"Fuck!" Graves cursed, twisting into a strangled plea as he fell forward, catching himself on his palms. From the corner of his eye, he saw the black of his feathers stretched wide and true. Warm, hot blood dripped down his spine from the two tears in his back where his wings had ripped free.
His breaths were strangled and desperate as he labored for air, feeling like he was going to pass out. His head was light, his vision speckled with darkness as everything wavered. He couldn’t hold himself up any longer; he fell to his front, the action jarring his whole body as a low, tired sound clawed its way up his sore, ravaged throat.
Graves blinked, fingers curling in the stone floor. "Luella," he whispered, as the golden light of the candle danced upon the grey stone, making him think of her hair, once spun a shade similar—her eyes that had once sparkled like the sunlight. But now she was so much more untouchable. Blue like moonlight and dappled like stars.
She was his greatest melancholy and the source of all his wants.
And Luella was what Graves thought of as he lay on the ground, unable to move, every breath hitching in his chest, making a fresh wave of blood gush down his back, agony taking him hostage—would he ever be free of this feeling?
Somewhere in the deep corners of his mind, he swore he heard Luella’s soft laughter.
Graves’s wings lay over him like a blanket, keeping him warm as he started to shiver from blood loss.
30
TORRENT OF MUSINGS
LUELLA
There was a soft knock on the door to Luella’s mind.
Her white hair fanned above her as she lay on the bed, tracing the cracks in the stone walls, wondering how many more it would take until everything crumbled.
Thunder boomed outside. Distant, but there. Rocking through the entire mountain.
She did not move as she sent a loud refusal battering against the door of her mind.
Get out!
She wanted no company, nor mercy from her thoughts. She was content to die in the torrent of her musings.
The knocking did not cease. A present, tap-tap-tap against the door of her thoughts. She imagined it to be a door crafted of wood, with blooming flowers crawling up the sides. Inviting and warm like the fragility of spring, right before the air turned thick and hot—the time of seasons in which they were quickly approaching. Spring.
Winter was relinquishing its hold on everyone and everything, and she felt it ever more clearly in the warmth of the Fallen Isles.
Luella imagined the flowers and vines snaking up the wooden door growing ripe with thorns, repelling the one who wished to steal into her mind. The interloper of her thoughts, the thief of her dreams—returned to her, again.
She had thought he had learned. But it appeared as though he had not.
A faint, thready whisper seeped between the cracks:
I must speak with you, pet. If there was another way, believe me, I would not be breaking my promise like this. So soon.
Luella knew he told the truth. They were trapped in solitude, unable to see each other or converse. And they hadmuchto converse about.
She released a long-suffering sigh.You may come into my thoughts… Just this once.
She felt Bastian inside her, then, a presence drifting through her mind carefully with ghostly steps, as if not wishing to disrupt the litany of her thoughts.
She blinked up at the ceiling, breath hitching as his voice rumbled deep inside her, louder now that he was truly in her mind:
I’m sorry, pet.
"What do you have to be sorry about?" Luella spoke aloud, her voice a low murmur.
I took part in keeping Graves’s secret,Bastian replied.
She thought about it for a long while. Could she fault the vampire for helping to deceive her? It was not Bastian’s secret to share, but Graves’s.Heshould be the one coming to her in apology.
