?His lips press into my temple before he stands up and leaves. The weight of his arm disappearing and I almost miss it.
?My thing tugs to my left with a sorrowful pull and I know Callahan is hurt but I’m just. . . I. . .
?I shove the vegetable into my mouth and then stab another piece of food with more force than needed.
?Once again, there was no burning as Thorne touched me. I have half a mind to smack Callahan’s hand over my face to see if he’s the same. But I’m currently ignoring him, which is shit and I’m being a complete bitch about it, but I just need to focus on one thing right now.
?Callahan ends up leaving when I’m halfway done and Jullia, Ricka, and Hanna immediately go off with questions, comments, and whatever else. I tune them out as I try to finish my food as fast as I can. I didn’t tell Jullia about what happened after we left our rooms in our costumes.
?They all know I won the wish because that was announced on their social media site, but it’s not allowed for the wish maker to say their wish out loud. Depending on the wish it’s usually obvious for people to figure it out – wealth, beauty, brains – but I haven’t made my wish yet.
?Another strain because wishes gifted are not meant to be held. Unless they have a containment, you shouldn’t hold onto a wish for more than a day. It’s like holding a star, and even the primordials have weakened to near mortals because of the strain.
?That’s why I’ve been more preoccupied this week. And also because part of me just wants to pretend everything going on doesn’t matter so I can just live a simple university life, graduate, and then laze around the brothel for the next ten years. The other part of me wants to work out what exactly is going on between my celestials, the rebels, and everything else about me and my past.
?I finish and jump out of my seat to head back to my dorm. I’m sure whatever Thorne is wanting he’ll either meet me there or stop me on my way.
?What a giant freakin mess. All of this. Secrets and curses and fate and higher powers and I am so tired. I am so exhausted.
?I wish I was angry. Anger is always better than exhaustion or depression. Rage is fuel, even if only for a time.
?I’m about to step onto the path that leads to the dorms when a hand stakes around my waist and the scent of ozone and copper drifts before a flash of black. The buildings before me are replaced by rundown warehouses and streets covered in blanketed snow.
?Shadows still drift as I push Thorne out of my hold and internally scream. I want to scream. I want to rage.
?Rage.
?Fury.
?There are so many things going on in my brain, too many things. So much concentration and control and before it never mattered because I didn’t have to deal with any of this. I didn’t have to worry about spies and rebels and keeping secrets and broody males who wanted to know them.
?I could forget about the past.
?I could pretend I was nothing.
?Not now though.
?“Save that,” he drawls as he grabs my arm and begins pulling me into one of the buildings. Always drawling, always lazy, always entitled, always a fucking demon with their high fucking morality.
?That’s why the witches hate them. It’s not just bone witches and blood demons that are instinctual enemies, it’s witches as a whole against demons as a whole. And with good fucking reason.
?I try to jerk my arm out of his grasp but he pulls me in close and wraps his arms around me again. Warmth cascading throughout my body and for the smallest of seconds, the split-est moment of time, I want to relax into his hold. I want to drop all the weight and let him hold me.
?I had done that last week in the ballroom. It was such a weak, pathetic momentfor me, but god did it feel so good. Pretending for just that blip that I was just a normal girl and he was just a normal boy.
?I can’t slip up again though, so I’m mentally preparing myself for the fight that is about to happen when he says, “I entered your name into the match for tonight’s fight.”
?Well if he wanted to shut me up from the beginning he could have started with that.
?I pull my head back and peer up at him. The corner of his lip ticks up as he gazes down at me.
?“Darian said you need to fight.” He pauses for a moment and his eyes trace my face. “He said you need to fight with your arms and legs exposed.”
?I think I might just regret asking that damned angel for help.
?Looking away, I sigh. I’m sure he was connecting the dots too. Somehow, in certain circumstances, when they touch me it doesn’t burn. Maybe a loophole in the curse or. . . I sigh again, something to do with fate.
?“How does being touched correlate to burning?”
