose energy constantly has the deep forest green of pride. It’s aggravating enough even without my current circumstances. “Come in.” I might as well get this over with.

Azazel steps into my study and looks around. He’s as out of place here as a hellcat in water, but somehow that doesn’t seem to bother him. He’s never lacking in confidence. “I thought we should speak.”

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