38. Thirty-Eight

Yeah, yeah, I should have mentioned that fun little tidbit sooner.

I didn’t. Moving on.

Vastian’s nostrils flared, and he jumped to his feet, looking like he was ready to kill me.

I liked it when he tried; it was deep-seated with his lust, and if he bit me while doing so—all the better. But that was not what was happening. Vastian didn’t want to go for round two. He wanted answers.

Was it even my place to tell him about Alora’s mom? It’d been like pulling teeth to get the little information I had out of the woman. And that was back when I was fucking her!

Scrubbing at my face, I sighed heavily. I wasn’t good at this. I never would be, so I blurted it out as usual. “Her mom did something, I don’t know what, so don’t ask. That something caused her to be stripped of her shifter-y abilities, got her head shaved in the process—odd detail, but that is what Alora said—and then promptly shoved through a portal straight into the bowels of hell. She’s been there for maybe two decades? I’m not sure, I wasn’t paying attention on that last bit.”

His jaw worked, his claws scratched at his thighs, and he did that lip movement, which meant he was seconds from biting something. Please be me. “And it didn’t seem even the slightest bit unusual to you that Alora, of all people, somehow magically freed me from Aryn’s home at the perfect time, and we’ve been unbothered since?”

What was he saying? No—what was he insinuating? “Alora wouldn’t do that. She would not do that!” I barked, walking away from him and falling into a pace.

“Open your eyes! She always knows where you are. She disappeared that night when I found you in the garden, and not even hours later, Aryn showed up. She didn’t know where he took me, but somehow, she was able to get to me before you.”

No. Absolutely not. I refused to believe it. The Vampyr was just fucking jealous. He’d had a bone to pick with her from the beginning. “Shut up! Alora would never betray me. NEVER!”

“Don”t be a bloody imbecile!”

The door to the room opened. Brianne’s stern expression focused on me. Not now, you fucking elf. “You both need to leave now.”

“It’s broad daylight!” I argued.

She stormed over to the window, flung open the drapes, and pointed. Vastian retreated to the shadows, but I stepped forward to see what she was incessant about. My eyes rounded into saucers when black fucking pits stared back at me.

“Yep. Open the portal. Anywhere, as long as it”s far!” I squeaked, ran over to Vastian, and grabbed him despite him fighting me.

Brianne flung her hand out, a portal opened, and I shoved him through before either of us got out another breath.

“Oh gods,” Vastian rasped, eyes bulging out of his head as his hands flung to the top of his head to tug at the hair.

Looking up at the sky, which currently pissed on us, I didn’t see even a sliver of sunlight. Endless, thick black clouds blanketed the sky.

“No! Fuck!”

“What?” I asked, directing my attention to him.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen Vastian pale in the way he did then. Rain slicked down his hair, turning the gold into a dull shade of light brown. His eyes darted from side to side, and the muscles of his shoulders bunched up into his throat. “Gods, no, this can’t be happening. No!”

“What is wrong!” I shook him, but he didn’t snap out of it. He just repeated the word no, over and over. So, I did the rational thing and slapped the shit out of him.

He stilled, his wide eyes now on me, and blinked once. Droplets of water rolled off his thick eyelashes, landing on his lips. “She ported us to my home.”

“How do you know?”

His mouth gaped as if I had asked the dumbest question he’d ever heard. And honestly, he was probably right. “Because I lived here my entire life!” He shoved me away.

“She ported us to fucking Vuleron?” It really wasn’t that shocking now that I was thinking about it.

Brianne knew nothing about Vastian, and she didn’t know the lengths he went to to escape—to run.

“How can I make myself any clearer?” Vastian snapped, fangs bared, and his eyes swirling with panic.

I should have thought up something comforting to say. Somewhere along the lines of she is an elf. She put you in the place she thought you’d want to go. But instead, I stood there, eyes unable to turn away from the countless castles before me.

All in a valley, topped on hills, lush with greenery and forests. And from the looks of the horizon—this was an island.

There was no way off this hunk of land—no place to hide and formulate a plan.

We were fucked.

Vastian turned on me, and I was knocked down to my knees by the firm punch he’d landed on my jaw. “What the fuck!”

“I can’t believe I trusted you. Was this the plan all along? Fuel me with fallacious tales of shit that never happened? How long have you been working with Aryn? Alora knew who I was, what I was. She knew everything! How long have you deceived me at the behest of the Queen? What did she offer you? Sex? Wealth? Or were you both in on this? Sell me out to her, and then when she was done, she’d toss me over to Aryn? Out of all the places in this world, the elf you know sent us here. The one place I’d be served on a silver platter to Verali!”

He cracked.

He lost his fucking mind.

Because what he accused me of was not in the realm of possibility. Anger licked up my body like a flame, surging through every bone, muscle, and vein. “First,” I spit some blood onto the floor and stood. “Everything I told you was true. Every fucking word. And you are a motherfucker for shitting on Lucios like that.”

My fists shook at my sides with the urgency to hit him, to break his face into nothing. “Second, after all that you and I have gone through together, you think that I’m a fucking spy? For your bitch Queen? I didn’t know Vampyrs even had a Queen! Alora is my friend. And I don’t fucking have friends. But she is. If she wanted to sell you out, believe me, she’d have done it sooner.”

Vastian’s face sobered, but I wasn’t done. Not even close.

“Third, I all but beg the gods to kill me daily. I’d never work with Aryn. He’s the reason I’m stuck like this. In a perpetual sour state where nothing feels, tastes, or sounds right. Where nothing has meaning. Where I have no meaning! But I’m working with him? Yes, I’m his fucking pet immortal, and my favorite pastime is finding powerful Vampyrs to fall for, knowing he is going to use them up.”

I couldn’t fucking breathe; I was so livid. So… hurt. My chest collapsed on itself under the weight of his words. Words that should’ve had no effect.

I shouldn’t have felt a single flicker of emotion attached to them, but by all the gods, they hurt.

“And lastly, go fuck yourself Vastian.” A single tear fell, but thanks to the rain, he couldn’t see it, and I barely felt it say for the lingering warmth down my cheek.

I turned, giving him my back, and walked.

Was this some twisted karma for what I’d done to others? Those who’d only wanted reciprocated love and I turned them away like a fucking chunk of used meat?

I’d never led them to believe it was anything other than physical. Never made promises I couldn’t keep or played into their emotions because I couldn’t. No one—not even Alora—had pierced through the fortress I’d built around myself like Vastian.

No one made me feel.

No one made me yearn for more.

And to ignore everything because of his fucked up paranoia… I had better things to do.

Fuck love. And fuck him.