AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Why would that matter? “A few times. Only at home where no one in the village could see. My parents, they… they knew how to calm me down.”
“Were they like you?”
I shook my head. “My family adopted me when I was an infant. My… my mother was a girl from another village. Young. No family to speak of. Scared of raising a baby on her own. So she gave me to them. My parents said I didn’t start showing what else I was until a few years later, and by that time, no one could find the girl again. But…” An ache throbbed in my chest for my parents. For all they’d been, back before I destroyed them. “My mother and father didn’t care. Even if none of us ever knew what the hell I was, I was still their son. That’s what they always told me. That it didn’t matter what I was. They still loved me.”
I fell silent, my past whispering on the wind like the far-off, agonized cries of the dead.
“How old were you when they died?” Gwyneira asked.
“Thirteen. Old enough that I should never have let that happen.”
“Let it happen? You’re talking like you were the monster that day.”
A pained scoff escaped me. Now she got it. She finally understood. “Exactly.”
Gwyneira took a step closer, and when she spoke, her voice was firm. “No. Roan, dammit, no. You were barely more than a child, and you saw something horrific happening to the people you loved. You weren’t the one who created that nightmare. Those soldiers did. And the fact you reacted when they shot you… It’s awful. But it doesn’t make you the monster.”
I looked away, despairing. Dammit, I didn’t want to hurt her. I’d done that enough. But how much more would it take to make her understand she was wrong about me?
“Roan.” She reached for my hand.
I pulled back. “I was awake.”
She stopped, but when I turned, all I saw was confusion.
I shuddered. “The demon and I… we were different back then. When I was a kid, we were more one, I guess. But it’s not like that anymore. And I’m glad of that. I am. I don’t want to be this… thing. I hate even being the way we are now. But back then, when it—when we—lost control, I saw it. All of it. My father and mother, my brothers and sisters. Even the people in chains. My fire took them all so fast, but they still screamed and screamed, and I couldn’t stop it.”
My chest ached, self-loathing surging as hard and fast as it ever did when I remembered that day. “My little brother was only seven when I killed him. My youngest sister was eight. I watched them burn alive because of me. Because of this thing that I am, the thing I just call a demon because what the fuck other description is there for something like that? And when it was over, the soldiers at the edge of the blast tried to run, and I… I just…”
“What?” she whispered.
“I chased them. Even with everything I’d just done, I wanted them to suffer. To pay. I burned those Aneirans to death nice and slow, and I relished every fucking second of it. And by the time I was finished, I was the only thing left alive in that village.” My head shook, the motion tight and jerky. “The Aneirans might’ve been the ones to attack us that day, but I was the one who killed everybody. So you tell me, how does that make me anything but a monster?”
Silence reigned, and somewhere along the line, everything had gone cold. My skin beneath my makeshift cloak. The air in my lungs. I was shaking so deep down, it was like my insides had turned to ice, and no amount of demonic fire could ever make me warm.
Because now, at last, she’d see. She’d know every reason I hated myself, and because of it all, she’d do the same.
I was a monster. Her kindness would never last in the face of the nightmare of what I’d done.
For the longest moment, Gwyneira didn’t move. She only watched me, saying nothing, until the silence was so deafening that I wanted to scream for her to just leave already. We both knew she had to. I wasn’t worthy of anyone not hating me, let alone showing me the slightest care.
Or love.
Deep inside, the demon ached, echoing the truth we both knew to the core of our mangled souls. We’d only ever tried to drive her away to spare her. Spare ourselves too. She was our torture.
And this moment was the worst torture of all.
“Good,” she whispered.
Everything stopped. “What?”
“Good.” She walked up to me, taking one of my hands, and I was so numbed by shock that I let her. “When it comes to those soldiers, good. Those bastards deserved death for what they planned to do to those kids. For stabbing your mother and for killing all those innocent people in your village. Your people weren’t warriors. That wasn’t about the war. That was a massacre and those soldiers deserved every fucking second of what you gave them for it, and so much more besides.” Her grip quivered, and her voice was tight with fury. “I’m glad you killed them. I’m glad you made it hurt. You did the world a favor.”
What was happening?
Her mouth compressed as she dropped her gaze to where she held my hand in both of her own. “But I’m so sorry for what happened to your family and friends. More sorry than I can ever say. What you did to the people you loved was an accident, though. A horrible, tragic accident that you never would have chosen or wanted, and I hope to the gods that your family would tell you that too if they could. That they’d let you know they forgive you because you weren’t the monster that day, and you still aren’t one now.” Her fingers tightened on my hand as she looked back up, her dark eyes so beautifully earnest and intense, they were like a black sun burning into me. “You kill the monsters.”
I stared at her. “But…” Words failed me. I’d tried over and over to make her see what I truly was, and yet she still didn’t understand. Instead she said these things that hurt so much because they couldn’t possibly be true. Not for something like me. “I… I’m not…”
