Page 84 of Her Dark Promise

I thought for a moment about compelling him to forget about his fears and anxiety. Compel him to never drown in his sorrows again. But that wouldn’t fix the overall issue— me. It wouldn’t fix his disdain for me.

It shouldn’t be surprising that he hates you. It seems that everyone that you come into contact with either dies or—

I squeezed my hand and shattered all of the glasses on the table, screaming in frustration. This had to end. I ran my fingers through my hair and stormed out of the room, leaving Emilia to eat by herself.

The garden. I could go to the garden, but she wouldn’t be able to find me.

I rushed out to the greenhouse as fast as I could, trying to beat Circe from saying another word.

I wrenched open the doors and practically hauled myself inside, slamming the door closed. My body was overheating, my mind was swimming, and I couldn’t seem to catch my breath.

Not again.

I doubled over, wrapping my arms around my knees, and put my head between my legs, taking unsteady breaths.

Deep breath in. One. Two. Three. Deep breath out. One. Two. Three.

I sat in a ball on the wet ground and didn’t move until my eyes grew heavy. Was my lack of sleep finally catching up to me?

I blinked slowly as my body relaxed slightly, but I knew I would be accosted by images of all the people who had died because of me. Remembered their faces even after all these years.

I hadn’t heard her voice for a while. I think I had effectively cast her far enough away into the recesses of my mind that she wouldn’t be able to bother me for the time being.

I left the greenhouse, made my way up the steps, and found a hunched figure peeking through the keyhole of one of the windows, with a head full of blonde hair.

“For a scholar, you aren’t very bright.”

Finally, it was my turn to scare him because he jumped straight into the air and banged his head against the glass.

“Shit!” He cursed, rubbing his head. “Please, do take care and not sneak up on a trained hunter.”

“A trained hunter? You?” I scoffed.

“Just because I would rather have my head in a book doesn’t mean that I wasn’t trained just as rigorously as Bast.”

I raised an eyebrow, skeptical. “What are you doing? You’re supposed to be finishing up cleaning.”

“I am finished cleaning, and well, I thought this was, uh, this was another—”

“I’m sorry. Do you need a moment to think of a lie?”

He rolled his eyes, and I reached out, grabbing his jaw tightly.

“Do I need to take you up to my chambers and teach you some manners?”

He stared up at me and, without missing a beat, replied, “Will that suffice you enough to answer more of my questions?”

His response made me pause, so I brought his face closer to mine.

“Would you really go that far for me just to answer a bunch of meaningless questions?”

“For knowledge? Always.”

I stared at him for a few more moments.

“Want to know what I really want from you? Right now?” I dragged my hand up his chest and then flicked his nose. “I want you to clean.”

Which effectively changed the subject.

---