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“You have cried around me before.”

Her smile was weak, but genuine. “Because I trust you.”

It was strange that she trusted him with her emotions, when the last person she’d trusted with them was... Gideon. To her, that was more significant than letting any man who played nice freely fuck her.

“You trust me, but are afraid of me?” he grumbled, lifting his head. “I do not understand how this is possible.”

“Humans are complex creatures, and how we feel can be singular and opposing to other emotions. It’s what makes us... fun, and interesting.”

Emerie finally stepped back to put space between them, relieved that he was calm now, even if his orbs hadn’t changed from their solemn hue.I told myself I wouldn’t add to his sadness and pain.And yet, she felt as though she’d done that. It ate at her.

“O-okay,” she said, taking in a deep breath so she could shakily sigh it out. “Time for me to wash so we can move on. You said we were only a day from the Veil.”

With that, she managed to get him to back up and go into the forest. Emerie quickly moved to kneel at the water’s edge, wishing she could jump into it. She couldn’t. It was too small, and she was injured.

She didn’t feel the need to check over her shoulder when she pulled her pants and shirt off, knowing Ingram wouldn’t break his promise and peek like a creepy jerk.

Scooping water into her hands, she washed her legs, trying her hardest to ignore her light skin and the pale scarring. It became harder as she washed between her stomach and side, then just underneath her breasts, where more skin had deformed.

Fresh tears sprung when she scooped water over her right breast, brushing her pink nipple, only for them to fall when she did the same to the other that looked completely different. Her areola was white, the nipple itself pale and smaller. The side of her breast was concaved with scarring, making it no longer appear or feel round and soft.

She hoped her sobbing couldn’t be heard by Ingram, but she couldn’t help it as she cleaned her shoulder, only to grip her biceps right where her scarring stopped.

Her shoulder and chest were the worst.

They were where she first landed in the burning puddle from the oil lamp. The rest of her had just been the straw and dry grass easily becoming alight around the worst of it, along with her clothes catching fire. Throwing a blanket over her had stopped the flames, but the material had stuck to her melted skin – requiring additional skin to be cut away.

Not wanting to be exposed for much longer, she quickly finished washing. She wished her conversation with Ingram hadn’t made her mind linger on these when she usually pretended they didn’t exist as she bathed.

However, once she was dressed again, managing to find a clean pair of underwear for underneath her dirty guild clothing, she sat at the shoreline. She brought her knees up, hugged them, and just gave herself a few minutes to let how she felt out.

How is anyone meant to love me like this?She was covered in more wounds, like Demon claws on most of her limbs, sword slashes from bandits, her knees and elbows scraped from countless falls during training.

Emerie was a map of scars, to the extent that not even her hands and feet were spared.

I don’t want to let Ingram see what I really look like... What if he hates it?She bit at her bottom lip until she feared it’d bleed.He called me a pretty butterfly – what if he stopped?Gosh! She thought one had sprung up in herchestwhen he’d said that, only for it to wither and die inside her.

He’s the first ‘guy’ to compliment me in so long.She squeezed her legs tighter.What if... what if I only like him because of it?

Oh god, I’m so pathetic.A quiet sob broke out of her like a whimper.Do I want someone to love me so badly that I don’t care who or what they are? That they’ve hurt me and tried to eat me?

Emerie didn’twanther feelings towards the Duskwalker to be so shallow. She wanted them to be real, rather than a dark twist of perversion because her mind and heart desired to no longer be alone.

Which is why she couldn’t trust herself.

I only dated Bryce because... because he was nice to me.

He’d given her attention and had been the one to ask her out. He’d never once complimented her, but she thought his soft touches to the unmarred side of her face were his way of showing it. Yet, he never snaked his hand up her shirt after the first time, never asked her to take it off. It was only ever her freaking pants.

And Jason...She’d been much younger when she’d dated him. Naïve, stupid, and hopeful. Only to find out he took advantage of her because she was lonely, and because she didn’t have a womb for him to impregnate.

Not like his wife... one she hadn’t known he had until her friends found out about their relationship and told her.

Apparently, many people within the guild had known, but Emerie hadn’t. It was why he’d kept their relationship a secret, and made her promise not to tell anyone, not even her friends. He’d just wanted someone to ease his dick while he was away from his wife, and Emerie had been like an injured baby deer, an easy target for a bit of sport hunting.

She’d been used. She hated that she’d been part of such a horrible betrayal to another woman.

But before that, there had been Declan. The first person she’d been in love with and had hoped to marry before that fateful and terrible night.