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CHAPTER 52
BLAISE
“You’re saying that you believe the Old Magic cursed me instead of you?” Nox enunciates his words carefully, one after the other, as he stares me down.
I’ve backed all the way to the other side of the cave now, unable to bear the humiliation of the one-sided passion that’s threatening to shred my heart into ribbons.
“I don’t know for sure. But he seemed so intent on punishing me for threatening Asha’s life. And he did say I wasn’t the one he cursed. But think about it, Nox: I betrayed Asha to get you back. The Old Magic told me himself that when Abra betrayed him all those years ago by going back on her promise not to tell anyone about him or his siblings, he cursed the fae with the inability to lie. It’s what killed Farin.”
Nox flinches at the name, and I can’t help but wonder what happened on the island that he hasn’t divulged yet.
“The Old Magic likes for his punishments to be poetic. And what’s more poetic than taking away your love for me, when you were exactly what I betrayed Asha for in the first place?”
I feel stupid as soon as the assumption leaves my mouth. “Of course, I’m not saying I deserve your love. I understand if it’s just that you’ve realized what kind of person I am. I understand if all it is, is that you don’t want to be with someone who is so willing to betray her friends…”
Nox shakes his head. “Blaise, stop, please. I think you’re right. I’m not…” He winces, but continues. “I’m not happy with you right now for what you did. It makes me sick, honestly. But I crossed realms just to get to you. I sacrificed… Blaise, that kind of love doesn’t just vanish overnight. The feelings I had for you before—they were gone as soon as I woke. Before I had any idea the lengths you had gone to in order to rescue me.”
The smallest gasp of pain escapes my lips.
He looks up at me and frowns. “I’m being too technical, too blunt.”
I cross my arms and fight back the tears, but I shake my head. “I don’t want you to sugarcoat it for me.”
“I think you’re right, that I must be the one the Old Magic cursed.”
I let out a huff, a mingled laugh and sob. “You came back for me. You stepped between me and Evander back there.”
Nox’s voice is steady. “I did.”
“Why?” I ask.
Nox blinks, as if unsure where the disconnect between us is. “Because he was about to break you.”
In other words, Nox would have done it for anyone.
We spend the day discussing a plan, even though formulating one feels futile.
“I have to get Asha away from Az,” I say. “I can’t just let him…” My throat closes up as my imagination runs away with all sorts of violence a male like Az might enact against the object of his obsession. But there’s a wicked, selfish part of me that longs to go to Asha for another reason, a part of me that hopes freeing Asha will somehow aid me in convincing the Old Magic to break the curse on Nox.
I refuse to lend credence to that motivation by acknowledging it aloud. I’m already a terrible enough person as it is. No need to share those kinds of thoughts.
“I don’t see how getting Asha away from Az is possible. Not with that host of Others under his control,” Nox says.
I tug at my braid. “I was able to take down several of them.”
Nox shakes his head. “Several. Not a host. Even with two of us, there’s too many of them to take down an army of them on our own.”
On our own.
Neither of us brings up the idea of asking my friends for help.
Mostly because I don’t have any of those anymore.
Neither does Nox, I realize.
“Now, if we could find a way to transfer control of the beasts from Az to us, that could present an opportunity to rescue her. Tell me again what Az’s ritual was like.”
I frown, but relay Az spreading his blood in ghostly runes on the thin air. Then I add, “I still don’t know how that helps us, unless we find some way to corral a host of Others through the same hole.”
