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CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
The wild flowers had all died.
As Rahvyn walked over the meadow’s soft bed, she remembered the blooms as they had been when Lassiter had conjured them, full of color and fragrance, a feast for the eyes and the senses. She had spun around in joy at the visual display, the thoughtfulness… the male who had presented her with such an unexpected gesture.
But then she had looked up properly into his face.
It was in that moment that she realized he was marking a goodbye, not the start of something, and her heart had been crushed.
Later, whilst she had been with the Book far from earth, she had wondered what would happen to the fragile flowers. Would they disappear after he left? Or, once brought into being, would they suffer a life cycle?
Now she had her answer. Like all things manifested into the physical world, the figment that had been made corporeal was subject to the reality it had entered. Out of season was out of season, and the fresh beauty had been unable to sustain itself in the harsh, cold nights.
Glancing over her shoulder, the farmhouse she had once resided in for a short time was like something from a fable, a curl of smoke lazing out of its chimney, vampires moving around inside the cozy rooms. It would be about time for the nightly Toll House cookies, handmade and fresh from the oven.
She had met Nate under its gabled roof. He had been working on the garage, putting up panels that smelled like flour and painting around windows. He had been as shy as she, and thus he had been easy to approach. He had also seemed to know that she was not long for Caldwell.
He had been correct. She had come forward through time just to reassure her cousin, Sahvage, of her persisted existence—and also, if she were honest with herself, to ask for his forgiveness. Following that, the Book had given her a purpose that had defined her choice of next destination.
Rahvyn refocused on the forest at the far edge of the meadow… and presently she had returned to the juncture of decision. What now? Did she go back to the Book? Or did she stay here and—
She wheeled around. When she saw who it was, her breath slowly departed her lungs.
Yet she wasn’t surprised.
With purpose that appeared grim, Lassiter walked forward through the dead flowers, his eyes on hers rather than the ruination upon the ground, his bare feet surely chilling to the bone.
“How did you know I was here?” she said roughly.
He stopped in front of her, his blond-and-black hair teased by the cold spring breeze. “It was a gamble.”
Turning away from him, she went back to staring at the trees. She thought about her landing in the forest, the fireball of energy created by her breaching the boundary of the calendar gouging into the earth, her corporeal form emerging from the great divot like a young newly born.
Lassiter cleared his throat. “I came to apologize. I know now what really happened behind the club and I—”
She put her hand up over her shoulder. “Stop.” As the angel fell silent, she cleared her throat. “I want you to listen to what I am about to say, so that I do not have to repeat it.”
“All right.”
It was a moment before she could continue.
“I want you to know who killed the male who took my virtue, who raped me until I bled. Who intended to hurt and humiliate me, who wanted me to feel sullied and used.” Rahvyn looked back at the angel. “It was me. I killed him.”
As those iridescent eyes flared, she faced him once again. “He had left me for dead on his bedding platform, quite satisfied with himself and the condition in which he left me. Whilst he celebrated his victory over his prey with a meal delivered unto him, I gathered my strength even with his chains still upon me.” There was a long silence. “And then I went after him. When I was done with the flaying, there was barely any life within him, and I impaled his remains on the standard pole above the entryway of his castle.”
The gruesome memories were so vivid, she could smell the copper of the blood in her nose anew, feel the cooling of the sweat from her exertions on her flesh. “In rendering him thus, I was not sending a message to those within the castle walls who had heard me scream and done nothing. It was not for the villagers, either. It was because he was so proud of all his power, so sure about how he wielded it and what was his due. His standard colors had always flown over his grand castle. I thought his skinned corpse was a better representation of him.”
