Page 114 of Accidental Fae (Fae War Chronicles 1)
“It can’t end this way.” He shakes his head. “All we need is a witch. She can break the connection—”
“Can she? You’re sure? Or are you just grasping at straws?”
His silence answers that one. I step forward and reach up to cup his cheek with my hand. It’s wet from the fresh tears falling from his eyes. “I made peace with death a while ago, Rafferty. This is how it was always supposed to play out. Desperately clinging to an idea will only stretch out the inevitable.”
He reaches up and covers my hand with his much larger one. “No. I will continue saying no until you believe that your life is worth more to me than anything.”
“Why?”
“Because you are everything to me, Ember of Austin. I have breathed you since the moment you first stepped into my dreams, and I will continue to breathe you until the day I die.”
I’m speechless. “You breathe me, and yet, one kiss nearly sent you spiraling into a murderous rage.” An exaggeration, sure. “We can’t be together, Rafferty, and I won’t complete the union with your brother.”
“I’m not asking you to.”
“No, you’re just asking me to keep living in a world where I can’t have the one thing I’ve ever actually dared to want.” I inhale sharply, and my throat burns. “We can’t be together, fine. I get it—but one thing in my lifewillbe on my terms.”
“My kind only mates once, and I had my chance.”
“Maybe it wasn’t your only chance,” I nearly whisper.
“A second chance with a woman destined for death,” he retorts. “Hell of a deal that is.”
The whimper leaves my lips before I can stop it. Rafferty rushes toward me, but I hold up both hands. “I’m not interested in whatever is about to come out of your mouth, and frankly, it’s for the best.”
“I didn’t mean to be so crass,” he says, softly.
“It’s the truth. Never apologize for speaking the truth. You and me? We can’t happen because that will give us both a reason to be selfish and not do what needs to be done. I’m dying. With or without you taking me home. It’s really only a matter of time, at this point.”
“We will find a way.”
“No, we won’t. Because even if we did, even if we fix whatever this is, it’s still only a matter of time before he finds us. My death, however screwed the logic is, solves that.”
Rafferty doesn’t speak. He simply glares on. “So even with me telling you how I feel, you’re still determined to let yourself die.”
“This is so much bigger than us. Think of Flora. Of that man who was killed while I was sitting at a dinner table. Of all the people who have died since Taranus took over; can you really say my life is more important than theirs? Than this world?”
“Yes,” he replies, no hesitation. “Because I would let this world burn if it meant saving you.”
“That’s not right.”
“Maybe it’s not, but it’s how I feel. I love this world, the people in it, but if I were forced to choose, I would pick you every single time.”
He takes a step toward me, but I back away. “It’s not right,” I repeat. “Innocent people are dying.”
“You’re innocent.”
“But I’m one person. They are—hundreds—thousands.”
Rafferty turns away from me, giving me a full view of his bare back and the scars left behind from Taranus’s mutilation.
Before I can stop myself, I’m walking toward him and reaching up to touch the jagged outlines. He shivers then stills beneath my touch. “He cannot keep doing to others what he did to you,” I whisper. “It’s not right. And for the first time in my life, I can make a difference. I can bring you—this world—peace. Please, let me do this.”
“I cannot,” he whispers. “I’m sorry, Ember, but even if you hate me for it, I will not deliver you to your world until I know—without a doubt—there is no other way.”
He turns, and I withdraw my hand then look up into his eyes. Anger churns in my belly, igniting my blood and cementing the realization that I am truly alone in this world, too.
No matter what I tell him, what I want my choice to be, he is going to fight me. The shitty part is that he has the power to do just that since I know little about this world, and even less about how to get out of it.
“You’re right,” I tell him. “You are stealing my choice, my ability to control the outcome of my own life, and I do hate you for it.”
Without speaking another word to him, I turn on my heel and march straight back to the fire I can still vaguely see through the trees. Every part of me knows that going home is the best answer for me.
It gets me away from here, away from Rafferty and Taranus, two brothers who couldn’t be more opposite and yet both feel they have the power to control me. It saves this world from Taranus’s bloody reign and hands the kingdom to a man who would rule fairly.
There really is no choice. No argument.
I just wish Rafferty could see it.