Page 57 of The Last One Standing (Rogue X Ara #4)

“Yes.” My heart ached for him. I wasn’t the only one who lost memories because of Adonis. “Yes, we were friends, although I don’t…” I winced. “I don’t remember a lot of our friendship.”

He released a low laugh. “Me either.”

“It’s strange, isn’t it?”

“Very.” He nodded, his brow furrowing. “My soul remembers, but my mind does not.”

“That’s exactly what it feels like for me, too—well, mostly. I didn’t lose everyone, just one person, but my heart remembers.” My palm flattened over my sternum. “It almost feels like nostalgia, but…longing for something I’ve never known is disorienting.”

“But you have,” Doran whispered. “Your soul—your heart longs for what it already knows. For what it misses. For who it misses.”

My eyes and throat burned like I’d walked into thick smoke. I mulled over Doran’s words as we walked and watched a blacksmith hammer at a bent breastplate, each strike ringing sharply.

Metal on metal.

Chains—

I jerked my attention away and caught Doran’s stare.

With a shaky laugh, I wiped my face and waved him off. “This couldn’t be the first time you’ve seen me cry.”

I regretted it the moment the words left my mouth. A tense silence fell between us as memories of exactly what he’d witnessed resurfaced.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “An apology isn’t enough, but I’m sorry all the same.”

“I shouldn’t have said that. I’d rather not talk about?—”

“No, I need you to know that I am sorry, that had I known, had I realized sooner… I need you to know I would’ve helped you sooner.

I wouldn’t have stayed down there at all.

Neither of us would have.” He frowned, his brows knitted together.

“I was so…confused and lost. Months of haziness, months of fading in and out of consciousness. I was missing time, blacking out—until I realized what was happening, and then it was too late.”

He came to a slow halt, his eyes as white as the falling snow, shadowed with grief. I didn’t know if his kind could cry, but my gut told me no. If they could, I thought he would be.

“Puer Mortis survive on souls. They…” His gaze fell to the ground, a grimace twisting his mouth.

“We eat souls—life. I eat life, and I guess…I guess he had to feed me enough of it before I became…alive? Sentient? Conscious? I ate the essence of his prisoners. He fed me their person, their very existence.” His fist rapped the center of his chest before his shoulders sagged and his hand flattened.

“And for what? For this? Those people no longer exist. Not here, not in the afterlife. I took them from their families, from the Goddess herself, and for what? I don’t even remember my life…

I would’ve been bones in the ground by now.

” He shook his head, his breath growing shaky and uneven.

A tear slipped past my lashes, but I quickly wiped it before he could see.

“I should’ve died. I should’ve stayed dead. ”

My breath hitched, and his head snapped up to me like he’d forgotten I was here. His mouth fell open, and he backed away, blinking rapidly.

“I’m sorry.” He held his hands up. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I’m sorry, Ara. I’m so… I’m just lost, and I can’t make sense of what’s up and what’s down, and I?—”

I threw my arms around him.

He was colder than a person should be, but not as cold as the stone he seemed to be impersonating, and I didn’t let go. Not when the cold seeped into my hands. Not when he tried to pull away. Not when people walked by, gawking, or when a wyvern flew overhead.

Eventually, a hitched breath escaped him, too, and he awkwardly wrapped an arm around my shoulders. A second passed, and his other arm followed, then I was crushed in a vise grip that forced a choked sound from my lips, halfway between a laugh and a cry.

I didn’t know how to help him or what to say to his confession, but sometimes, people didn’t need a response. Sometimes, people only needed a listening ear and a hug from someone who heard them—advice courtesy of Alden.

The knot in my throat returned, but the pain wasn’t so sharp this time.

Doran released me when I pulled back with a sigh, wiping my cheeks with both hands. “You don’t scare me.”

His eyes flitted between mine as he whispered, “Thank you.”

Sometimes, we just needed to admit the worst things we had ever done and have someone accept us anyway, not in spite of it but alongside it.

The Doran I knew—what I could remember of him—was selfless to a fault. This man might not remember who he was, but that didn’t make him any less himself. His soul was the same, and I had no doubt he’d find his way back to himself.

