Chapter 52

Chapter 52

“ O kay. Sit.”

Mariah gestured to the cushioned vanity chair in her bathroom, waving the scissors in her hand impatiently. Andrian’s lip pulled back into that familiar smirk as he slid smoothly into the seat. He met her gaze in the mirror, humor flashing in his marvelous eyes.

“Nervous, princess?”

Mariah scoffed. “No. Of course not.” She stepped closer to him, close enough to feel his warmth. “I’ve cut plenty of men’s hair before. Yours is no different.”

“Oh, is that so?” His smirk stretched into a grin. “Care to elaborate?”

“Nope.” She popped the “p” in her response. Her hands were clammy.

A heavy pause filled the room.

“Just your brother’s, then?”

She shot her gaze back up to meet his in the mirror. His smile had softened, as had his expression.

Mariah only hummed low in her chest and turned back to his hair. It was quite long, the longest it’d been since she’d met him. It had always fallen a bit errantly but there was a sort of reason to the madness. Messy, yet polished. Tousled, yet groomed. Never past his ears, never reaching his brow.

Now, the onyx strands brushed against his neck. His ears were nearly concealed behind black, and it fell into his eyes.

“Who normally cuts your hair?” She didn’t ask what she really wanted to. She looked in the mirror, flinching away when she found him watching her.

Why ask me to cut it?

“Since moving to the palace? There are plenty of barbers in the market district; they aren’t too hard to find.”

“And why didn’t you go find one before today?”

A shrug. “Not sure, princess. Maybe I was looking to change some things.”

Her chest squeezed. There was so much behind that statement. So many unspoken words, so many unasked questions. She nodded, not meeting his gaze.

“You were right, by the way.”

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw an eyebrow lift. “Oh? About what?”

She cleared her throat. “About my brother.” She dared a glance. Held it. Let herself fall into his stare. “He’s the only one whose hair I’ve cut. Our mother worked long hours at the clinic, and our father would’ve tried, but … that was a terrifying idea. So I learned to cut Ellan’s hair, and he learned to cut mine.” She squeezed her fingers around the scissors, the cool metal slowly warming in her palm. “Although I hardly ever let him take any off mine. I loved my long hair.”

She could feel him in the silence, weighing what to say next.

“I love the short hair, too.”

Mariah smiled. “So do I.”

She took one last half-step closer to him. The tips of her slightly shaking fingers brushed against the black strands of his hair.

His forearms clenched. A muscle feathered in his jaw.

A smile tugged at her lips. Emboldened, she dove her fingers deeper into his hair.

It was softer than she remembered. Like strands of silk. Black as night, dark as the shadows that exist opposite every bright light. She ran her hands through its length, pulling it back from his face and away from his ears. She stood behind him, tapping the scissors against her palm as she met his gaze in the mirror.

Pained. His expression was pained . And desperate. Holding so much back.

Something surged in her.

Something like … excitement.

She gripped the scissors loosely, the metal now familiar. Flashes of memory painted her minds’ eye: sitting outside by the firepit with her brother, snipping bits of dark auburn hair as he spoke of his friend’s antics, or told a story about finding a quiet brook deep within the Ivory Forest. Of wanting to bring the pretty girl with yellow-blonde hair who lived down the road there with him. How the wildflowers that grew along its bank would look so lovely woven into her curls.

“Mariah.” Andrian’s soft voice pulled her from her thoughts. She blinked, her hand still wrapped around the scissors.

He met her gaze with a smile. “I trust you. I … I just want you to know that.”

She smiled at him a little shyly, nodded, and with a deep inhale made the first cut.

“You know, princess, it doesn’t look half bad.”

“‘ Half bad? ’” Mariah scoffed, setting down her scissors. She stepped back and rested her hip against the bathroom counter before crossing her arms and cocking her head, a faint smile on her lips. “I don’t think you’ve ever looked better.”

He froze, a hand in his hair, eyes blowing wide. His shock was … almost humorous, and she didn’t stop the laugh that slipped free from her chest.

Besides, she meant it.

She’d gotten quite skilled in her life at cutting her brother’s hair, and it wasn’t a skill she shared with many. But she knew what she was doing with a man’s haircut, and even with time and lack of practice, she hadn’t lost it.

She’d trimmed most of the length around his ears and neck and cut back his bangs so they no longer fell haphazardly into his eyes. But she’d still left a good portion of the length on top, enough for fingers to dig into.

Enough to grab.

Mariah swallowed, giving her head a slight shake, and brushed away those thoughts.

She’d also found a sharp-edged razor in one of the drawers—where it had come from, she had no idea—and had used it carefully to trim around his ears and neck and face just a little closer.

The result was polished yet roguish.

Perfect.

And standing that close to him while doing it …

She uncrossed her arms, rubbing her sweaty palms on her leggings. He dropped his hand from his hair at the same time, relaxing in his seat.

“Never looked better?” A touch of a smile on his lips. “Tell me more about that.”

“Alright, now you’re pushing it.” She pushed off the counter, striding for the exit. She didn’t know where she was going, but just had the feeling that this moment, whatever this was, was nearing its end.

“Mariah … wait.”

She halted less than a foot from her bathroom door and closed her eyes, clenching her eyelids so tight she saw spots. Mariah drew in a deep breath and held it for a moment before expelling it through her lips.

“A haircut isn’t all you wanted, is it?”

There was a shuffle and the scraping of a chair on marble floors.

“I … No. Well, it was. I needed a haircut. But there’s more.” A pause, his voice closer to her than before. Then, quieter: “With you, there’s always more.”

