“I don’t care what she wanted.”
Zarrek’s jaw tensed. “Yeah. I can see that.”
“Why didn’t you obey me?” Resh’s voice hardened. “You were there. You saw how close she was to death. And you still let her burn herself out for me—”
“You were the one burning, Resh’Agar. She was trying to keep your runes from flaying you open in your sleep.”
“You should have stopped her.” His fists clenched.
Zarrek stepped forward. “I did watch her. I watched her save you. I watched her risk herself because you won’t admit you’re not made of stone.”
Resh lunged a half-step, fury crackling.
Zarrek didn’t flinch. “She loves you,” he said flatly.
Resh froze.
“All she wanted was to keep you safe while you finally—finally—slept.”
Silence. Deafening.
Zarrek exhaled, turned away. “I should’ve stopped her. But I couldn’t. Because she’d already made up her mind to protect the only thing she couldn’tlive without.”
Then, quieter, “And maybe I thought you deserved to see it.”
He walked off without waiting for an answer.
Resh stood alone, fury still pounding in his ears, haunted by silver eyes and the pain he had put there. He had never meant to hurt her. Void. He only wanted her to know how precious she was. To those around her. To herself. To him.
Resh couldn’t stay still.
Running the perimeter, checking wards, and all his usual duties wouldn’t diffuse the roiling boil in his gut. The itching at his nape returned with a vengeance, and no amount of scratching soothed it.
He needed violence. Exertion. A way to scream to the sunless sky without unleashing an earthquake. As it was, his magic pushed against his self-control, mana leeching past his barriers and lashing out at the nearest victim.
A tent went flying, ripped from the ground, as he passed. Wind shifted around him. A fire pit cracked in half, the pot resting on a spit above it thrown backwards.
He went to the sparring ring, but none dared face him in this state. They made excuses. Wagon repairs. Patrols. Gathering supplies. He grabbed a practice blade and shifted through stances. Mindlessly.
Voids-damned cowards.
So what if he wanted to hit a little harder than he usually did? So what if he went too far? He wanted to push them to fight back. Hit him like theymeant it. Maybe if one hit hard enough, it could surpass the gaping woundfestering in his gut. Maybe the sound of ringing steel could drown out the reverberations of her voice still echoing over and over in his skull.
Ididn’t know you saw me as a burden.
The metal blade snapped in his hands like a twig. The pieces fell to the ground, but he didn’t hear theirclang.
Rain fell in thin, needling sheets—sharp and icy. The torrents of water hissed against the blackened stone where a campfire had long since burned out. But Resh didn’t move. He stared at nothing.
…a burden...
Burdens could be carried. They just had to be controlled. Mitigated. Guided. If she would just stop using thataccursedpower, then everything would be all right. If she would just be with him, stay with him, live with him, smile with him—he needed nothing else from her.
Only the chance to see her.
The chance to touch her, even in passing.
To hear her laughter.
