Page 90 of A War of Embers

“But you weren’t there! You weren’t anywhere. I could feel you,” he pounds his fist into his chest right over his heart. “I knew you were alive, but I couldn’t pinpoint your location. You vanished and no one could find you. I understand you’re pissed off that I lied to you, but you don’t get to just vanish into thin air anytime you want, Keres.”

Right now seems like a bad time to point out the intent of my vanishing was to never come back here. I thought I found a way to relieve the pain of my actions that ride me every moment of every day, but every time I think I find a way there’s another loophole. “I know you’re upset with me for leaving like that, but I thought I was doing what was right.”

“For who?” he snaps.

“Me!” I poke my finger into my own chest. “Me, Rowan. I was trying to do what’s right for me.” Pulling in a deep breath, I quickly let it out to continue on before he can interrupt what I’m trying to say. “Neither of us are listening to each other. You lied, tied me to you without my consent as your mate, and didn’t even bother telling me you did so. I had to find out from other people what the mark on my face meant. But you aren’t hearing me when I say I’m tired, Rowan. I live with every evil thing I’ve done replaying on a loop in my mind. I want it to stop. But you don’t care about that because your monster decided it wanted a mate and so you tied me to you.”

Rowan blinks several times but says nothing, so I press on.

“I’m not listening to you either,” I admit. “I don’t want to hear you tell me about how my life can be different. How you’ll keep me safe. How I can have friends and experience emotions I thought were permanently lost to me. I don’t feel like I deserve to have the life you’re offering after everything I’ve done.”

“I knew from the moment I felt your presence here in Aïdes who you were to me. I knew down to the fiber of my being, the force of my magic, that you belonged to me like I belonged to you. I thought you were coming for me. I thought you knew who I was. But you had no idea. You don’t feel it in your soul the way I feel it in mine. I understand that. I fed you a lie to keep you close because I don’t know what to do, Keres. You want to die, you want to disappear eternally forever. Mates are considered highly valuable, especially here in Aïdes where there are so few to be found. But your culture, the way you live in Tellus, they don’t tell you about any of this. You have no idea what you walked into when you came here and I was out of my depth trying to figure it out as well.”

My mind begins to spin as I think about what he’s saying. He recognized who I was by my soul? “You never said anything.”

“All you want to do is die.” Rowan angrily kicks one of the tables until it skitters a few feet away. “You don’t want to hear what I have to say, so I don’t bother.”

“So you trapped me into becoming a Lady? You put a mating mark on me so people would know who I am and be hesitant to do what I’m asking?”

Rowan snorts. “You think I put my mark on you for that? I put my mark on you because it fucking pleases me to see it imprinted on your skin where it’ll never fade, never come off. Even in your death, it’ll remain. So no, Keres, I didn’t put it on you to warn other people away. I put my mating mark on you because if you succeed in this suicide mission, then at least you’ll have a part of me when you go.”

Shock fills me while I try to rationalize what he’s saying. This…this isn’t what I thought he would say to me. “I don’t understand. You knew?”

“The immortal souls are blocking–”

Anger rises quickly. Not at him, but at this situation. Everything boils down to Lady Gwenyth’s heinous crimes. “You mean the fact my soul is that of a monster so it calls to yours? I would understand how this all works, how being a Lady works, if I wasn’t stolen from here as a babe?”

Rowan freezes.

Although Rowan’s eyes remain black, his monster is still in control with his volatile emotions so close to the surface, he grows to an unnatural stillness as he watches me.

“You knew.” Or he suspected at the very least.

He doesn’t bother confirming or denying. No, Rowan isn’t going to tell me much about what’s going on in this realm. He never does. “How do you know?” he volleys.

“Micah said only a monstrous soul can recognize another one. You recognized mine.”

Rowan’s face transforms into a thunderous expression. “You went to the Cliff of Embers.”

Lifting my chin in defiance, I confirm his suspension. “Yes, I did. Lady Cirilla said immortals–”

A booming rattle echoes out of Rowan’s chest. “Lady Cirilla told you what, Keres? That going there would be easy and the High Lord protecting the gateway would allow you in?”

I was hoping. Now isn’t the best time to explain that, though. Stiffly, I point out, “I already explained to you why I went there.” Crossing my arms tightly across my chest, I glare at him. “Now, I think we need to have a talk about all the shit you’ve been keeping from me because it’s a lot, Rowan. You’re doing things in some misguided–”

“I’m not forthcoming on issues that appear here in Aïdes because you don’t want to be made aware. You don’t want to stop and think about what’s going on with my people and my side of the realm. You’re all about what you want. I’m not forcing shit on you because you already have your mind made up. Be pissed off that you’re kept in the dark if you want, but the reality is I’ve been doing things the way you want them to be done.”

Grinding my back molars together as he speaks, I resist the urge to interrupt him the way he did me. “You don’t think telling me I was potentially born here and stolen might have been something I needed to know?”

“No,” Rowan answers bluntly. “You came here with one thing in mind. Who cares where you’re born? This isn’t your home, these aren’t your people. You made your point when you asked to die.”

“That doesn’t mean you should’ve kept things from me!”

“Really?” Rowan drawls. “Like you’ve been keeping shit from me? Stalking Lady Cirilla in hopes of me cashing in on my side of the bargain? Or maybe when you went snooping in my study and stole jewels to use as currency to pay for your death and for my people to look the other way? Or maybe the fact you went fucking missing? At what point do I believe you’re not strictly focused on your goal enough to give a fuck about other people besides yourself, Keres?”

The more he says my name, the more unstable my emotions feel rioting inside. Like a physical blow punching my heart every single time. “You didn’t tell me that I was your mate.”

Impatient, he snaps, “For the same fucking reasons. Do you think I like keeping myself held back emotionally and physically when I’m around you? Do you think I don’t wish you would open your mind to the possibility of finding peace here, with my people, with me? I’m not about to force anything on you, Keres. And I’m not about to put you in front of my people when you don’t care what happens to them. You want to die? Fine. You’re not harming innocent people on your downward spiral to do so.”

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