Page 118 of When Ashes Fall

“You are my mate,” I told her.

“No, I’m not. You’ve made it clear you’ll never claim me as such again, and I agree.”

My finger tightened on her hair. I had said that, but things had changed, and she wouldn’t deny what was meant to be.

I’d never be the same, I’d always be broken, and I wasn’t the man she deserved, but I didn’t give a fuck anymore. All I cared about was taking what was mine.

Tugging gently on her hair, I tried to pull her toward me, but her feet remained firmly planted. “You are my mate.”

Her chin rose. “No, I’m not. I don’t know what animal you were supposed to be, but it wasn’t the beast you are now. That animal claimed me, not the beast. I’m no one’s mate.”

My fangs extended as the beast became a hurricane within me. Its snarl rumbled through my chest and up my throat. Wariness flashed across Briar’s features before she covered it.

“I did a lot of thinking while I was out there spreading your potion,” I told her.

She twisted her head to try pulling her hair free, but I refused to relinquish it. With a huff, she gave up trying to break away. “I hope all that thinking didn’t hurt you.”

“You’re funny, mea eveto,” I murmured.

“Don’t call me that.”

“And why not?” I asked with a deceptively calm tone, considering the turmoil within me.

“Because I’m not your mea eveto. I’m your mea perfidious eveto, remember?”

“I remember.” Instead of tugging her closer, I caressed her cheek with the finger I’d entwined her hair around. “I remember everything about you.”

“No, you chose to forget everything about me when you chose to believe the lies my mother told about me.”

The cool indifference of her words broke as sorrow filled her voice. I’d meant to shatter her hardened exterior, but I didn’t want this.

“You don’t know what it was like in the harem,” I told her.

She tried to slap my hand away from her cheek, but I flattened my palm against her skin. Her hit did as much damage as a gnat fighting a basilisk. When she failed to dislodge me, her hands fisted at her sides.

“I know that!” she cried. “I can imagine what you went through and understand the horror, torment, and degradation you all endured, but I can never know. You’ve made that very clear.”

“That’s right,” I growled as I stepped closer. “You’ll never understand the desperation we felt to retain our true selves while trying to remember the good times. You have no idea how long I clung to the memories of sunshine on my face, the smell of the forest, the way the leaves sound when the wind blows, or the taste of you.

“I’ll make sure you never learn what it’s like to have the memories of good things slip away because your entire existence is nothing but degradation. Or how awful it feels when you start wanting to forget those things because it’s too painful to remember and all hope of breaking free fades.

“You can’t understand what it’s like to have women you loathe crawling all over you while telling you the worst things you could ever imagine. And not just the women, but the men also abusing you in the most degrading ways possible.

“You’ll never understand what it’s like to have your body respond to them, even if it was as the beast. How humiliating that was.”

Her mouth parted as her eyes widened. “You couldn’t help that.”

I held her gaze as I twirled her hair around my finger before unwinding it again. “Maybe not. Maybe I couldn’t control the beast, but I could have controlled the worst of it, and I didn’t.”

“What was the worst of it?”

I stared at the beautiful color of her hair as memories threatened to overwhelm me. “As hope fades, the whispers of betrayal continue to fill your ears.” When I stepped closer, she didn’t move away but tipped her head back. “And those whispers only serve to confirm what you’ve started to believe.”

“What’s that?”

“That there is nothing good left in this world.”

Her mouth parted on a small “Oh” of sadness.