Mariah drew in another shuddering breath before turning slowly to face him.

Andrian stood in the middle of her bathroom, tall, imposing, yet subdued. Open.

Vulnerable.

He drew in a deep breath of his own, shadows flickering around his shoulders.

“I know you said I didn’t have to beg for your forgiveness. That there was nothing for you to forgive. And maybe you’re right. Maybe there is nothing to forgive. But those scars on your back and the shadows in your eyes say something different.”

Her stomach twisted and knotted around itself. “Andrian?—”

“I’m not finished.” His eyes flashed with intensity and desperation. “You say that instead of begging for your forgiveness, I should beg for your trust. So, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. With a story.” He sagged as a bit of heaviness left him. He raked a hand through his hair. “A story … about my mother.”

Mariah blinked, shock spiking through her. His mother? The one he spoke of in the past tense?

The one his father had mocked in that last meeting before their world had flipped upside down?

“I told you that my mother was Leuxrithian. It’s where I got … this .” He lifted a hand, shadows dancing around his fingers. “Growing up, she was—she was all I had. Antoris is a cold place, and you’ve met my father.” He nearly spat the word, lip curling into a grimace. “She was the only thing I loved about living there. The first person I loved.” He met Mariah’s gaze. “The only person I loved … until you.”

Mariah’s heart hammered against her ribs. Her hands clenched into fists at her sides. Magic rippled through her veins.

Andrian took a small step closer.

“You asked who usually gave me my haircuts. I told you that after coming to Verith, it was always some barber in the market district. But before that … it was my mother. And during those moments, when it was just me and her, she would teach me bits about her culture. Her language, her legends, the magic of her people.” More shadows danced around his shoulders. “My father hated it, of course, but that didn’t stop her. I think it was her version of rebellion against him, in a way.”

Mariah’s throat tried to close around her words, but she pushed them out anyway. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Because,” Andrian said, his voice thick. With a slow, measured movement, he lowered himself to his knees. His head bowed, and he laid a hand flat on the white marble floor.

“Because you told me to beg for your trust, and this is the only way I know how. Yes, others besides my mother have cut my hair. But since her, I’ve never let myself be touched like that by someone I love. Because I haven’t loved anyone since her. Don’t you understand?” He looked up at her, peeking through stray strands of his hair. “My love got her killed . And it will do the same to you. That’s my deepest secret, my darkest truth. I’m fucking terrified because I love you more than I love myself, and that means I will always be destined to lose you.”

Her hands shook at her sides. Tears brushed against the back of her eyes and settled in her throat.

“I’m not sure this is convincing me to trust you.”

He laughed—a sorrowful, bitter sound. “I have nothing left to give you other than my honesty, Mariah. I warned you long ago I would bring you nothing but pain. That my love for you was selfish.” He shook his head. “And it will never not be selfish, but if this is my fate, then I accept it now.”

Her mind spun. This felt so much like before, when he had come to her with his grand confessions. But that was before they’d been taken. Before he’d been captured, along with her.

This man kneeling on the floor before her was broken, just like her.

With a racing heart and clammy hands, she took a step toward him. Then another.

“Why?” she whispered, the breath hoarse as it left her lungs.

He glanced up, confusion twisting his brow.

She took another step.

“Why … me? Why love me ?” She bit her lip. “Why did this happen?”

The hint of a smile touched his lips. “I don’t know, Mariah. I don’t think anyone does. Perhaps only the gods know.”

“No. The gods have nothing to do with it.” She remembered her conversation with the goddesses. “That much, I’m sure of.”

Andrian narrowed his eyes, his mouth tightening. “Fine. Not the gods. But perhaps something. Or maybe nothing at all. It doesn’t matter. I don’t think there’s an answer to that question. There is no ‘why.’ I love you ,” he growled, voice pitching lower near the end. “And I don’t care if you don’t want to hear me say it. Because it’s true, and I know you feel the same.”

She held her breath, counting each beat of her heart in her ears. It thudded against her chest like a war drum, a march toward a fate she’d always tried to fight.

Love would be your retribution.

She lifted her chin.

“You’re right,” she said, taking one more step to him.

He held her gaze, the tanzanite steady and blazing.

“I do feel the same. I do love you, Andrian Laurent, and despite the part of myself that’s terrified, that hates this weakness, I can’t stop it. Can’t fight it. But,” she said, breaking from his too-bright stare to look at her hands. Her callouses were reforming, each mark and scar and imperfection a reminder of her strength. Of what she’d endured.

Of what she would endure.

“But,” she repeated, dropping her hands.

He watched her with so much intensity, she was amazed he still knelt on the floor. Energy crackled around him, shadows winding down his arms.

“There is only one way you can earn back my trust.”

“Anything,” he ground out, his voice a hoarse whisper. “Mariah, I would do anything. Even if you asked me to journey to Enfara itself, to face the Scourge alone, I would do it.”

She smiled gently at him, heavy sadness filling the cracks in her chest. “I know you would. But that’s not it. I need you to answer one very simple question. Tell me the truth, and I think …” She drew in a great breath, lifting her gaze quickly to the ceiling before returning it to him. “I think I can learn to trust you again.”

He nodded. “Okay. Ask your question. Whatever it is, I’ll answer it.”

She met his stare, and for just a moment, a surge of fear—anxiety, nervousness, trepidation—washed over her.

But instead of pushing it away, she let it exist. It rolled through her before receding, washing away as a wave returns to the ocean. With a final, deep inhale, she spoke.

“Andrian, what does nio mean?”