Page 60 of Wings of Darkness (Daughter of the Seven Circles #2)

Chapter

Thirty-Nine

LUCILLE

I woke up in the last place I ever wanted to be. My chest ached as little firewings zapped around me, their vibrant color warning me back. If they landed on my bare skin, they’d bite and swarm, devouring me in heat and torment. Still, that wouldn’t compare to how I felt on the inside.

“Take me out,” I whispered to my power. “Let me leave, please,” I begged.

Why was I even here?

I dropped my head.

I knew why. Aspen had told me.

He told me how to tap into them because he knew how. Then he covered up his confident words with lies and kisses.

My gut warned me, and I ignored it for him, blinded by my feelings instead of logic.

“Sweetheart?”

I flinched, the shards of my heart grinding together.

“Lucille?” Aspen touched my shoulder, attempting to turn me around.

“Don’t touch me.” I wrenched out of his hold, biting my wobbling lip hard before facing him. The taste of copper trickled into my mouth, but I barely noticed.

Aspen searched my face, then thoroughly scoured our surroundings before the concern tugging on his lips flatlined. “So you finally figured it out.”

Finally , as if I should’ve known from the beginning—and I should’ve. I should’ve known all of this was too good to be true, that his behavior was different. But I wanted to believe I was with the real Aspen—the one without secrets, hidden agendas, and uncontrolled by Lilith.

“I’m not sure. Are you actually even Aspen?”

“Good question.” He imagined two chairs and plopped himself in one, sitting back. “I’m the Aspen you were with in Elora.”

At least he wasn’t Lilith. Something clicked into place at that thought, and I laughed, the sound a broken, half-version of itself.

He may not be Lilith, but I guarantee the figure I saw in our last dream-walk was—and I bet that wasn’t the only time she showed up.

Which meant she either had some rune or power to infiltrate dreams, or she was a dream-walker, and that was where I got my power from.

Not from my mother, father, or their Weaver—from the evil bitch who made my birth possible.

“Let me guess, Aspen. You’re Hell Runed.”

He switched his leather uniform for a short-sleeved tunic and pants, looking at his wrists. “No, I’m not.”

He kept his arms turned up and rested them on his legs, revealing two red-black Hell Runes, showing me his lie, and confirming Lilith controlled what he could and couldn’t say. Did that mean she controlled what he did too?

A lump traveled up my throat. He did things to me I’d never done with anyone else.

I was vulnerable and nervous, but I’d felt like it was okay.

He had me. He’d guided me through my nerves with that desire in his eyes and those gorgeous dimples.

I had trusted him, given a piece of myself to him that no one else had. I thought it meant something to him.

Clearly. Fucking. Not.

“Did she watch us?” My voice cracked.

He flinched like it hurt him. His usually vibrant blues seemed to hold shame. But as great as it was to see, it didn’t make me feel better.

“Did you put on a good show for her? Did I?”

He dropped my heated stare to his hands, stomping on whatever remained of my heart.

“She commanded you to be nice to me too, didn’t she? So I’d spill all my secrets?” I yelled, searching his face for the answers, knowing it was the only thing that made sense.

I was so fucking na?ve. And stupid.

“Glad you’re not floundering anymore, sweetheart,” he whispered, sounding sad and exhausted.

I tilted my head to the overcast sky, blinking back the stinging in my eyes, covering my mouth, and locking my knees from buckling. Every part of me wanted to drop to the grass and scream, to grieve the fake male I fell for. He was an illusion. One big, fat lie.

I held tightly to our tender moments in Elora, to who he could be, and his poisonous words snuck into my weak heart.

I should’ve listened to my gut.

Knowing I couldn’t hold it all in much longer, I forced my tears back and looked at him again. I waited until he met my gaze and told him the one secret I’d been hiding, wanting to hurt him as badly as he’d hurt me.

“Your first love, Nalini—she’s living in Hell now, and she’d be so disgusted with you.”

Aspen’s face blanched right before he cried out, and the runes on his wrists pulsed with light—the same old song and dance.

“Enjoy rotting with Lilith,” I snapped, then forced myself out of the dream-walk.

I quietly slipped out of bed, put on a robe, and left Oliver to his sleep.

Tears trickled down my face as I walked through the halls, half-aware.

When I reached the hidden doorway and stepped out onto the castle roof, I ignored the snow burning the bottoms of my feet.

I fell to my knees, and they cracked against the dark stone.

Then I tilted my head back to the black sky and screamed.

It was low and wet, vibrating out from my crushed heart and tapering off into whimpers.

Through my softer sounds, a bellow rang out far in the distance. A foreign pang tightened my chest—almost like I could feel their hurt, like their pain was my pain.

For some reason, the thought that I wasn’t completely alone in my grief, that someone out there was hurting as much as I, made me feel a little less lonely on this cold, dreary night.

The next few days, my nerves were a chaotic mess. I needed to apologize to Ronen and make sure he was okay, despite Alexei’s reassurance. But neither he nor Rune showed up—for anything.

Instead, it was just Alexei and Oliver at every run and training. Nothing felt the same anymore.

Lucifer never used his powers on me, saying my mother needed his extra energy, which I confirmed with my own eyes when I saw her skinnier and paler than usual.

I tried to dream-walk to her afterward, but it never worked.

I asked Cato again, but he refused to speak of it and luscelered away to wherever he hid.

Then there was Oliver. My heart was in pieces from Aspen, and I was scared to tell him.

He’d been right. Aspen had been lying to me the whole time.

But how did I admit that to my best friend?

After spending night and day trying to strengthen myself and find a way to Aspen—choosing him over my mom—only to ignore my gut and discover I was just a pawn again.

How did I get those shameful words out? Worse, how did I tell him a part of me couldn’t stop thinking about Aspen?

