Chapter 52

Fifty-Two

WESLEY

T wo more statues and the memories of loss left Finn a few meters away, and the Hunt pacing the edge of Sebastian’s statue. Maybe he could keep them back a little longer? I knew the worst was yet to come, though each dream Finn shared with me broke both our hearts until I paced, a fury growing beneath my skin at all the pain he’d suffered.

“Finn,” I called.

He groaned, but didn’t move.

“Honey,” I said, softening my tone. “Please get up.”

He lay face down, barely breathing, the darkness surrounding him a deep abyss that left me with little more than our bond to find him. And that bond was weak, pulsing with his pain as though he’d tried to sever it a thousand times and failed.

“I’m a monster.”

“Sometimes,” I agreed. His dark half took over from time to time, though it never seemed truly unwarranted. He’d destroyed entire wolf packs for forcing the change on people, killing to feed on human flesh, and enslaving humans in an attempt to breed. The memories cut like a thousand daggers, and yet he never hesitated to act. “People, of all kinds,” I said, “can be corrupted. Sometimes it’s better to end their madness before it spreads.”

“Who am I to judge?”

I snorted. “As if a thousand less worthy don’t judge every day.”

“I don’t want to make that decision.”

“What if I help?”

“You shouldn’t have that burden either.”

His heart was far too soft for a fae king. “Honey,” I said.

“I wish I could hold you.”

“Me too. Can you make it to the next statue?” It was the final statue before Sebastian’s, Felix’s, and mine. An ending to the pain, or the final nail in our coffins?

“It’s bad,” he whispered. “I can sense it from here.”

I smashed the barrier with my fists, but it was like standing in a bubble. “Fucking hell I need out of this shield. Don’t suppose you can let me out?”

He rolled his head to the side to gaze my way, his face completely lost beneath the stretching veil of darkness. “Nothing’s happening.”

I sighed, glaring at the Hunt that paced ready to attack. What were they waiting for? “Honey, I need you to get to the next memory. I’m sorry you have to suffer like this.”

Finn groaned and crawled, his form shifting and morphing like it was a bat creeping up a wall rather than the handsome young man I knew. A broken dragon, or something worse? He heaved himself across the ground until he lay at the base of the next statue of a woman whose gaze focused off into the distance. Her expression was oddly serene, not unlike Sebastian’s.

“I wish I were as beautiful as my mom had been,” Finn said. “You deserve that. A goddess of light and warmth.”

“I’m not really into women, goddesses or otherwise. I guess you could say I’m drawn to the bad boys.”

He laughed and it sounded like a cackle again, deep and echoing. “Bound to the worst then.”

“Not true. You have light inside you.”

“All I feel is pain, darkness, and hopelessness.”

“It’s okay, honey,” I said. “It’s almost over.” The journey, our chance at a relationship, perhaps even the world, but I let him take his own meaning. The worst thing about being a seer was seeing things I couldn’t change. I thought for a long time that I could stop the world from ending under the ooze of dark power, but each time I shifted the paths of those I could see, the direction of the end changed, but never slowed.

Fuck. Maybe this was all my fault. If I’d just left everything alone, would Finn have to suffer like this?

“No,” Finn whispered.

“What?”

“I can feel you,” he said. “It’s not strong, but our link grows the closer I get. It’s not your fault.”

“You don’t know that.” While we’d never crossed paths, fate rippled like a pebble touching the water, a thousand tiny changes from one shift.

“Is it too soon, you think?” he asked.

“For what, honey?”

“To love you?”

I gasped and sank to my knees. “Finn…”

“It is too soon, right? But I feel it. My soul is begging to hold you. Like through all of this, you’re the one thing that will calm my soul, ease the pain, and give me a touch of peace.” He sucked in a large gulp of air. “Can’t really see you anymore, everything is dark, shadowed.” Frost grew in patches over his skin and I couldn’t hold back my tears at how much it must hurt. “Not really,” he said, “I’m sort of numb.”

“If I could do this for you, I would,” I told him.

“I know. You’re sweet under all those thorns.”

“Don’t ruin my reputation.”

He laughed, the sound half screech, half himself, which gave me hope there was enough left of him to make it through this nightmare.

“Your secret is safe with me.”

Finn touched the base of the statue, and was swallowed up by the still structure. I closed my eyes, head bowed to the ground and sobbed as the memory awakened for him.