With a firm nod, I rolled my shoulders back, feeling oddly…better. “Right. Let’s go find Rogue.”

A faint grin curved his lips, the first one I’d seen.

“Ah, before we go…” He dug in his pocket and pulled out something, hidden in his fist. “I believe these are yours.”

He opened his hand, and two rings sat in his palm. My breath caught when I spotted a dainty silver one with a blue stone. “My mother’s.”

Sliding it on my finger, I inspected the other one.

I recognized it but couldn’t place it: silver with a flower embellishment stamped on the center.

I slipped my nail under the bezel, paused, and flipped it open, knowing what I’d find.

The compartment was coated in white dust—the poison of women’s revenge.

It was mine, but how?

I slipped it on and stared, racking my brain. The memory was on the tip of my tongue. I bought it somewhere, the shop’s air cool but arid, blurry images of trinkets and hazy sounds—voices. Someone had been with me, or at least speaking to me, at the time. Who?

Pain crept around the edges of my skull, stabbing into my temples, and I flinched, letting the memory slip away.

“Thank you,” I murmured, spinning the ring around my finger as we followed the tug in my chest toward Rogue.

My mate.

With one hand flattened over my chest as if it’d be able to feel the odd sensation stirring within it, I glanced down at the ring again, spinning it with my thumb. The air had been dry and dusty, stacks and piles taller than me, chatter… I had to have bought it in Canyon.

My cheeks heated.

Rogue said we went to Canyon together. Had he been there with me?

A smile pulled at my lips, my hand falling to my side, and for once, the puzzle pieces in my head didn’t feel so threatening. This time, it was almost a game, a mystery in a novel I had to solve…if it could be reduced to that.

“Look at us,” I said, “two peas in a pod. Just two Fae with a little mind rot.” I nudged him with my elbow. “Nothing we can’t handle, hmm?”

His laughter was quiet but genuine. “Nothing we can’t handle.”

His twin sister, though, was a different beast altogether—not her per se, but the rigid dichotomy each time I thought of her.

Logically, I knew it wasn’t her fault. She’d been forced to do the things she did.

Illogically, I couldn’t help but associate her with the bite of shackles and agony of freezing, of having water poured down my throat and lungs, and Adonis fracturing my mind like it was nothing more than shattering glass.

The angry, resentful part of me remembered the hurt, and pain hardly listened to reason.

It called for blood, yet the idea of bleeding that hollowed version of her made me physically ill, because I was no better than her.

Our only difference was that I hadn’t succeeded.

Rogue stopped his own murder, but no one had been there that day to stop Delphia.

Biting my lip, I glanced at Doran, the similarities between the two astounding. Now, the only real difference was their eyes; he lost the blue they once shared.

“Have you told Delphia any of this?” I asked.

“No,” he replied. “She seems to be coming back from the brink of…something, and I don’t want to push her back over the edge.” His head whipped to me, eyes wide. “That’s not to say I want to put the burden of knowing what I’ve done, what I am, on you. I?—”

“You’re not a burden,” I interrupted. “Knowing you is not a burden.”

After a beat of silence, he asked, “Do you give yourself the same grace?”

My mouth opened, then closed, and stayed that way for the remainder of our walk.

I shoved the question from my mind as we came to a large, black tent. He was in there. I knew it in my bones, felt his nearness like I felt the breeze on my cheeks and the air in my lungs.

As I stepped inside, I found him with his back to us, and for a moment, I imagined his wings, as great and powerful as his dragon, stretching wide and blood red.

Fearsome.

Beautiful.

They were beautiful. They had to have been. The rest of him was.

I blinked and forced my gaze to those on the other side of the table.

Rogue stood before five Fae clad in pristine armor, velvet cloaks hanging behind them.

Two of the Fae were women. A tall, muscular woman with oddly delicate facial features and a petite elderly woman with rich brown skin—both strong, both beautiful—regarded me with what seemed like respect, faintly dipping their chins in greeting.

Had I known them before? If I didn’t, I wanted to.

Every pair of eyes found me before Rogue’s, but the older man regarded me with such irritation, I scowled at him.

