Chapter 16

God, that had been a shit show.

It had been pretty bad from the moment Aither had shown up with half of his family tree in tow, but it had definitely gotten more complicated once Evrin had entered the picture. I could only blame myself for that—I'd been begging him with my eyes to come in and rescue me from the dire date situation I'd found myself in.

It was only once he'd entered the room, that I'd seen how Shades reacted to him in confined quarters with no other distractions around, that I realized they weren't afraid of him.

They were repulsed by him.

It hadn't escaped my notice that they had been looking at the empty spot just above his head almost the entire time.

Things that hadn't made sense, that had been sending my insecurities into a tailspin, were falling into place now. Like the fact that Evrin seemed so into me, and yet totally unwilling to do anything about it.

Almost as though he was trying to protect me.

Stop, I chided. This was how false hope began. My heart couldn't handle doing this dance again.

Elverston House seemed oddly loud when I got back, with the new contingent of Hunters chattering away happily in one of the drawing rooms. Sebastian waved me over as I passed the arched doorway, but I shook my head with a smile, pointing toward the kitchen. My social battery had been sending me warning beeps for hours now, and I couldn't face the idea of going in there and making small talk with the others.

Even though I didn't trust them, I still felt like I had a responsibility to them to be cheerful and positive about life in the shadow realm, and while I was, there were a few black thoughts hanging around that I didn't want to slip out in their presence.

The kitchen wasn't empty either, but Meera looked to be hiding, too. She shot me a sheepish look while sitting at the hearth, adding another log to the fire.

"Needed a break?" I asked sympathetically.

"Is that awful of me?"

"Never."

She hummed, gesturing for me to join her. "How did it go? Shall I make tea?"

"Tea would be amazing."

"I'm assuming it didn't go well, then," she said, climbing to her feet and pumping water into the kettle before hanging it in the hook over the fire. "That sounded more like a request for commiseration tea than celebration tea."

The weight of all the secrets I'd been keeping was feeling suffocating. It had been fine when I'd had Evrin to talk to, to rely on. But without him, it was just me and the loud self-recriminations that played in my head all day, and the bitter aftertaste of my bad decisions.

"Tonight was just the next episode in an ongoing saga that started the night of the ball," I sighed, kicking off my shoes and climbing up on the wide ledge below the fireplace, tucking my legs to my chest and pulling my dress down over them.

Meera glanced at me out of the corner of her eye, filling a teapot with loose leaves. "The saga of the mystery Shade?"

"The very one."

"Does it have anything to do with those long midmorning walks you would always come back smiling from, and why they stopped?"

"The two may be interlinked."

Meera hummed. "Well, if you're ready to talk, I'm ready to listen."

"Are you going to judge me?"

She suppressed a smile. "Did you do anything I should judge you for?"

I exhaled heavily. "God, yes."

"So," Meera said, setting the kettle back over the fire for the third time. "He stayed for your whole date, then? Didn't Aither have something to say about that?"

"Did you miss the part where I said he brought his entire family along? It's not like he had room to complain. Ophelia looked like she was about to pop a blood vessel when they rocked up, but I didn't want to make it awkward by asking them to leave, so I told her it was fine."

She'd left very reluctantly, insisting Damen stay in her place since she had to attend dinner.

"I don't have room to judge because I also dislike confrontation, but Ophelia would have been more than happy to be the bad guy there if you'd let her," Meera pointed out, giving me a slightly exasperated look as she washed out the teapot.

I opened my mouth to object, to make excuses and justify my actions under the guise of not wanting to upset anyone. But I probably had upset Ophelia by not speaking up when she'd gone to all that effort to set the date up in the first place. And I'd upset myself by staying in an avoidable situation I wasn't comfortable in purely for the sake of not ruffling feathers.

Maybe… maybe I needed to advocate a little harder for myself. Not just tonight, but in all things.

"I want to preface this by saying that I am Team Tallulah, always. I've only met Evrin a couple of times, and while he seems nice, my loyalty lies with you," Meera said gently, looking at me like she was about to tell me some home truths that I might not want to hear. "Did you ever actually tell Evrin that you like him?"

"Liked him," I corrected hastily. "Past tense."

"Okay. Sure. For argument's sake, let's pretend that's true."

I snorted. "I mean, not in so many words. But I feel like I showed it a lot. And he never said he liked me either," I added a little defensively. "I don't even know for sure that he does. I mean, did. Whatever."

"That's strange," Meera mused. "Because I know that, and I've only spent perhaps an hour in the guy's company."

"I came here for emotional support, not helpful feedback," I laughed, accepting the fresh cup of tea Meera slid toward me.

"Well, you're getting both." She gave me another ghost of a smile that almost reached her eyes. Not for the first time, I wondered what it would take to make Meera really smile. "Just… I don't know. Maybe neither of you have been as wholly honest as you should be."

"No, maybe not," I agreed, holding my cup up so the steam warmed my face. "It seems like we should be having bigger problems than that though, right? He's not human. Shouldn't that be what I'm struggling with?"

She raised an eyebrow at me. "You didn't seem to mind that in the courtyard that night. Or on any of those long walks—"

"Okay, okay," I laughed. "Point taken."

"I'm half asleep, I'm going to head up to bed. I'll leave you to reflect on all that helpful feedback," Meera added, mouth twitching with amusement as she blew me a kiss over her shoulder before leaving me next to the glowing embers of the fire.

I didn't want to reflect, because reflection meant acknowledging my own mistakes, and my head was a more pleasant place to be when I ignored those.

But at the same time, I hadn't told Evrin I liked him. I'd assumed that he'd known, then gotten mad when he hadn't. I downed half my tea like it was whiskey, admitting at least to myself that it wasn't the only unfair burden of expectation I'd placed on Evrin.

He had been such a calming presence from the moment I'd met him, and I'd leaned hard on that. But Evrin wasn't my emotional support Shade. It wasn't his responsibility to handle my raging insecurities. It was mine. And perhaps a lot of those insecurities would have been mitigated if I'd understood why he was so reticent to pursue anything more with me.

And perhaps they would have been mitigated if I'd just had the courage to have the conversation.

It was a scary prospect, but if anyone was worth being brave for, it was Evrin.