17

You're lovely. And I am so horribly, thoroughly unlovely that I don't know what to do with myself around you.

I woke up numb from confusion. My body ached from having slept on the hard ground all night, and my head felt like a nest of wasps, endlessly buzzing and swarming.

I had only pretended to be asleep last night because I'd been angry and hurt and disappointed that Apollo hadn't even bothered to apologize, let alone admit that his behavior at Walder's had been nothing but a cheap act, and I'd been determined not to entertain him in pointless conversation any longer and just get some much-needed rest.

But now… What was I supposed to do now? Act as though I hadn't heard any of it? As though his words, genuine or not, hadn't made my blood sing and my heart skip as if it wanted to leave my body? As though I hadn't wanted to turn around, open my eyes, and confess too: I know you didn't mean those things you said at Walder's. But they still hurt me. They hurt me because I'm afraid that they're true. I'm terrified that I will never be good enough for anyone. I'm scared of going forward. I'm scared of going back. I feel suspended between time and space, floating in an arbitrary in-between. Here. With you. I kind of hate you for using my insecurities against me. I kind of can't take my eyes off of you either. I kind of want to never see your stupid face again. I kind of want you to kiss me, touch me, make me feel…everything. Because I know you can. I know you can revive me as easily as you can break me.

Was I supposed to say that? Was I supposed to make a fool of myself again just so he could have the satisfaction of belittling me under the pretense of doing it for my own good?

No. No, I was smarter than this.

My back made a horrible crack as I propped on one elbow. Apollo was sleeping right next to me, or I should rather say right behind me, as the curve of my backside was pressed to his groin. He had his hand loosely flung around my waist, and as I moved, it slipped lower, down to my stomach. He pulled me closer in his sleep, letting out a low, almost guttural sound. A delirious sort of pressure built inside me, a craving unsatisfied. I wanted to push back against his hardness. I wanted his hand lower on my body. I wanted him to soothe the ache between my thighs. And I knew he could. I knew that those beautiful, big hands of his could do the most marvelous, filthy—

Gods, what was I thinking?

I pulled out of his embrace and sat up with a gasp. Mercifully, he didn't wake up. The tide of his breathing was still calm and oblivious as I watched him closely. He had a tiny bump on the bridge of his nose, a small birthmark on the underside of his square jaw, and a faded childhood scar above his left dark brow. I drowned in his perfect imperfections.

Apollo was so, so beautiful. Beautiful, like neck kisses and midnight storms. Beautiful, like the fun kind of secrets. Beautiful, like summer sunsets and unexpected romances.

His long, feathery eyelashes fluttered behind a few messy locks. He blinked, frowned, then very slowly withdrew his hand from my stomach and folded it behind his head as he turned on his back.

"Hello," he rasped, his voice exquisitely harsh and a little roguish. He looked like a debauched rake after a sinful night in the woods with some no-longer-chaste maiden—hair ruffled, shirt half-undone, eyes drowsy and dark.

"Hello," I said a little timorously. "Did I make too much noise and wake you up?"

He shook his head. "Just felt you pull out of my arms. You started shivering in your sleep last night. That's why I… I don't want you to think—"

"It's okay," I reassured. "It was a cold night."

"Are you feeling sick?"

"No, I'm fine."

"Good." His eyes trailed to my throat. "The mark has almost faded too."

"I don't want another one," I deadpanned, and it shocked me how much of a lie it was. All I could think about now was his mouth on my neck, his teeth grazing that tender spot, his tongue soothing it over, making me teeter on the edge between pleasure and pain—me, who always preferred gentle kisses and even gentler touches.

Apollo had asked me last night if I missed Ryker, but the truth was, I didn't miss much from my life in Elora apart from the Shop. Yes, sometimes I regretted that I hadn't left Elora with him, but that had nothing to do with Ryker, really. And as for right now, I didn't seem to want gentle anymore. I wanted reckless. Deep, deep down, I thought I wanted to break a little just to have an excuse to build myself anew.

"What are you thinking about so intensely?" Apollo asked.

I hated that he wanted to know what I was thinking.

I loved that he wanted to know what I was thinking.

"Just that I'm excited to see the city tomorrow," I croaked.

He nodded a little absently and leaned closer.

I fell back on my palms. "What are you doing?"

He pointed at my throat. "Your necklace is stuck to your hair. Do you want me to—"

"I can do it," I muttered, glancing down to indeed find a lock of my hair wrapped around the chain. I tried to detangle it by tugging my hair up while pulling the chain downward, but then it popped and slipped off my neck altogether. "Oh no," I murmured, gathering the broken silver pieces in my palm. "I ruined it."

"It's okay. At least your little butterfly is safe," Apollo said gently. "When we get to the city, I'll buy you a new chain. A prettier one."

"You don't have to do that," I whispered.

