Marcus abruptly shut his mouth. His face paled, as if he had a terrifying realization he said something he shouldn't. Everyone’s mouth dropped open, and the table gotso quiet.
I’d turned water to ice so many times in my life that I knew exactly how it felt when the magic left my fingers. That same sensation flooded over my entire body and froze me to the bench as my stomach bottomed out. “What… what did you just say?”
“Fuck,” Marcus mumbled. He tore at his curls, and Rishi began meowing frantically underneath the table. “I wasn’t supposed to— he’s gonna be— shit.”
I was over and across that table so fast a vampire couldn’t catch me. I bunched my hands in Marcus’ collar and began shaking him. “Marcus,tell me. What did he say!?”
Marcus squeezed out the words. “When Charlie went to the hypnotist… he remembered his past, before he lost his sight. Eagle Spirit came to him on the night of your birth and took him to your mom. Charlie saw dark spirits all around her, sent by evil gods, and their power was killing you as your mom was trying to give birth. You weredying, Ava. Eagle Spirit said that the only way you’d survive is if Charlie sacrificed a piece of himself so you could live, and he decided to give up his sight. He was barely three years old, and he still chose to save you.”
“Fuck,” Ez mumbled under his breath, looking disturbed. He’d heard the story of my birth— everyone in my family had. It’d been a night that had long haunted my mother for ages. She’d always insisted that I shouldn’t have survived, that something was supernatural about the day I was born.Darklysupernatural.
Now I knew why.
“So there. How can you say he doesn’t love you?” Marcus rasped. “What bigger gift could someone give you? He always loved you, from the moment he first saw you. And you were the last thing he saw before he lost his sight forever. What else is love, if not that?”
I unfurled my fingers from Marcus’ sweater and took a step back. Every breath I inhaled felt like a dagger shooting through my lungs. I was speechless. “I— I—”
Everyone lookedveryconcerned. A couple of people went to stand, but before they could follow me, I turned on my heel and ran like hell.
I don’t remember running from the cafeteria back to the cell. All I recall is throwing the door open, and Charlie taking a worried step back when he heard the doorknob smash against the brick wall.
You weren’t gone long, Oberi remarked, still stuck on the couch.
Charlie had barely moved from the spot I’d left him standing in. I witnessed his body stiffen. He sensed there was something big that had changed between us.
A whimper escaped my lips as I staggered forward and threw my arms around him. I held him tighter than I knew I could as tears escaped my eyes and cascaded onto his front. “You gave me your eyes!” I wailed.
“Goddamn it, Marcus,” Charlie growled under his breath as he clutched me to his chest. He folded his arms around me and rocked me back and forth as I wept uncontrollably against his chest.
You two obviously need a minute, Oberi said slowly. Oberi shifted into a husky.While you work it out, I’m gonna get snacks. To the Commissary I go!
I was crumbling to pieces, so once the door clicked closed behind Oberi, Charlie picked me up. My head fell against his shoulder and nestled there as he nudged the bedroom door shut behind us and sat down on the mattress.
I would’ve liked to be carried to the bed on my wedding night not crying buckets, but hey, beggars can’t be choosers.
“What did Marcus tell you?” Charlie’s voice got really soft, and his breath felt like velvet against my cheek.
“Everything.” It felt really good cuddling him. “I owe you my life.”
“Well, you got me back when you saved me from the Underground, so I guess we’re even.” He pressed his lips to the top of my head, and ancestors, a kiss from the gods couldn’t feel better.
“How could you do such a thing? You were practically a baby,” I said. “I shouldn’t even be here, but I am because of you.”
“I don’t regret losing my sight, and even if I could remember what it was like, it was a worthy sacrifice to have you. Missing you in my life would’ve been real blindness, because I never would’ve seen what was truly important,” he replied. “I knew I loved you right away, even when I was that little, before I could even comprehend what love was. I just… looked at you and knew I’d do anything to get the chance to love you.”
It gave a whole new meaning to love at first sight. “But you missed out on so much. And so many terrible things happened to you because you were blind. You would’ve never suffered if you’d had your eyes.”
“There’s nothing more terrible than not having you in my life. If I hadn’t saved you, things would’ve been different, but worse. Yeah, I would’ve had my eyes, but so what? I would’ve lived knowing a piece of my soul was missing, and it would’ve tormented me every day until the second I died. A life without you isn’t a life, Ava; it’s just living. And what does life mean if we can’t be with the people we love?”
I still wasn’t sure. The guilt I felt that he’d made such a sacrifice for me consumed me like a flame that began at my heart and caught fire outward. Charlie had been homeless, starving, taken advantage of and targeted his whole life because he was blind. And for what? For me?
“Yes, for you,” he insisted. “And once I found out what I’d been waiting for, I was happy to do it.”
He’d overheard what I was thinking. We were becoming so seamlessly connected. But I still couldn’t understand his sacrifice.
I loved people— I felt it, knew the emotions, and knew that love was more than that, too. It was devotion, and promises, and yes, even sacrifices. But underneath all that, I was struggling to understand what lovemeant. Because I still didn’t comprehend how Charlie could loveme, especially not that much.
“Would you do it for me?” he asked. The edge of the sentence was clipped. He worried that was the wrong thing to ask.
