Page 84 of Vengeance of the Gods

Their powers weren’t completely cut off, just dulled to basically useless. “I’m sure there’s a way to learn to block it out. If my powers are mixed in, it’s pretty easy once you get the hang of it.” He’d done so easily for forty years until their bond decided enough was enough.

“You giving a master class?” she asked, opening one eye.

She was talking to him. That was good, but gods, she looked exhausted. “Tell me something real,” he blurted out, looking to give her a distraction.

Vega blew a laugh from her nose, shaking her head, but finally opened both eyes. “I have no idea what I’m fucking doing.”

“I don’t think we’re supposed to,” he admitted. “I mean, there’s never been new gods before. I think the point is to figure it out as we go.”

“How do you do it?” she asked, making Bridger furrow his brow in confusion. “Talk to me. How do you send the thoughts down?”

Bridger bit his bottom lip to contain the smile. “Uh…” He paused, searching for a way to explain it. “There’s a door, right? A pathway. And I can just feel it. Feel you.”

“Does it work like that with the others?” she asked.

“No. Only you. I could see through everyone’s eyes the other day though. Knew where they were and what their next strike was. But I can’t feel them like I feel you.” The intensity of their bond had always been there, but with no barriers… gods, Bridger had never felt anything like it in his entire life.

“They say the same thing… about the fight and being connected.”

He wanted so badly to reach out and touch her, to remind her he was in this with her. To make her see he meant everything he said on Earth… but he didn’t have to. Vega brought it up before he had the chance.

Vega wrapped her arms around her legs, resting her chin on top of her knees. Bridger felt her sigh in his own chest. “Why didn’t you tell me about the deal with Marlena?”

Answering honestly, Bridger let himself be seen. “At first I was still so unsure of what I was supposed to want. I knew I wanted to stop my dreams, that I wanted to live. I knew I had to be the one to go to Earth. I was the one who had the dream… but then I didn’t want to tell you because I was seeing the girl I loved again, and I couldn’t bear the idea of losing her to some stupid scheme I’d never truly wanted.” Bridger chuffed, shaking his head faintly. “I knew you’d never believe I was telling the truth about being on your side. If I would have told you what I promised Marlena, you never would have trusted me.” He hadn’t even trusted himself at the beginning, unsure what following Vega into another life would do to him.

“Okay, fine, but why didn’t you just come clean when Marlena showed up? Why put on the act and make her believe you were the person who wanted those things? The curse is broken. You don’t have to be that person anymore, Bridger.” The hurt finally broke through in her voice, piercing Bridger through his heart.

The stabbing of Vega’s sorrows hurt almost as much as it had when she’d stabbed him through the heart with a dagger. “I’ll always be the man who took an oath to protect his realm, Vega. The second Marlena finds out I’m no longer hers to control, people will suffer. She will find a way to make me pay for it. I meant everything I said to you on Earth, but I can’t make rash decisions like I once did. Especially now.”

Her face sank. “No matter how hard I try to hate you, I can’t… I don’t think I ever really could. I was mad, hurt, and it was easier to turn those feelings into rage. I can’t find it in me to be mad anymore. I have too many other pressing matters to worry about now. But I don’t trust you yet,” Vega told him. “I know you had to do whatever was best for you, but⁠—”

“Do what was best for me?” Bridger interrupted, cocking his head. “You think I did what was best for me?”

Vega scrunched her eyebrows like it was obvious. “Yes, I mean, sure, you lost the girl you loved, but you gained the army you always wanted in return, and it wasn’t like we knew then what we know now.”

“Vega, if I had done what was best for me, I would have snatched you up and found a way out of Tolevarre. I thought about it once. Forcing you back through the portal and disappearing where we could live in peace. That’s what I would have done if I’d gotten my way. I did what was best for the people around me. For my best friend. For your best friends.” He bubbled a laugh. “Marlena told me she would let Arlet and Khort live if I just fell in line where I was supposed to be. I bet she already knew none of us could die at that point, but Tolevarre was without a commander. Other bloodlines were ready to swoop in and take over.” The fate of their army had been in limbo. “Could you imagine if Fraus took over the army? The madness my uncle would have unleashed alongside your sister? No one would have been safe.”

He’d made the decision to save others instead of Vega. “When I escaped, Marlena let me stay away long enough to meet you in your next life. I left the rebels, I left you, because the you I loved was gone, and there were people, our people, the people you begged me to keep safe, who needed me.”

Vega wasn’t fuming, she wasn’t ready to set anything ablaze with her ire, but the look on her face was worse than anything else he could have seen.

Pity.

“I never wanted to hurt you. You were the best thing that had ever happened to me, but I was lost—so lost without you. And then after everything Marlena said, everything I’d lived through, the people I thought were my friends didn’t trust me anymore, and then you came back as the stranger Marlena told me you’d be.” Bridger gripped his thigh hard enough to feel pain, letting the uncomfortable pinch keep him from cracking. “I don’t know… Yes. I acted selfishly because I couldn’t watch you die anymore.” Joke was on him, though, because Marlena continued to make Bridger kill her. “I couldn’t wait for you to become someone I didn’t know—not when our people were dying. The people we promised to protect were dying… and then she was going to take Meyer. He was all I had left.”

Vega kept her chin on her knees, watching him with neutrality.

“I don’t expect you to understand what or why I did it, but learning to forget you was the only way I could become the commander everyone needed me to be.” Bridger felt swept up in the moment, swept away in the feeling of getting all this unsaid shit he’d held in for nearly half a century off his chest. “I don’t regret it, and if that means you can never learn to trust me again, then so be it. But Vega.” He paused, waiting for her to look him in the eyes. When she finally did, Bridger finished. “I do regret hurting you.”

They both stayed quiet for a while, emotion thick between them in the small space, when Vega decided to drop valuable information seemingly out of the blue. “Death was waiting for me when I brought Romulus back through the portal. I was forced to make a deal, promising to deliver the gods and Marlena to the underworld for the power to save Tolevarre.”

Bridger held his breath until she stopped talking, breathing her name on his exhale. “Vega.”

She stood, and Bridger jumped up after her, having no fucking clue what his response was supposed to be.

Vega sighed. “Stop knocking, okay?”

And then Bridger watched her lock his cell door before disappearing completely. Her absence didn’t stop Bridger from speaking out loud. “It’s not Death who makes deals.”