He exhaled, suddenly exasperated, and stood up at once. "Let's not make it a big deal."

He fished the matchbox out of his pocket, opened it, and the magical fire swooshed back into it instantly. Then he busied himself with fastening his baldric and putting on his cape.

"Apollo?" I pressed.

"Yes, darling," he said disinterestedly, not turning around to look at me.

It's pointless, Nepheli. Forget about him and just focus on getting home. The Shop is waiting. You can still have a nice life in Elora. You can still find a way to grow in the same space you've always been in.

But if there was one thing I had learned from the plants in my Shop—and plants were indeed excellent teachers if you ever bothered to listen—was that when something stopped blooming, you didn't just throw it out. You changed the soil. You repotted it. You gave it more room to grow.

I knew change couldn't come without change, but I did not feel brave enough to tell myself this truth now.

"Nothing," was all I said, exhaling, and finally got up to my feet to help him gather our things. "Let's just go."

At one point last night, I had taken off my boots to relieve my skin from the friction, and as I grudgingly grabbed them now, I found the collars lined with soft, cottony pads. A little sound of surprise escaped me as I realized that Apollo must have taken them out of his own boots and put them in mine while I was asleep. "Apollo—"

"Shhh," Apollo suddenly warned.

I swiveled around.

He was half-crouched under the cave's mouth, his body drawn forward, ready to lunge at something.

Quickly, I slipped my boots on and stalked behind him to see what was going on outside and—oh gods. A massive grey-black, breathing ball of fur was blocking part of our exit. A wolf. A demon.

Panic blazed down my throat and set my insides on fire. "What is it doing here in broad daylight?" I whisper-yelled, clutching Apollo's arm to pull him back inside. But he was immovable. His eyes were bright with clarity, pinpointed on the wolf's curled form.

"It's injured," Apollo said, and as I inched my head to the side and took a closer look at the creature, I indeed found that the knuckles of its spine were forced into a wrong angle and the fur around them was muddied with blood. It was clearly sleeping, letting out pulmonary sounds as though it had a hard time breathing. "Its pack must have left it behind. Fuck, it was probably prowling around the cave all night, and I didn't even notice it." He cursed under his breath again, furious with himself.

"Why didn't it get in here, you know, to eat us?"

"Because this cave is sacred ground," Apollo explained with a hiss. "Demons are soulless. They can't enter it."

The creature let out a guttural growl, and Apollo, quick as thunder, interposed himself between me and the exit.

"What are we going to do?" I wheezed, trying to remain calm and… think. Take a breath and think for a moment. There's always a way.

Apollo glared at me over his shoulder as he unsheathed his sword, the clean, long blade shining in the cavernous semi-darkness. "You aren't going to do anything."

I slipped with more stealth than I knew I had in my body right in front of him. "You can't fight it."

His nostrils flared. "Can you please not feel bad about the soul-sucking demon?"

I'm not worried about the demon, you idiot brute! "It's sleeping. We can sneak past it," I argued. "You said it yourself. The manor's location adds an hour to our journey, so we certainly can't afford to waste precious daylight just because you want to swing your sword around."

"It's blocking our way," Apollo growled.

"Give me that," I muttered, stealing the sword from his hand.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" he seethed.

I ignored him and pressed my back against the side of the entrance, then plunged the sword into the sunbeams that streaked over the wolf and into the cave. The shiny blade caught the sun, and as I angled it upward and left, the light bounced off the metal surface and onto the demon's back.

"Are you trying to infuriate it?" Apollo snarled.

"I'm trying to make it shift its position," I bit back, and sure enough, a low grunting sound escaped the creature. Sluggishly, it raised its head and looked around with half-opened eyes, its torn muzzle twitching. Then, with a strenuous push, it lifted its wounded body a few inches off the ground and crawled over the underbrush to a shadier spot.

I lowered the sword and veered around to shoot a triumphant grin at Apollo. "See?" I chirped, handing him back his weapon. "Violence isn't always the answer."

"It will attack us the moment we step outside," Apollo decided. "Or it will follow us and—"

"Apollo," I stopped him with a sigh. "It's dying. It's suffering."

"It's a demon. It doesn't have a heart to suffer," he said, and there was something so raw and stripped-down in his voice that the words pierced right through me. How was it possible that he could sound like that, given his heartless state? His face looked harder than I'd ever seen it before, not hard like stone but hard like glass—the kind of hardness you could so easily shatter.

"That doesn't mean we should be cruel to it," I said, my voice patient.

Apollo looked away, working his jaw. "Fine. But have the blade I gave you in hand, don't just throw it in your bag."

"Okay," I muttered.

We gathered the last of our things and ventured carefully out of the cave with breaths drawn and weapons at the ready.

The creature did not move, attack, or follow us after all. And Apollo seemed almost angry about it, convinced that something as heartless deserved nothing better than an unkind, inglorious end.