Page 15 of Caging Darling

I told Victor to take Michael back to the Den. He’d protested at first, said I didn’t look well. That I didn’t need to be wandering off on my own. But I’d reminded him that I’d bathed twice this week all by myself without drowning myself, and that if he thought I needed supervising out here, then perhaps he thought I needed supervising bathing, too. His cheeks had turned scarlet, and he’d led Michael to the Den, muttering something under his breath.

I try to tell myself it’s irrational—the idea that Tink killed John. There’s a part of me, deep down, that knows he took his own life. The part of me that saw the evidence with my own eyes. The part of me that knows how convincing the wraiths can be.

But I’m so very angry.

And if John killed himself, if he left me, then I have to direct that anger at him.

I can’t.

Besides, Victor agreed that John’s suicide made little sense. And Tink’s known to be obsessive. That’s why she came after me,isn’t it? Because she was so jealous of Peter’s attention over me, she thought she’d punish me for it.

There’s a story there, one that’s not so difficult to weave. If John found Tink, if he questioned her about my disappearance, it’s possible to see her misconstruing his attentiveness for affection.

And if she tried to pursue him, and he denied her…

If she took him from me…

My face flushes hot, and I can’t tell if it’s my rage or the windburn. I glance up at the sky. It’s daytime, and though I can’t see the stars, I know exactly where they are. Track them with a religious fervor.

The sky is gray today, overcast, but not with shadows.

No one is coming. But he has to come. He has to… The back of my neck stings.

“Where are you?” I whisper to the sky and to no one at all. “Why haven’t you come? You have to—” I rub at the back of my neck, the divots of the Nomad’s bargain aching now, begging me to find Tink. “Even if not for me.”

I stare up at the sky. I can’t even see the sun today through the hazy clouds. It’s as empty as my chest.

A thought knocks at the back of my mind. That perhaps bargains are, in fact, resistible. Perhaps the only reason I’m forced to bend underneath Peter’s bargain is because I’m too weak to resist.

Maybe Astor can resist. Maybe he’s just that much stronger than me. But even then, I’m fairly certain if the bargain isn’t fulfilled by the end of the term, we’ll both die. One doesn’t simply refuse to fulfill a fae bargain.

Unless your name is Nolan Astor. The man who would rather die than be controlled. The man who would rather die than risk suffering my presence.

“Is it because you’re angry with me?” I ask the howling wind. “Is that why you won’t come? Not even to save yourself?”

There’s another daydream I sometimes entertain. It’s less common than the others, but just as potent. Usually, when Astor comes to fulfill his bargain to the Nomad, I spit on him. Stare him down with as much vitriol as I can muster.

But sometimes? Sometimes I take his arm by the wrist, run my hand over the scar tissue where I severed his flesh and bone. Sometimes I tell him how desperately sorry I am. Sometimes I beg him to forgive me. Just as long as he’ll take me away from this wretched place.

The daydream diverges after that. There are times when I beg, and he takes my jaw in his hand and brings my mouth to his, and we’re lost in each other’s longing.

Other times, he laughs at me.

Neither of those scenarios is possible, of course. Not with Peter’s bargain binding my words under its spell.

“Do you hate me that much?” I whisper.

This time, even the wind doesn’t bother to answer.

Tears sting at my eyes, and I hardly have the energy to wipe them with the back of my hand. All of a sudden my limbs feel heavy, and I wonder if I’ll even have the strength to make it back to the Den. Back to my prison cell. The one my Mating Mark ensures I’ll enjoy. Or think I enjoy, but what’s the difference?

I stopped fighting my body’s relaxation into his, my heart’s flutter at his touch, long ago. But I’ve held onto the awareness that I exist separately from the Mark’s devotion. Even when I’m with Peter, I’ve kept that knowledge wound tightly in the back of my mind.

But it’s slipping away from me, little by little, each time Peter pulls me close. The temptation to lose myself in my Mark’s obsession with him is so strong, I don’t know how much longerI’ll even remember that the urge to love him is my Mark and not me.

I don’t even know whomeis.

I knew. For just a moment. The night I told Peter I was leaving him. The first and only time in my life I knew who Wendy Darling was. But she’s been erased again. And I’d banish her from existence not to feel this way anymore.

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