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The fury behind his voice pierces my heart like a rusted dagger. A single puncture wound that leaves me infected and bleeding out.
“Dessin,” Warrose scolds.
I hear Dessin panting with wild energy racing off his standing frame. And right now, nothing is more heartbreaking than the fact that all I want is for Kaspias to leave me in his cage. Leave me in his arms. I just want that hug only Dessin and Kane can give me.
“I’ll take her,” Warrose says softly.
There’s clanking below me as Kaspias unlocks his cage, passing me gingerly to rest against Warrose’s bare chest.
There’s an awkward silence that stretches from Kaspias to the rest of us. All I can hear is the even breathing and heartbeat of Warrose’s warm skin against my left ear.
I open my eyes again, finding Kaspias staring down at Ruth. A deep crease forming between his eyebrows. “I’ll make this right.”
As he walks away. Dessin growls, banging his fists against the metal bars.
“Knock it off!” Warrose snarls.
“Skylenna,” Niles murmurs, kissing my forehead like he hasn’t seen me in years. “What happened?”
I blink through the tears, through the pain of Dessin so close yet so far away. I exhale slowly, unraveling a shaky breath that sounds dangerously close to a sob.
“C-cold,” I say.
“She must have done some damage in the void,” Warrose explains. “Let’s get her warmed up.”
I let my eyes rest as Marilynn helps take off my uniform, pressing my damp skin to Warrose and Niles’s chests. They wrap the blankets around us, creating a cocoon of body heat. Through the fading in and out of consciousness, Ruth holds my hand, Niles whispers sweet words, Warrose massages my cold feet.
“How can you all treat her like she’s some sort of angel?” Dessin speaks, and it feels like a razor blade carving the skin and muscles off my bones.
“Because she is an angel,” Marilynn answers. “You both are.”
“Is this what you wanted?” Dessin’s question is directed at me. I sense the weight of it, like a rock too heavy to skip across the water.
“What?” I mutter with a dry mouth.
“To isolate me from my friends. To leave me with nothing and no one.”
With labored breaths, I force myself up, using my hand to push off Warrose’s shoulder and Niles’s thigh to grip the bars, facing Dessin in his cage. His blazing eyes shudder as they land on my naked body, my blue lips, my puffy, tear-streaked face.
Dessin looks away, taking long, staggered breaths.
“L-look at m-me,” I command in a wobbly voice. He continues glaring at the floor. “LOOK AT ME!”
Dessin drags his glower from the floor to me reluctantly.
It brings me back to the Red Oaks. To the time he lit a fire on the shore of the lagoon. I took my wet dress off, and I dared him to look at my body.
“You. Are. Not. Alone.” I wish I could still my body, stop it from shivering, stop the endless chill from freezing my veins.
He remains so still. Not even an ounce of compassion.
“If I w-wasn’t sick right now, I’d go into the v-void, and I wouldn’t come back until I found you. I would use my l-last breath to show you every memory I have of the two of us.” I grip the bars, sensing my friends turning away to give me privacy as I bear my soul to him.
“I have every memory of us. Do you know how many alters have had to split off because of those memories?” He shows his teeth, grimacing at my naked body. Disgusted. Hysterical wrath unfurling in his bloodstream.
“I don’t care about the fabricated memories that the Mind Phantoms gave you. I want you to s-see ME! I w-want you to remember when you watched Meridei whip me in the asylum. The rage you felt because all you wanted was to protect me. To—avenge me.”
Tears flood over my bottom lashes, gushing down my red cheeks. I force the stammering away from my voice so I can get this out clearly.
