Page 242 of Keldori By Daybreak

I glanced around the apartment, trying to remember, but it was hard to separate the two parts of Ciarán in my head. It wasn’t Liam. It was all Ciarán.

“Jonquil liked him more than she liked me, which was annoying,” I finally said.

“Jonquil is perfect,” Ciarán interjected.

“Which is exactly the sort of thing Liam would say to annoy me,” I laughed. “Which he loved to do, by the way.”

“But why did you like him?” Ciarán stepped closer to me, his face falling into shadow as he stepped away from the window.

“I was an ass to him,” I admitted. “But he was kind in return. Whenever Galahad called me to Skalterra, Liam would worry because I’d pass out and he had no idea what was happening. But he’d put me to bed and leave me water. He’d check on me and fuss, which was annoying, but sweet too. I think I secretly liked it.”

Ciarán shook his head. “So he’s nothing like me.”

“I tried to kill you on the ice,” I said. “When we fought on the frozen lake, I had every intention to kill you. But when I almost turned into a rotsbane—”

I fumbled to a halt when Ciarán’s face paled in the dark.

I didn’t have to finish the thought. He knew he’d saved me from turning into a monster, and he had intimate knowledge of how much worse than death that fate would’ve been for me had he not.

“Liam died for me,” I continued. “I betrayed him, but he still ran back into the woods when he heard me call for him.”

“I remember this part already,” Ciarán said, turning away.

“Then you know there was absolutely no way Liam should’ve been able to hear me from the train station, but he did. Do you know why?”

Ciarán paused.

“I don’t,” he finally admitted.

“Because you and I are tethered.” I closed the distance he’d tried to put between us, taking his face in my hands so he couldn’t look away. “And when I called for Liam, he heard me through a connection that only exists between me and you. You heard me. You came into the woods for me. You died for me.”

Ciarán bowed his head, letting my hands slip from his cheeks. “Okay.”

“Okay?” I repeated the word too loudly, and Ciarán flinched away. “Sorry. Right. You mean it?”

“There’s only one way to know for sure if Liam is actually a part of me and not a delusional aspiration fueled by magick, and I’m tired of wondering.”

He took my hand in his and led me to his bedroom.

I closed the door behind us, leaning against it to click it shut as Ciarán took careful steps towards the desk. He hesitated with his hand reaching halfway for the drawer.

“Whatever happens,” he said, “thank you, Wren, for loving both of me.”

“The word you’re looking for is ‘all’. I love all of you.”

He gave me a sad smile over his shoulder, as if he didn’t believe me, and opened the drawer.

The light of the digital clock on Riley’s bedside table glinted off the glaze of the line of chickens inside the desk. Ciarán reached for one, holding his breath, and held it in the palm of his hand.

Nothing happened.

He cocked his head at it, and my heart hammered.

It was okay if Liam’s memories weren’t here, I told myself. I liked him just how he was.

But it wasn’t me I wanted his memories for. It was him. Ciarán deserved to remember the life he’d lived here.

He suddenly grabbed at the back of the desk chair for support.