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“You said I couldn’t control how people treated me, but I could control my reaction to their mistreatment. That it would define who I was.”
“Well, the moral of the story is to be kind to others but defend yourself if you must.”
“Come back with me tomorrow and see Headmaster Clarke at The Academy.” My head reeled back in shock. “Why the Nightling would I do that?” He looked me up and down again, slowly, and my stomach warmed. “Because you have more magic than anyone I’ve ever met. I can smell it on you, like a sharp, aged whiskey. You belong here.”
“You want me to be on your side for some war that is coming!” A rush of heat flushed my cheeks and my brows furrowed as my temper rose. “Then you show me that you are worth fighting for. Let my innocent friend go so that I can trust that the people of The Gilded City are good. Because from where I am sitting, all you have been is evil to me. Maybe I’m not the dark one. You are!”
I knew in that moment that no matter what Ariyon did to me, no matter how cruel my four years here were with him at The Academy, I would never be able to hate a single hair on his head. I owed him everything.
Sometimes I rolled myself really tightly in a blanket just to feel pressure on my skin, but I would never admit that to anyone. Oh, how I longed to be full-body hugged or picked up like the boys did to their girlfriends. I’d bet it felt good.
“Ayden!” I ran for him, but Ariyon put out a hand to stop me, placing it right on my bare chest. “You’ve done enough, Fallon. Please leave,” he growled, and shame burned through me so hot I couldn’t help the tears that burned the back of my eyes. He thought this had to do with me? “Don’t talk to her like that!” Ayden snapped from his place on the ground. “Let’s go home.” Eden tugged on my sleeve.
‘Let’s get one thing clear. I am loyal to you and you alone, Fallon Bane. If you need my help, I offer it without question. If your heart breaks, my heart breaks too. If someone seeks to harm you, I will harm them no matter who they are or what title they carry. And if you go insane with darkness and become a Nightling, then I too go with you.’
She looked supremely flustered at that. “Well, what do you want, Fallon?!” she huffed. I met her gaze, unable to stop my tongue from baring my deepest truth. “To be loved. To be kissed by a boy. To be normal. To go to the school dance with my hair down, in a short dress, with no gloves, and dance all night without fear of being touched and caused pain.”
“We can’t help what we are born into, Fallon. Only the choices we make each day.”
Stepping up next to me and placing his hand on the door handle, Ariyon leaned into my ear, pressing his lips against them. “If I could take the curse from you, I would, Fallon,” he whispered,
I reached out and grasped his hands, pushing them away from me. “Ariyon Madden, I will not be the reason you have any less life to live.” I would never again accept another healing from him, not after I had seen that wall where he counted down how many days he’d given away.
“And what if I go dark?” I whimpered. His face sobered. “Then I will jump into the shadows and pull you back to the Light.”
Master Clarke beaming down at me with pride. “Your magic isn’t powered by rage like your mother, it’s driven by the urge to protect.”
He sighed then, looking at my lips. “In another life I could have loved you so hard, Fallon.”
he leaned towards my ear. “I want to give you everything you want,”
“Because she wasn’t you,” he declared, and I sucked in a shocked breath. “Because no matter how many times I kissed her, it wasn’t you.”
“I’m saying that from the moment I met you I’ve felt some spark of myself come alive that I long thought was dead. I’m saying that I can’t get the way you smell out of my head, and I dream about tasting you. I’m saying, Fallon Brookshire, that I don’t care who your mother is, I just want to be the person that makes you happy. It’s always been you.”
