Page 422 of Alchemised

“Did you bring anything else?” she asked teasingly when she made him sit down on the edge of the bed and found an obsidian gimlet knife hidden in his shoe.

He avoided the question.

They lay facing each other, but his eyes kept flickering over to the weapons she’d taken. She touched his chin with her index finger, drawing his attention back.

“What did you want to do, before the war?” she asked.

“I was the iron guild heir—that was all I was allowed to be,” he said. “The only thing I did that I wanted was staying at the Institute after I was certified. My father didn’t think it was necessary, but my mother had wanted to study longer when she’d been there. Her family couldn’t afford it. I had the ranking to qualify, so she convinced my father to let me. But when I returned, Crowther showed up, wanting to know why someone of my class wanted more than a trade education. My father was furious. I doubt I would have returned the next year if he hadn’t been arrested.”

“We’ll have to figure something out now, then,” she said, and pressed her head against his shoulder. He tangled his hand in her hair, holding her close. “Are we really safe?”

“We are.”

She drew a deep breath and closed her eyes. “Good. I’m so tired.”

When she woke, Kaine was asleep. He did not stir, even when she moved. It was as if years of exhaustion had risen up and swallowed him.

He slept for days. He didn’t even twitch when Helena pressed a hand against his chest, her resonance reaching in. His soul finally seemed to begin integrating itself back into him.

Helena slept beside him for the first week. She hadn’t thought she was tired enough to sleep for consecutive days, but it was as if a relentless tension had finally released and this was the first time she’d ever truly rested.

They woke to eat, and Kaine would go out, and she’d watch him walk along the edge of the cliff and survey the island and wander the house, and then he’d come back and pass out again.

But he only slept if Helena stayed near him. When she got up and went to peruse the various shelves to see what kinds of books there were, he immediately sat up.

“I can get up now,” he said.

“No. I’m still tired,” she lied. “I just want to read a little.”

She brought a few books over and laced her fingers with his as she read, and he was asleep again in minutes. When she touched him with her resonance, he’d ceased to feel like something on the verge of unravelling.

He’d been sleeping almost two weeks when the door opened and Lila peeked across the room at them. “Pol’s napping. Can I come in?”

Helena closed her book, nodding. They’d seen each other only in passing since their arrival.

Lila came over and stared at Kaine for a moment before she turned and sat on the edge of the bed, facing away from him. “I wanted to talk to you, but there’s never been time. The people in the village say the tide will be rising past the sea road soon.”

Helena nodded.

Lila inhaled. “You know, when he told me about you two, I didn’t believe him. He said that Luc and everyone else was dead. He brought newspapers to prove it, and he said the only reason I was still alive was because of you. I believed him about most of it, but not what he said about you.” Lila was staring hard at the floor as she spoke. “I couldn’t believe it could have happened—that you wouldn’t ever—but then I thought about how withdrawn you got, right when things started getting better. We used to talk about it, Luc and Soren and I, and none of us could understand why. When Ferron told me when everything started, I realised it was right around that same time. But I was sure you’d tricked Ferron into thinking you cared about him. Thought he was so pathetic for believing it.”

Helena’s fingers, entwined with Kaine’s, spasmed.

“At first, he used to come check on me almost every week. It was like watching someone starve to death, him looking for you. I think he went mad for a while. He started threatening me, saying it was all my fault. If it weren’t for me, you’d be safe, and he started telling me that when he found you, it’d be my job to take care of you for a change. Eventually he stopped saying anything about what would happen once he found you.”

Lila pressed her lips together tightly. “Then I got word that you’d been found, but he said you’d forgotten everything, about him and me and Pol, that they’d try to smuggle you out before the Abeyance, but it had to be just before, because you’d be hunted when you escaped. Then I started hearing rumours about the repopulation program. I didn’t think you’d be part of that—”

“He didn’t have any choice,” Helena said. “If it hadn’t been him, it would have been someone else. It was that or kill me.”

Lila drew an unsteady breath. “Well, I am glad that you’re alive,” she finally said. “But I still hate him, and I hate that you’re trapped with him. Because you were right, and no one listened to you; you stayed with us despite knowing the whole time. You didn’t deserve any of this. You shouldn’t have to spend the rest of your life trapped by all the promises that people forced you to make.”

Helena stiffened, and Lila noticed, her mouth tensing. “I don’t just mean Ferron. I mean with me and Pol, too. Luc made you promise, and I know you’d stay with us for the rest of your life without ever complaining, but you don’t have to. You’ve already done more than anyone should have ever asked from you. You deserve to make some choices for yourself. Don’t spend any more of your life chained to old promises. Not for anyone. Not Luc, or me—or Ferron.”

Lila closed her eyes and exhaled. “I just—I had to say that once, before we’re all trapped on this island.”

She stood up and left the room as quietly as she’d come in.

Helena sat in silence for a moment and finally looked down. “You can stop pretending to be asleep.”