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CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
WYN
Tara fiddles with her nails, an old habit she’s always done when she’s nervous.
I step away from Bash, inching closer to her. When Tara sees what I’m doing, she flinches but I take her hand.
“Are you okay?”
She lets out a shaky laugh.
“I’m not sure how to answer this. Yes, no, both.”
“What…what did you see when Bash, um, touched you with his shadows?”
Her eyes unfocus, and it takes her a second to find her voice.
“I saw myself die alone because I drove everyone away. And then I saw—no, felt—all your pain from my actions.”
Tara chokes on a sob, and her words cut through me.
Her fears mirrors my own, ones of isolation, of being unlovable.
The memories of my own dark, twisting path claw at me—a place where phantoms of my past whispered cruelties in my ear.
“I know the pain of feeling alone, of thinking you’re unlovable—no one wants to end up like that—but it’s not true. You don’t have to live alone and you can be loved. We all have shadows we fight, fears that drive us, but they don’t define us. But most importantly, you don’t have to fight alone.”
“Who’s going to fight with me?”
“I will.”
Tara’s mouth drops open.
“Why? Why would you do that?”
“Because there’s a light inside of you—inside all of us—and it grows brighter when someone helps it shine. I believe you can shine, you just need someone to show you how to find your light.”
Her tears fall fast as she launches herself into my arms.
Even in heels, she’s many inches shorter than me, and I hug her tightly.
“Wyn?”
“Yes?”
“I have another confession…I’m super jealous of your hair.”
The sheer silliness of this after everything takes me off guard, and I burst into laughter.
“Don’t be. I’ll show you the hair products I use.”
Some of the tension eases in the room, and I turn to até.
Once he was the most commanding figure I ever knew, but now, he seems a shell of himself.
“Tell me what you saw,” I whisper as I walk over to him.
He shudders, shaking his head, but I won’t back down.
