Page 52 of Kill the Beast
“Oh, stop it, you two,” Rags scolded.
Lyssa shouldered her pack. “I’m going to go soak in the hot springs while Al sleeps. After that, we’ll be on our way.”
“We’re having shepherd’s pie for dinner,” Ragnhild said hopefully.
“Good for you,” Lyssa replied, and stormed out of the kitchen.
The walk to the hot springs was just strenuous enough, after all she had been through over the past few days, that by the time she reached them Lyssa hadn’t thought about anything besides her aching muscles and the sharp pain of the stitches tugging at her skin. But once she shucked off her clothes and sank down into the steaming water, Ragnhild’s voice resumed its accusations inside her head.
I saw that look you gave him when you tucked him in.
Something has changed between the two of you.
It rattled her, that the fledgling affection she felt for Alderic was so visible. Rattled her even more that it hadn’t wilted with every mile they’d traveled down the mountain. She kept telling herself that this feeling was temporary, confined to a particular moment in time. That it would fade the farther they got from Bellgaard and the shadows of Alderic’s past. But to her chagrin, it had only gotten stronger the more time she spent in his company.
Lyssa didn’t need Ragnhild’s bones to foresee that it was going to become a problem. She had already allowed it to compromise their task, choosing to spare his feelings rather than make him go into the ruins of his old summer home to find iron they could use for the sword. And his attitude about her propensity for violence could prove problematic as well. The last thing she needed was that frilly bastard’s voice in her head when she was fighting the Beast, warning her not to lose herself to her anger. She had to be willing to sacrifice everything in order to kill it, even her own life.
Whatever she felt for Alderic, she had to distance herself from it, for her own good. Had to rip it out by the roots now that thesigns of infestation were becoming obvious. It didn’t matter that he seemed to understand her in a way no one else did, despite the fact that he knew next to nothing about her. It didn’t matter that her instinct was to cultivate the thing budding between them, to confide in him the way he had confided in her.
In fact, that instinct was proof that she could not allow these feelings to grow any further.
Trusting people was just as dangerous as caring about them. It only gave them more ways to hurt her. Lyssa couldn’t imagine Alderic betraying her like Honoria had—he wanted the Beast dead, too, after all—but that didn’t mean it was safe to let him in.
It was better to be lonely than vulnerable. Better to be heartless than weak.
Alderic was right—humans were social creatures, and it was difficult to curb the urge to form bonds, especially in the face of shared circumstances or grief. But shehadto curb it. Her oath was the only thing that mattered, and she was on the verge of finally fulfilling it. Alderic was a distraction at best, a liability at worst, and if she didn’t uproot this insidious vine of affection, it could strangle her and jeopardize everything.
He had simply caught her off guard, at the lake, with his swift emotional dissection of her. His honesty about his past, his scars. But there was still time to rectify her mistakes before they bloomed into bigger ones.
Besides, it was forhisown good, as well. He didn’t want attachments any more than she did, and what was the point of becoming friends—if that was even where this was headed—when she was just going to die soon, anyway?
By the time she got out of the steaming pool, her flesh was healed and her heart was armored anew. She went straight to the smithy, her clothes clinging uncomfortably to her damp skin, and took the creaking stairs two at a time. If Alderic was still asleep, she would sit at her desk and wait for him to wake up; she couldn’t stand the thought of going back to the cottage with Ragnhild and Nadia and their knowing smiles.
But Alderic was awake already, staring at the articles about the Beast that she had tacked up all over the walls around her bed.
“Why do you want to kill it so badly?” he asked without turning around. Like he knew it was her by her footsteps alone.
“Do you ever listen to what anyone tells you, or are you too busy thinking about your next shopping spree?” she said with as much frost in her voice as she could muster. “Rags and I won’t stop until we’ve killed every last faerie and Hound on this island.”
“You don’t have an entire wall devoted to every last faerie and Hound,” he said, his voice hollow as he peered at the collection of articles speculating about why there had been a monster at the circus to begin with. “You have a wall devoted to the Beast of Buxton Fields.”
The words were on the tip of her tongue again:The Beast killed my brother and I swore an oath to kill it,but she shoved them away. The time for confessions was over between them. She had made her decision and she had to stick with it—for Eddie, for Alderic, and for herself. It didn’t matter that they had this grief in common. All that mattered was avenging those they had lost, and sharing any more of herself with him than she already had would only make that more difficult.
“I want to become a legend,” she said instead. “The Beast killed more people than any of the other Hounds, and then it vanished without a trace. It has become a story people tell their children at night, to scare them into being good. I want to kill all of the Hounds, sure, but if I kill the Beast? I might as well kill Death. And what little girl doesn’t grow up dreaming about killing Death?”
He didn’t laugh. “Listen. Lyssa.” He finally turned to face her, and she frowned with concern at how miserable he looked. “I think I made a mistake.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I shouldn’t have told you those things, at the lake,” he said, running a hand over his face. There were dark circles beneath his eyes, and she resisted the urge to scold him for not sleeping longer.“About me. About my past. I… wasn’t thinking. I hope I didn’t make you uncomfortable.”
“You didn’t make me uncomfortable.” He had done something far worse. He had made her care about him—and she couldn’t afford to care about anyone or anything but killing the Beast.
A sword is only a sword.For all his pretty words about control and the difference between humans and monsters, she knew what she was. A weapon. It was all she’d ever be, until she fulfilled her oath.
“Oh. Good.” He looked at the floor, as though he was trying to figure out how to phrase what he wanted to say next and couldn’t do it if he knew she was staring at him. “It’s just that… well, it complicates things, if we are anything other than employer and sword-for-hire, and I think it’s best if we discontinue the friendly repartee and fireside confessions, and focus on the task at hand.”
“I was thinking the same thing,” she said, relieved that he had come to the same conclusion she had. It would make things easier, anyway.