“There’s another woman in the tent,” he snarled.

One of the other men released a deep sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose, but Rogue swiveled on his heel. His head cocked to the side as I met his gaze, cheeks heating.

Something had changed with us.

I didn’t know when or how, but I felt it, and I was starting to trust it, this pull I felt toward him, beyond that of a mate bond. I felt at ease around him; hence, why I’d come here. Days I’d begged him to let me go, yet here I was, seeking him out after mere hours apart.

I could’ve felt embarrassed or foolish, pathetic even, but I didn’t, not when a subtle smile curved his lips.

He strode over and curled his fingers around the nape of my neck, kissing my forehead. “What are you doing here? Why aren’t you resting?”

Up close, his canine teeth looked marginally longer than the rest, coming to a fine point. A fleeting thought of those teeth sinking into my neck ran through my head, and the flush crept down my neck.

I stepped back to pull out of his hold, only for him to grab my jaw and hold me in place.

Worse.

“Why aren’t you resting?” he asked again.

“I don’t need more rest. I’d rather be here with you.”

He blinked as if surprised before a dazzling smile spread across his face. “Well, then, good.” His thumb slid across my bottom lip, his touch so light, I barely felt it as he whispered, “I’d rather you be here with me, too.”

My heart stuttered, but if he kept looking at me like that, it would stop beating altogether.

When his attention finally slid to Doran, his hand falling from my face, I sucked in a slow breath.

“And how are you here?” Rogue asked, eyes narrowed.

“Magic can’t affect me, not even a blood oath.”

“Doran?” one of the men asked. “ You’re the Puer Mortis?”

“Yes,” Doran replied, then said to Rogue, “We just arrived. The ship is docked about a mile out.”

“Everyone?” Rogue asked, and Doran nodded. “Did Calypso resurface?”

“No, not that I saw.”

“Calypso? Calypso, the sea wench?” the older, uglier man snapped. “You tried to bring her here? Are you?—”

Rogue spun toward him. “Enough.”

In the blink of an eye, Rogue was on him, his large hand wrapped around the man’s face before he lifted a small knife and?—

Oh.

The man’s scream was lost to the smell of burning flesh as Rogue tossed his tongue into the brazier.

I couldn’t look away.

I just…stared. Everyone in the room stared in shock while the tongue-less man wailed and choked on the blood pouring from his mouth.

Rogue stepped back. “Boyd, meet Doran.”

He stopped screaming, blanching so fiercely, his white scars blended in with the rest of his skin.

Doran spoke in Boyd’s voice, and I whipped around to find he’d completely assimilated into the elderly man. He tilted his head to the side, and Boyd sputtered what I assumed was an apology.

What is happening?

“Maybe we should have that talk now,” I said with more confidence than I felt.

All eyes turned in my direction, but I focused on Rogue’s.

His expression turned soft as he walked over slowly, almost cautiously. With a nod, he slid his hand in mine, watching me like he were afraid I’d run or fall into sobs.

As he led me out of the tent, he said over his shoulder, “Acquaint Doran with what we know. Doran, fill in the gaps of knowledge where you can.”

Outside, he slid his hand beneath my chin again and tipped my face to him. “Did I scare you?”

He sounded afraid.

Instead of answering, I raised on my toes, heart pounding, and pressed a soft kiss to his lips. When he stilled, I started to pull away, but he wrapped an arm around my waist and melted into me as he followed my mouth, unwilling to break the kiss.

I would face my fate head on, because my fate was him. I wouldn’t accept anything else.

I wanted him.

I needed him.

I would have him.

“Mine,” escaped under my breath.

A low growl reverberated from his chest, his hand snaking into my hair where it fisted and pulled my head back an inch. “Don’t do that here.”

I bit my lip, suppressing a smile.

He ran his thumb along my mouth and pulled my lip from my teeth, his jaw clenched.

“Don’t do that here.” He stepped back to put space between us.

He was mine, and I was his. It was a fact, etched into our skin in the form of bite marks and stitched into the fabric of our souls.

A fact, but two things could be true at once.

We were mated, and I was a danger to him—an issue I would resolve very soon, much to his dismay.