I couldn’t. So I withdrew as much as possible and put on a show that I was okay. If only I were.

At the end of the week, after training, I strode up to the dais where Alexei stood.

I’d finally had enough. I didn’t think their absence would hurt this much, at least not Ronen’s.

But each day that passed, I found myself scanning the arena for his golden gaze, analyzing every shadow like a hopeless fool.

“Where are they? Is he okay?”

Alexei finished writing the rankings on his parchment, then gave me a small smile. “He just needs time, beautiful.”

“It’s been a week. Can you at least tell me where he is? So I can apologize—or help, or something?”

Alexei grabbed my shoulder. “An apology won’t fix anything because this isn’t about you. Ronen needs time to think and heal. Give him that.”

I didn’t completely believe him. I knew I’d struck some chord within Ronen, one Alexei refused to enlighten me on, but that didn’t mean it still wasn’t my fault.

I had infiltrated Ronen’s mind. I’d made him live out that scene.

The pain that twisted his features and bled through his voice gutted me, and I needed to see for myself that he was okay.

I cared about him—more than I ever thought I would.

Over the next few days, I badgered Alexei with the same questions, only to receive the same result.

To distract myself, Oliver and I read every night, searching for a way out of Hell. Sometimes I found myself picking up a book on the Tenebrous Kingdom, feeling a strange urgency in my blood. I’d think about Aspen, ease the gnawing need for him in my stomach, then slam the book shut.

At one point, I searched the library for books on relationships or guardian bonds, trying to comprehend my twisted feelings. It was like something inside me still wanted him, still desired to save him. But why?

How could I possibly still care about him ?

This shame and want couldn’t be love, could it?

None of the books told me one way or another. I’d never been in love, but I knew I’d been falling for him.

But maybe that wasn’t what this was.

Perhaps it was the overwhelming guilt that came with remembering Miriam’s words, asking me to save her son.

Or maybe it was the bond we shared, the one I couldn’t just cut away, no matter how much I wanted to.

After two weeks, Ronen and Rune were still gone, and I coped like I had every previous night.

I went to the library hoping to see him.

Not sure why. It was a pointless hope. Ronen wouldn’t be sitting in his chair reading.

He never was. Yet I still came at this time, just to see—and to have some of Dorus’s tea and chocolates.

Before I opened the doors, I paused in front of them. Their colorful pieces shifted from the symbol they had been displaying daily—a symbol I still couldn’t decipher—to a new image: Michael’s dagger in Ronen’s hands.

My stomach churned as I remembered every instance that blade had drawn my blood.

At four years old, it had nearly killed me.

At five, six, seven, eight, and nine, it marked my birthday “gifts.” At nineteen, Michael tortured me with it.

But I didn’t think the doors were showing me the dagger to just reminisce.

There had to be a purpose, some kind of significance.

Thinking, something I had forgotten came rushing back. Her words—the female from my nightmares, the one who invaded my mind in Elora—trickled into my memory:

“If you ever want to save Aspen, steal the bastard’s knife.”

Part of me wanted to save him as badly as I wanted to breathe. But another part ached with self-hatred at the thought.

“What is wrong with me?” I whispered, opening the library doors.

I stopped short at the entrance.

Oliver lounged at our table, plopping chocolates into his mouth with his fuzzy slippers propped up.

“Didn’t I leave you in bed?” I padded down the marble floor and took a seat opposite him.

He smiled, his teeth covered in my chocolate truffles. “Haven’t heard of the old pillow trick?”

“I wasn’t that sheltered. But why are you up this late?”

He took his feet off the table and leaned forward, grabbing my hands before they could reach for a book. “We need to talk.”

I quirked a brow. “Breaking up with me, Oli?”

“You know, that would’ve actually been kind of funny if not for your monotone voice and dead eyes. Now what the hell is going on with you?”

I pulled my hands back. “Noth?—”

“I’m going to lose it. I will shriek like a girl and wake up Cato, and we’ll get the scolding of our lives. I’m your best friend. Just talk to me,” Oliver pleaded.

I stared at my fidgeting fingers, unable to meet his eyes. “Have you ever been in love?”

Oliver’s chair shifted, and I peeked up at him. His silence told me he hadn’t expected that to come out of my mouth.

He shook his head. “No. Searching for Melanie took up all of my time. I had flings and flirted. But falling in love has never been on my mind. ”

“What do you think it feels like?”

Oliver let out a puff of air. “Everything. I think some days you’ll wake, roll over, and look at them in bed, and a feeling of unadulterated joy will fill you up.

A small smile might stretch across both your faces, because in that moment, you both feel like the luckiest person alive.

Other days… it’ll ache. It’ll squeeze your chest in an unbearable grip.

They’ll frustrate you. They may even hurt you in ways you never expected.

But love isn’t just beautiful, it’s brutal.

Soft and sharp. But worth it when you find the right one. ”

I narrowed my eyes. “Are you sure you haven’t been in love?”

“I’m sure I have eyes and ears and have lived a long enough life to have witnessed it.” He clasped his hands and placed his arms on the table, leaning forward. “Is that what this is about? Aspen?”

“Maybe.”

“We’ll find a way out and get to them. Don’t worry.”

That was the problem, wasn’t it? I was worried. I shouldn’t want to rescue him.

“This’ll cheer you up. Alexei told me to tell you to meet him on the roof tomorrow morning. Something about seeing the sulking general. So you can apologize and then get back to wooing him over to our side.”

The urgency whispering in my ear practically hummed with contentment at the idea. The thoughts lessened the strangling of my organs.

Was this what love was? I almost hoped it wasn’t.

“You’re not coming?”

“Wasn’t invited. But I believe in you.”

I didn’t.

How in the world would I woo Ronen to our side after I apologized?