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Fate was her summer sun—too intense for most to bear, while she tipped toward him like a flower, craving his touch.
“I am not the only one in this world who matters, my love.” Fate’s fingers curled against her waist. “You are to me.”
Age had fatigued her, stripping away all pretenses and desires so that nothing in the world sounded nicer than feeling the pulse of the earth against her skin as she rested beneath her favorite tree with her favorite people.
There could be no life without the experience of death, so what choice did she have but to let herself finally succumb?
“I will not lose you.” But he already had.
“Hello, love.” Aris may have whispered the words, but his voice was a weapon that slipped through Blythe’s skin and struck to the hilt. “I hoped you wouldn’t make it.” She squeezed his hand, forcing her own smile onto a face she hoped looked half as vicious as his. “I wouldn’t have missed this for the world, my darling. Though do feel free to divorce me tomorrow.”
It was not a ring but a shackle.
“Do not make yourself small. Do not change yourself to suit him. Teach him how to treat you, and remember that you deserve everything this life has to offer.
“Just as Death does not choose when people die, I do not choose how they live,” Aris argued. “I write their story as it’s shown to me, and that is the way of things. It matters not if someone is cruel or kind. It makes no difference whether they deserve the life that they get. Once a soul tells me its story, I do not alter it. I do not embellish. I give it the fate I foresee, nothing more, nothing less.”
“Burn as brightly as the sun if you wish, Aris, but I will not look away.”
“My hand isn’t going to bite you, love,
“To my room, where I can keep an eye on you.
You are a mystery to me. A sweetbrier, full of thorns in my side.
She was also pathetically aware of what his words had done to her.
Aris stalked across the rug to see what fate awaited him on those slips of papers.
If he was in, then so was she.
“Speak one more word to my wife,” Aris growled, “and I will tear your tongue from your throat.”
Burn was too casual a word, for Blythe did not burn for this man; she incinerated. And in that moment, she knew there would be no getting it out of her system. No satiating the hunger.
“Beasty? That is what you chose to name her?” “I thought you’d appreciate having her named after you.”
She was meant to be the bane of his existence. A hindrance to his every waking moment. So why was it that seeing that spark in her eyes felt like it had awoken something within him?
For the second time in his life, Aris Dryden was falling in love.
“He could have the entire world in the palm of his hand if he wanted it, but he chooses confirmed happiness rather than the gamble. Fear will stop him from taking a risk, as it does with so many.”
For years I have felt bitterness toward every soul who bows to their fear. And yet I now find myself ruled by my own. You have bewitched me, Sweetbrier, and for that I am terrified.”
Only then did Blythe notice two amber eyes watching her from the floor. In the absence of others, the fox tentatively hopped to the edge of her bed, chittering its greeting.
The fox only seems to show up when no.ome is there. Also, Chaos was wearing a fox mask. Beasty is Chaos?? Or she has to kill Beasty to replace the foal??
figure
wait .. I think she brought Percy back?? maybe?
“Get my mother’s name off your filthy tongue.”
But that was the thing about lessons: They were always learned too late.
Elijah took it all in,
Why I didn't cry until this part I don't know 😭
There were cuts on his cheeks. His neck, his hands. From thorns, Blythe realized. From the thorns of her briar patch.
😭
