Page 61

Silas claps his hands together like a child about to cause trouble. “It’s settled then! We feast!”

And just like that, the decision is made, chaos moving around us as they scramble out of the water, arguing over who’s going to buy the first round.

But I stay close, deliberately letting my leg brush against hers one more time before I push up from the pond. I don’t look back when I say, under my breath, just for her, “You look good wet.”

I catch the sharp intake of her breath behind me as I wade to the bank, and the way her gaze lingers on me long after I’ve left the water.

Lucien

I should’ve stayed behind. The tavern is too loud, too warm, too full of voices I could compel with a thought, and none of that matters because the only voice I can’t quiet is my own.

I sit at the end of the table, my back to the wall like always, nursing a drink that burns too weak and too soft down my throat. It doesn’t do a damn thing to ease the fracture behind my ribs, the one that’s been there since the moment Luna walked into our world and ruined everything.

Across the room, they’re laughing—Orin, Silas, Elias. Even Ambrose, who never laughs. And her.

She glows. Even here, in this battered, dim little tavern, she glows like something wild and untouchable, and every time her eyes cut toward me, I swear it carves something out of me I don’t know how to name.

I shouldn’t look. I shouldn’t care.

But my gaze drifts to her anyway, always.

Orin is beside her, too close, his arm slung along the back of her chair like he owns the air she breathes. And maybe he does now. He’s wooing her, slowly, deliberately, planting seeds that will bloom whether she wants them to or not.

And when he bonds to her—because we both know that’s coming—I will lose the last inch of ground I’ve been clinging to. Because after Orin, there will be no one left to hold me back. The pull will become unbearable.

I drain the rest of my drink, signaling for another before the server even makes it halfway across the room. I don’t drink like the others. I don’t allow myself to lose edge or composure.

But tonight, I want the ache dulled. I want the shaking in my hands to stop when she laughs too softly. When she leans toward Orin and I can feel the gravity of her magic twisting around me, even when I’m across the damn room.

My next drink slams down in front of me, and I knock it back like it’ll fix anything. Elias glances over from where he’s lounging, too lazy to sit properly, his arm thrown carelessly across Silas’s shoulders. He raises a brow at me, mouthing something snarky I don’t bother to read.

I can’t stand how easy it is for them—all of them—to let her in.

I’m the only one still fighting. I’m the only one trying to hold the line. Because once Orin bonds with her, it will shred me, and I know it. I can feel it already, like a hook under my skin, pulling, pulling.

But I will not fall quietly. If the Hollow wants to watch me drown, it’s going to have to watch me claw at the walls until I bleed.

I lift the next drink to my lips, and when I meet her eyes across the tavern, she’s already looking at me. She sticks her damn tongue out at me. That sharp little flick of defiance, like I don't own the very bones of this room. Like I don’t decide who lives and dies here with a word. She does it with a smirk, like I’m some joke she hasn’t gotten tired of laughing at yet.

And gods help me—I want her to smile at me the way she smiles at Silas.

That soft, stupid way like she’s weightless in the middle of this crumbling, dying world. I want to be the reason she looks that way. Not because I care. Not because I want her.

Because I shouldn’t.

And that thought? That’s what pisses me off the most.

The liquor isn’t helping. It never helps, but it’s crawling in my veins now, warm and slow, making my tongue heavy and my skin too thin. I shouldn’t have touched the bottle tonight. I know better. But then again, I’ve been making bad decisions since the moment she said my name without flinching.

So I do the only thing that won’t have me tearing this place to the ground—I get up, the chair scraping violently across the warped tavern floor. Too loud. Too sloppy. I hate how unsteady I feel, how the floor tries to tilt beneath me like it’s mocking me too. Silas and Elias glance up, but I don’t look at them. Orin watches me go like he knows exactly why I’m leaving, and that’s almost worse.

I push out the door, the cold slap of night air hitting me like a curse. It’s quieter out here, but no less suffocating. I brace my hands against the stone wall beside the tavern, breathing hard, trying to shake her out of my system, but she’s there—pressed under my skin like a bruise I keep poking.

A shadow shifts behind me, boots scuffing across gravel, and I know without looking it’s Riven. He’s the only one quiet enough to follow without me noticing.

"You're drunk," he says blandly, leaning beside me without asking.

I don’t answer. I don’t need him to spell out how far I’ve unraveled tonight. He knows. They all know. Riven doesn’t push, but he doesn’t leave either. The door creaks behind us, the sound of Silas’s laughter spilling out into the street. And I swear I can still feel her eyes on the back of my neck.