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Arrows.
Someone is shooting arrows at them.
Forwal has come through.
For a man who said he was good for nothing, for a man who said he was useless, Forwal somehow decided to defend his home, to defend his place. He somehow decided that fighting for me was worth it.
He’s going to save us.
One by one, the men fall to the ground, and soon only my father is left. Fortune and Gauge, along with a few other men, go out the front door of the mansion and surround him. My father’s only weapon is a knife. He holds it in front of him like a shield, like it’s going to save him.
He holds it as if it’s going to offer him some sort of protection, but there are simply too many of them.
And then he looks up.
Our eyes lock through the glass, and my heart clenches as I see the different emotions there: first hope, then pain, then sadness.
I press my hand to the glass.
I’m sorry, my father mouths.
I don’t even have time to respond before an arrow hits him, too, and he falls. It seems to take hours, days, weeks for his body to hit the ground, and when it does, the entire world goes silent.
My father, the murderer, is dead.
My father is gone.
My father, the man who raised me, the man who taught me to believe, is no more.
A single tear falls down my cheek, and then I hear the door to the bedroom open behind me.
“I’m sorry you had to see this,” he says. “I gave you a chance to leave.”
“Why?” I don’t turn around. “Why did you offer me that? You stole me away, or have you forgotten? You took me. You took me, and then you wanted to throw me back to those same men.” I turn around, and I hate that Forwal is seeing me cry. “Did you decide you no longer wanted me?”
He crosses the room quickly, grabs my hair, and pulls my head back sharply.
“Don’t ever think that,” he says firmly. “Never, ever think that.”
“What am I supposed to think?” I spit at him. “You were going to give me away.”
“I was giving you a choice.”
“Why?”
“Because I love you,” he growls the words, and his mouth crashes fiercely onto mine. There is nothing sweet or romantic about the way he’s kissing me now. No, now he’s kissing me with need, with desire. He’s kissing me because he has to.
He’s kissing me because he can’t get enough of me.
“I love you, too,” I whisper. Then I add, “Fortune said you did not love me.”
“Fortune is a fool.”
“He’s been with you a long time.”
“And you will be with me longer,” Forwal says. “I want you to remember, Evelyn. I want you to remember that I gave you a chance to leave, and you chose to stay. You chose me.”
I reach for his face and touch his cheek softly, gently. “When it comes to you, I never had a choice.”
