Aris
“I have to leave tomorrow morning.”
Posey’s fingers are unnaturally warm as she carefully fits the mask to my face. She tilts my head back, then to the side, smoothing her thumbs over my cheek where the third prong should be. I can’t stop looking at her when she’s like this–hyper-focused, her green eyes sharp and unyielding. It’s the same side of her I got to witness this summer every time I barged into her room to harass her and waste her time while she tried to study into the later hours of the night.
I feel like we’ve both lived an entire lifetime since then.
“How does it feel?”
“A little small.”
Her brow furrows. She angles the mask upwards so the middle prong rests directly over my nose, which feels wrong, and judging by the frustration behind her eyes, she knows it, too. “It’s missing something. You’re sure this is all you found?”
“Well, the third prong is missing.”
She tsks and sets the mask down on her worktable, which is now covered by a slab of pure white granite. Yesterday morning, when I’d come here to coax her into taking a healing draft for the scratches Morgan left on her face, which she’d refused, she’d explained that granite doesn’t absorb resonance, which makes it perfect for practicing alchemy. That is also why all the temples in Eastonia are made of granite, and then I zoned out, watching her hands smooth raw iron ore into thin, sharp picks and curved blades–tools, I realized. She made them all without even blinking, all while talking, giving me a complete history of her kind.
And I’d been just as transfixed as I am now.
“There’s a piece missing,” she huffs, frustrated, her hands outstretched in surrender as she looks down at the mask. “It’s not the third prong, either. There’s something else. A piece here. A headpiece–no–a helmet. That’s it.” She reaches into her soot covered apron and tosses a small, already half-full notebook on the table and brushes her black fingertips off on the apron’s cream colored fabric. Her pencil is already worn down as she scribbles, and I just sit here, watching her, watching her chew her lower lip in thought. “It was a helmet, not just a mask. Where is the rest of it?”
“Huh?”
She’s looking at me now, a strand of hair falling loose from the messy bun I watched her wind and tie back half an hour ago, imagining the curve of her spine and the indent between her shoulders, the same places I kissed–
“Aris?”
“What?”
“Are you listening? This mask is supposed to be connected to a head guard–it’s a helmet. That’s why it won’t fit over your face and why it’s so heavy.”
“Well, shit.”
“Well, shit,” she parrots, her hands pressed to her hips. “The caves, then?”
“No.” I rise, clearing my throat to try to stop from laughing. Her gaze is incredulous. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“I–”
“You are not permitted to access those caves under any circumstances.” I already know she’s not going to heed any warning or listen to a Goddess-damned word I say.
“Why not?”
“Are you fucking serious?” I step toward her. She doesn’t shy away. In fact, she tilts her chin to continue looking me directly in the eyes while I tower over her. I’m tempted to close her against the worktable, but I refrain because I’ve had months of practice doing just that at this point. I’m a bundle of nerves and pure, undying heat on my better days. Today isn’t one of them. Yesterday nearly undid me on a molecular level.
It was the most beautiful day I’d ever seen in my entire life. Endless crystal blue skies. A white-washed landscape buried in more snow than Veiled Valley had ever experienced. The city was alive, everyone in the streets, kids screaming with joy and Solstice music blaring.
I spent the majority of the day dealing with pack business, which was only reports of kids throwing snowballs at businesses and elderly neighbors. I also got in touch with Maeve about the Morgan situation, giving her the go-ahead to spread an official statement from her office instead of mine about the fabricated report of my engagement.
By midmorning, however, reality sank in. Posey was up in her spire, hard at work or avoiding me and the world entirely, I wasn’t sure. I wandered the castle, replaying the fact I told her I loved her, and she didn’t say a word over and over until I felt like it would be more comfortable to peel my flesh from my bones than remain in that memory another second.
But when it comes to her, I’m a weak man.
“What does this do?”
“Don’t touch that.”
“If I eat this, what will happen?”
“Aris, put that down.”
“AH! What the fuck–”
“That was literally just on fire! Why are you in here? Don’t you have other things to do?”
Mostly, for the rest of the afternoon, I sat in that rocking chair under the window, watching her. Watching her move. Watching her reach for those shiny glass vials. Watching her grind herbs and dunk her new tools in vats of cool water.
I’m not used to being alone in the quiet. She thrives in it. My presence, as long as I’m not in her way, touching her things, doesn’t seem to bother her.
I kept enough of a distance I didn’t feel like my skin would combust if I didn’t touch her, and on occasion, I did feel her gaze… brief, but curious. Brief but heartsick.
I can’t figure her out. She’s a maze. Her mind is built like the vault door below the castle–impenetrable–and she’s the only one who holds the key. I’d give this up, let myself succumb to the fact that she isn’t interested if her eyes didn’t glisten and her body lean toward mine during every conversation. I’d let this festering, heartbreaking rejection fade if she gave me a real reason she hates me, but she hasn’t. She won’t. She doesn’t.
Now, she’s fitting a new prong onto the mask knowing full well it won’t fix it, and I’m refusing to give her what she’s pouting about.
“Do you understand why I won’t let you go into the caves?”
“No, I don’t.” Metal sizzles under her touch, turning molten. She quickly grabs a tool I’m not even going to try to name to score the mask before carefully putting the new prong in place. Her fingers stain black with soot but otherwise remain perfectly intact. It’s amazing.
“It’s dangerous.”
