Page 53 of Hunted
I wiped sweat from my forehead with my arm, hoping my idiotic thoughts didn’t show on my face.“What do you want?”
“To help.”The sign was lazy and unhurried, but sincere.
“I don’t need your comfort and patronizing,” I bit out, rotating my wrist to work the tension out of my sword arm.
I didn’t say anything about comforting you, icicle.I said I came to help.He spoke in my mind again, something he’d rarely ever attempted with me.
Cicely stepped closer, his expression soft, eyes full of gentleness.I felt the shift in the room’s pressure—a subtle warmth sliding over my shoulders.Empathic magic.Soft, skilled, unobtrusive, nearly undetectable if you weren’t watching for it.
“Don’t,” I snapped.
Cicely stilled, his leaf-green eyes watching me with a weird mix of pity and curiosity.I hated that look.Hated that I probably warranted it.
“I don’t want you in my head,” I said evenly, trying not to snap this time.Trying to avoid the outward display of emotion that gave me away.
“I thought it might be easier for you if you didn’t have to speak,”Cicely signed.
I exhaled sharply.“What might be easier?I told you not to do this shit, faun.”
“You pretend you feel anything, so no one will look too close,”he signed.“But deep down, I think you just want someone to ask if you’re okay.”
That stung.
Cicely moved to the edge of the mat, knelt slowly, and waited.As if he were nothing more than a lowly lesser fae awaiting orders from a high fae lord.
I stared at him, then grunted and tossed my blade aside and went to sit across from him.Fine.If it would get him to just leave me the fuck alone, then fine.I’d talk about myfeelings.
“He didn’t fight,” I said, voice low.
“I heard.”
“He didn’t scream.Or run.Or curse me.He just...waited.Robin was blocking the exit, but she didn’t even need to be there.”
Cicely nodded.
“He said my name.Once.Like he knew me from before.Probably recognized me as O’Dell’s pet assassin, since he was so old—he was definitely around back then.But whatever the reason...it was like he’d already resigned herself to his fate and forgiven me for it.”
“And?”
“I hated him for it,” Yukio whispered.“For not making it easier.For not attacking me first.For not reminding me how evil he was or how I was doing the world a favor regardless of what Acacia wanted.”
Cicely’s eyes shone faintly, but he didn’t speak.
I looked down at my hands.“Acacia’s going to keep doing this,” I muttered.“And Robin’s going to keep saying yes.And we’re all going to keep pretending we’re better than the people we kill.”
Cicely reached out, placed a hand over mine, warm and steady, squeezing briefly before it lifting to sign.“Then stop pretending.Start choosing.”
I looked up, confused.
“There’s a difference between surviving and surrendering,”he said, his expression full of understanding.“I think you know that as well as I do.You are choosing to do this because it will help keep Josh and the rest of us safe.You’re not a mindless tool.Unlike when you were with O’Dell, thereischoice in this.Robin listens to your opinions.She might order you around, but in the end, youcansay no.That’s what makes it different than when you belonged to the fae.”
He had also been one of O’Dell’s tools—and even less voluntarily than I had.O’Dell had used Cicely’s abilities to spy for him, to pry into the minds and hearts of others.He probablydidknow a thing or two about the mental gymnastics needed to keep yourself sane by justifying your actions in some way, by grasping at any opportunity to feel like you had some sort of control.
I blinked hard to quell the stupid tears that wanted to well up, then waved a hand at him.“Okay, enough.Go away.”
His chiseled lips quirked upward with suppressed laughter as he signed.“When you stop being so hard on yourself, I will.”
But he finally took pity on me and stood.“You’re not a monster, Yukio.And you’re not weak for having feelings.You’re scared you’ll become that old you—a version of yourself that was trapped and wounded.That’s hard.And very understandable.”
