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And then they all come back to me.
She all comes back to me.
Mina. Lucy. Dahlia. Rose.
Rose.
“Rose?” I ask, her name feeling like honey on my lips.
I can’t breathe. This can’t be.
Now her mouth parts, her eyes wide and she presses her hand to her chest and she’s gasping. “Val?” The hope that spreads across her face is like a firework.
I try to say something, anything, but I can’t because all at once every single memory that I had so selfishly erased comes pouring back over me like a tidal wave. It drowns me, crushes me, bombards me from all angles until I am given no choice but to remember.
My mind flips back in time, back to when I killed her, then to a burial at sea, then the taking of the book. Then the night in Venice with Solon when I took the potion and erased her.
Then I’m living my years without any knowledge of her, unaware of the simmering pain and grief that was collecting in my soul. I lived a life so selfish and cold and isolated that I lost all parts of my humanity, all those tiny good parts that were binding me together like a rag doll, a monstrous creation of my own doing.
Then I’m in the square of Mittenwald, waiting for Van Helsing to deliver me a whore and then I see her, I see Dahlia walking toward me and I see the pain on her face when she realizes what I’ve done, how it’s erased her, and then I see how awful I’ve been treating her, so cruel, so callous, and, and…
I see myself falling in love with her despite all my best laid plans. I see myself falling in love with Rose, because it’s my destiny to love her, no matter what her name is, no matter where we are in time.
And then I see what I just did today. I see myself getting so damn scared of feeling pain again, of losing her and feeling grief, that I erase her yet again.
A heavy cloak is lifted from my head and I can see clearly for the first time.
And what I see is my reflection looking back at me.
I really am a fucking monster.
“Val?” Rose says again, taking a tentative step forward, wounded inside and out. “Please don’t be fucking with me, please.”
I get to my knees and try to get up but I can’t. The weight of guilt and anger and disappointment keeps me where I am.
I stare up at her, at my dove, my love, at her goodness and her loyalty and the fact that she’s in my life again, she’s alive and she’s here and I burst out into tears.
“I’m sorry,” I say through a sob, the sorrow wracking through me, hollowing me out. “I am so fucking sorry.”
“No,” she says, and she drops to her knees beside me, her fingers going through my hair. “Val, please, you have nothing to be sorry for.”
I raise my head and look at her, my vision blurred, the guilt tearing me apart. “Nothing to be sorry for? Rose, I have everything to be sorry for. I treated you so horribly, I…I don’t understand how it all happened.”
“You were in pain,” she says, crying now too. “You were in pain and you couldn’t bear it. I don’t blame you for what you did, you were just trying to survive. We have such long lives and there is so much pain in this world.”
“You would have never done that to me,” I tell her, unable to escape the agony while at the same time, fuck,fuckI am so goddamn overjoyed that she’s alive and she’s here.
She’s here!
“You’re alive,” I add, shaking my head, the tears spilling onto the floor. “I can’t believe you’re alive.”
“I told you my heart would always find yours,” she says, her hands now at my cheeks, wiping away the tears. “And it did. It did.”
“I love you.” I take in a deep, shaking breath. “I love you, I love you. As Mina and Lucy and Dahlia and Rose, I love all of you.”
“I love you,” Rose says, smiling so sweetly it breaks my heart. “You know I do.”
She leans in and kisses me.