Her forest green eyes meet mine for several seconds in a searing glare before they drop back to her task, and she sighs heavily, shaking her head. “It’s your loss. You need the entire helmet.”
“Just make me a new one.”
“It doesn’t work like that.”
“How does it work, then?”
“I don’t know! You’re the Shadowsynger. You tell me!”
“Well, you’re an alchemist, the same kind of fire breathing creature who made this shit in the first place.” I motion to the mask.
She scoffs. I mimic the sound. She points to the door and doesn’t blink until I take several determined steps out of her way. “I’m leaving tonight. I’ll be back in two days, give or take.”
“I heard you the first time.”
“Don’t go into the caves.”
She doesn’t reply and instead yanks a stool beneath her and sits with a huff, propping her chin on her fist. I linger in the doorway for several seconds, gripping the top of the frame. Antagonize her some more, that little voice in my head demands. Ruffle her notebook pages. Make her see you.
“Aris?”
“Yeah?”
I don’t turn to the sound of her voice, but she’s closer, light on her feet like always.
“Are we going to be able to do this? Work together?”
“My only other option is sending you back to Sapphire Ridge.”
Silence. It’s heavy and suffocating.
“We should… talk about Morgan.”
I turn, bracing myself on the doorframe. “Why?”
She’s standing only a few feet away, her stained fingers fiddling with her apron. She reaches up to pull the clip out of her hair. It falls over her shoulders like strawberry silk, somehow more vibrant in the faint silver glow beginning to drift through the frosted glass of the windows behind her.
I asked her if she’d ever been in the sun before. Now, I hope the weather will always be gray because she’s stunning in this light. So beautiful it hurts.
I’d crawl through fire for her. I’d give her anything she wants other than access to the fucking caves. That’s where I have to draw the line. A wide, immovable one.
“You sent her away because she…”
“Hurt you?”
“I handled it.”
“By lying down and taking it.”
“I wasn’t going to strike the future Luna–”
“I was never going to marry her.”
“You only decided that after I came back into your life and that isn’t fair to you.”
Why can’t you just say it back? Do you not feel it, this terrible, all-consuming yearning? This feeling like we’ll die if we don’t just… touch? I’m dying here, Posey. I’d rather you took a knife to my throat and just ended it. Gods, I’d die happy for just a touch.
I lick my lips, biting back a bitter laugh. “I have options. I can use a breeder. I can find one of those anywhere.”
Her cheeks flush. I can’t take it. It’s so much easier to be around her when she’s annoyed with me, or mad, or doing anything but being soft and kind.
“You said… you loved me.”
Fuck. “I know.”
“You shouldn’t.”
My eyes close against the pained look on her face. “Posey.”
“I… can never give you what you need. You need an heir. I can’t give that to you.”
We could adopt. We could hope and pray Maeve has a son, or even a daughter who isn’t fully Firestone and has a single drop of Shadowsynger blood passed down from our grandfather and our mother. I’d give it all up. I’d fucking walk. If I knew I had the option of being with you, I would do it in a heartbeat.
“I talked to Willow about Roman. The call dropped, but… I was sure she was going to say that Roman wanted to… step down.”
I open my eyes to slits just to see the troubled look on her face, and it’s damning. The fear in her eyes is palpable.
“He loves her, doesn’t he? That night at the manor? She was the one who ended things, not him. He didn’t hurt her. It was her. Did you know he went to Crescent Falls to talk to her? That he told her he’d step down so she could stay there, keep her dream job? That he was willing to step down and not be Alpha of Sapphire Ridge?” she asks.
“I didn’t.”
“Aris,” she whispers, tears in her eyes. I feel like my chest is being bent apart, my heart and lungs on display. “Don’t.”
Don’t step down for her.
That’s the worst part about this. I can’t. I’m the only male of my line, the only one of my siblings with these powers. I’m the strongest Shadowsynger since my grandfather. The caves called out to me, and… I need kids. A family. Promises that my powers will be passed down and Veiled Valley and its endless secrets and sacred mountains will remain protected.
Posey cannot have children.
We were doomed from the beginning.
“I care about you,” she says, her voice pinched. “I hate this. If I’d known how hard it’d be, I wouldn’t have–this summer–”
“Do you regret it? What we did?”
“No,” she whispers. “Never. Not for a second. I wish things were different.”
I can’t take it. I’ll shatter like glass right here, right now, if she so much as touches me. When she steps toward me, reaching for me like she always does without realizing what it does to me, I step into the shadows, putting that gaping ocean of distance between us once more.
“The spirits will report to me if you’ve been in the caves. Don’t do it. That’s all I ask.”
I don’t even bother packing a bag. Fuck it. Fuck the broken look in her eyes and the way her fingers clench into tight fists. I want to hate her for this so much. I want to bend her to my will, force her to break and tell me the truth. There has to be more to this than her inability to give me an heir. It’s not Roman. It’s not her family. It’s something else. Something she can’t say. The thing driving every self-deprecating decision.
“Do not go in the caves, Posey.” I tear myself into pieces, letting it hurt, pushing myself to the limit on purpose, and when my powers sing and writhe, begging for mercy, Blake’s ugly, impossibly open and massive modern living room comes into view.
I run my hand over my face, knowing full well that impossible, untrainable, aggravating, utterly perfect woman is going to the caves right now.
“You look like you could use a drink,” Soren says, his voice bouncing off the Tarsian-plastered walls.
“A whole bottle might do, for now.”