Page 89 of Faerie Fate
“I wish there were a way not to have anyone I care about be involved but there just…isn’t.”
She smiled at my helpless tone. Only her nose and eyes were visible at the edge of the tassels.
“We’re not just here for you, Tavi, although I will totally kick ass if you need me to. We’re here for all of Faerie. Because things have been divided for too long. And if there’s a way for us to make it right, then I’m sure I speak for everyone, friends and family. We’ll do it.”
Was she speaking for Mike too? The door hadn’t budged. I kept glancing at it, waiting for it to crack open, waiting for something to change. When would Mike be back?
Finally I forced myself to stand, a little wobbly but otherwise not as bad as anticipated. Bronwen looked like she wanted to ask about the whole gun ordeal. What I’d done to myself and why. I wasn’t in the mood.
“Try to get some sleep, Tavi.”
“Good night, Bron.”
Rather than getting comfortable on the couch, I arranged several of the blankets on the floor near Noren. Elfhame had conjured a small fire in the potbelly stove and it added a comfortable and floral-scented warmth to the room.
Under the blankets, things smoothed out. The briars in my mind still snagged my thoughts but everything else felt too far for me to touch.
Eventually the door snicked open and heavy footsteps sounded against the old wood floor.
I didn’t glance up at Mike’s return. Vowed not to move with Noren cuddled to my right infusing me with heat. Sealing the pieces of my soul back together.
Rather than taking the couch, Mike let the last pillow fall beside my head and curled himself around my back, wrapping his lanky body around me. His hands on my waist, he pulled me forward, fitting me to the front of his body.
His nose tickled my hair. “I’m sorry.”
I stiffened but the longer he held me, the further his heat and scent seeped into me, the more I relaxed.
“You think an apology is going to smooth things over?” I asked softly. “You can’t always just walk out.”
“I know. I needed time to think and I didn’t think you’d want me around for it. I know I’m not the easiest when I get in these moods.”
“You do act like a real jerk sometimes.” But he was touching me, so… “I do, too.”
His smile gave me tingles even though I couldn’t see it with him behind me. I felt it anyway. “Think you’ll be able to forgive me one last time?”
Why wouldn’t I forgive him? I wanted it to be easy, to offer the words to tell him how unconditionally I cared for him, but for some reason they were impossible to get out. My throat worked but nothing happened.
Maybe at my core I wasn’t really the unconditional type. Maybe I was tired and wanted to be a little mean with someone who knew me, with someone who already had a problem with me although he refused to admit it.
“What’s there to forgive? You’re pissed at me and I get it.”
I baited him for an answer and waited for him to pull his fingers back. Soon he’d stop drawing his fingers in neat little circles on my hip. Soon he’d turn on his back and break the connection because deep down I disgusted him, no matter how he tried to act like we were getting back to what we’d been.
“I’m not mad at you,” he corrected gruffly. “The situation blows. There are things I know we need to do and it kills me because I don’t want to have to put us in those predicaments. I have no power. I’m useless.”
“Us?” I repeated. Dull. Unbelieving.
Did I really think there was going to be anus? We were a thing in the past, so far gone not even his time manipulation could reach the relationship we used to have and the people we used to be.
Mike still refused to look at the scar on my neck because we both knew exactly what it meant.
“We’re in a unique and fucking terrible position because we know what the battle will cost. I have serious reservations that we’ll survive.” His breathing deepened.
He exhaled and settled his weight closer to me, his hip bones digging into my back.
“I don’t know much about the battle of EverRose,” I admitted.
“Not one of those things they teach at the academy if they can help it.” He pulled to bring me closer. “It’s the first battle of the Great Pixie War. It changed the course of Faerie history. Hundreds of thousands of fae and pixies died.”
