“Because someone needs to.” I step into her space, watching the flare of anger war with the sting I know I just landed. “You think being stubborn makes you strong? It doesn’t. It makes you reckless. You latch onto these ideas—I won’t feed, I won’t go home—and even when it’s killing you, you dig in your heels to protect your pride.”
Her breath catches, but she squares her jaw like she’s holding herself together with sheer spite.
“You’d rather die choking on your pride than change course and go home.”
Her hand flies fast. The slap lands sharp across my face.
For a second, all I feel is the heat of it. Then the ache catches up.
She stares at me, wide-eyed, her fingers pressed to her mouth like she can’t believe she did it.
I roll my jaw slowly, testing the sting. Can’t lie—part of me likes the contact.
“Did you burn yourself?” I ask, low. “Did I hurt you?”
Her shock morphs into exasperation again. “Are you serious? I slap you, and you are worried about hurting me?” She scrubs her hands over her face, and I surmise her palm is fine. “Of course you’re serious. That’s all you know how to be. Protect me. Protect, protect, protect. You’ve made it your whole damn personality.”
“Aura—” I start, but she barrels over me.
“How about after you’ve been continually forced tofuckandkillpeople for the majority of your life, then you come back to me and give notes on how I’m handling this.”
My teeth grind. The truth is ugly, but it’s ours and I can’t deny it.
“You think I’m stubborn?” She glares. “You think I’m the one who won’t change? At least I’m trying to figure out who I am. What I want. What living looks like. What about you? Have you even tried to live here? Or have you just been following me around like a shadow, waiting for things to go to shit so you can take me back to the castle where you can control ‘the situation?’” She throws air quotes aroundthe situation. A way to illuminate how we avoid talking about the ugly heart of what it is she does and what I force her to do.
“If you're not safe, nothing matters,” I grit.
“And you think that’s enough? You think that’s living?” She shakes her head, disgust flashing through her exhaustion. “You’re so careful, so controlled. You’ve never even asked what you’re supposed to do when you’re not protecting me. You don’t even know how to want anything beyond that.”
“You think I don’t know that?” I raise my voice to be heard. “You think I haven’t noticed I don’t have a life beyond you? It’s my job. Your parents hunted me down because I’m theonly onewho can help you. I bound my fealty to your safety. Maybe if you could go two damn minutes without needing me to swoop in and save the day, I would have some time to figure out what the hell else I should do.”
Her breath catches, and I see it, that look. The one that says I’ve been too sharp, too harsh.
“That’s it?” Her arms fold tight across her chest, like she’s holding herself together by force alone. “I'm just a job to you?”
I rake my hands through my hair. “Aura, you know that’s not what I mean.” She’s twisting my words around me so quickly, I’m chasing my own wings.
“Well, congratulations,” she says, lifting her chin. “Consider yourself dismissed. Go on a vacation, learn how to knit, find something else to do, Talon, because I’m. Not. Feeding.”
The logic part of her brain has completely switched off.
She’s drowning in grief, in anger, in hunger, and whatever black energy I continually watch stab and sink into her, turning her weaker and paler with every moment that passes. I shake my head. “You have to.”
She shoves me with both hands on my coat. I fall back a step, but it’s not the strength that matters—it’s the rage. “You can force me through the doors. Hell, you can fucking tie me to the bed. But I won’t feed. Not from anyone else. Not ever again.”
“I’m heartbroken too.” That gets her attention. “You think this doesn’t wreck me too?” I drop my voice to a low timbre.
Her head jerks back toward me.
“You think it doesn’t kill me to walk you into that club and serve you up like a dish to everyone there? To pretend it’s fine? To pretend some stranger touching you doesn’t slice through my fucking insides?”
Her mouth parts, eyes wide. She hadn’t expected that. I hadn’t either.
Of all the things I’ve let spill out, I’ve never, not once let jealousy get the best of me. But it’s always been there. Always simmering, bubbling beneath the surface, turning my stomach.
I never wanted to pilethaton top of her burdens.
I grab her by the shoulders. “I love you, Aura. I love you so much, I’ll drag you into that place with these gloves on and let someone else fill you up because I’d rather die of heartbreak and jealousy than watch you waste away.” The words crack out of the deepest part of me, and for a moment, I feel I’ll split in two.
