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I’ve figured out my life, somewhat.
Mostly.
It’s kind of hard, right after losing the love of my life, but I’m making due. I don’t even have anything of his to keep—except for the little, white lotus carved from wood we found in his pocket—due to Basgiath’s tradition of burning a cadet’s items.
It’s been less than a year, and I’ve been tossed right into war school— Basgiath.
And everyday, I watch people I feel responsible or I care for in some shape, way, or form, die—during school or in my nightmares.
I’m separated from Xaden, Garrick…Garrick, who’s my best friend, a close confidant; Xaden, who’s my literal cousin ; and even Eya, who is practically my sister due to our years being fostering together.
This isn’t even mentioning the nightly weapon runs I do.
It’s all unfair to Sloane, but…but there’s nothing I can do. Poromiel needs to help and Xaden’s gone, meaning the responsibility has fallen to me. I get to my room most nights past midnight, and fall asleep, wishing I could hold Sloane in my arms.
The nights I don’t go on runs are spent with Sloane, normally. We rarely fuck anymore—not that we don’t give in to our “guilty pleasures,” as Cuir calls it, as if she doesn’t still have an occasional escapade with a random dragon—but we stay in one of our beds, curled around each other, her back arched into my stomach, her hair spread over the pillow and smells heavenly, her arm bent to rest over my back, a comforting weight. She says that my arms around her stomach are comforting.
I’ve learned that love is complicated.
And it requires effort—it cannot be done from will alone.
Less than a year ago, I would imagine my future with Liam Mairi—tall, muscular, blonde, blue eyes, and the sweetest heart. Less than a year ago, I was riding the love boat, clinging onto the distant dream of happiness. Less than a year ago, I knew myself less than I know now.
It doesn’t mean that part of my heart won’t forever be held by Liam. He’s part of me, a part that won’t—can’t—go.
I’ve accepted that.
At least, I think I have. I hope.
I really fucking hope.
Unfortunately, today isn’t one of those days I get to fall asleep with my head buried in Sloane’s hair. It isn’t a night I can fall asleep without Cuir’s pestering.
I’ve just gotten back from a weapon run, and along with the blood staining my leather jacket (dammit) , my eyes are fluttering with exhaustion. Cuir’s presence is a gentle breeze in my mind. My conversations with Syrena and Catriona are barely tolerable and there’s no denying the fear that was pounding through my veins hours earlier—fear I can’t be as good as Xaden.
“I wouldn’t have chosen you if you were weak,” Cuir scoffs.
I don’t thank Cuir, but still, she chuffs easily as if he knows what I’m thinking—well, she should, considering we basically share a mind.
“Though with how you act with the girl…” I can imagine Cuir’s eyes narrowing in her cave in the Vale.
“Not now,” I fling back, shrugging my flying coat from my shoulders and tossing it onto my chair, trying not to wince, knowing that if any blood got onto it, it would stain the wood. My eyes try to close again, and I have to forcibly pull them open with my fingers to keep from falling asleep.
I’d like nothing more than to take a soothing, warm shower, but it’s multiple hours past midnight and I have, A) important classes tomorrow; and B) Sloane is still gone with her squad training. I won’t be able to relax anyways, and there’s a higher chance of me falling asleep than actually getting clean.
“Not my fault all humans are weak,” Cuir scoffs in my mind as I strip down to my boxers. “But you.”
I can’t stop the response that I don’t speak but he understands. “Yet you bonded one.”
“For reasons humans wouldn’t understand. Besides, I said, ‘but you’.” Cuir doesn’t hold a high opinion on humans—and riders—and she’s reassured me multiple times that other dragons think the same. I wouldn’t know. As she thinks, I’m a measly human, the only one worthy of bonding with her. Me and some random female rider decades ago.
That’s always her response when we get to dragon stuff. Humans can’t know. Apparently Sgaeyl and Chradh say the same thing, so it’s not exclusively a Cuir-doesn’t-want-to-tell-her-rider event. The Empyrean is hidden, I know, so I never push.
I close my eyes as I curl under the uncomfortable black blanket, wishing, not for the first time, that I could go back six years to when we were younger, things were simpler, and everyone was alive. But those wishes are fucking futile.
There are people we won’t get back.
Eya.
Her name echoes in my head, the stunning reminder that even if something seems secure, it’s gone.
Liam.
Xaden’s brother. He had a connection to Xaden that even I didn’t have.
Ciaran.
A marked one all the same, even if I didn’t know him well.
“You are being self-deprecating again,” Cuir chuffs, as if it doesn’t bother her. It does, though—evident by her notion—but I close my eyes and try to fall asleep.
Sleep doesn’t come easily, but it comes calling.
It comes calling like Garrick did when I first stepped off Parapet, how Eya, behind a tree, had thrown her arms around me.
It comes calling like a friend I can’t see, but it’s not a nice friend.
Lately, it’s been wrapped in nightmares—nightmares filling the gap of dreams. The dreams had been soothing; new memories taking over the burning fire of General Melgren’s dragon that swallowed my mother and uncle. The memories were good ones of Basgiath: surviving the Gauntlet, seeing Xaden and Eya and Garrick again, teasing Imogen about Garrick…meeting Liam. But the nightmares overtake it, again and again and again.
Resson and Athebyne have been on my mind more than ever.
Like tonight.
When the cascade of sleep finally washes over me, it isn’t pleasant. My eyes are flooded with memories of Resson, flashing behind my eyes so quickly that it merges with the wood landscape from so little months ago.
Resson, Resson, Resson.
Deigh to my right, the thunderous red daggertail flying, his winds pounding the air. Compressions, I remember from some useless class I’d had to attend back in Aretia. My own hair is ruffling back in the wind, floating just over my eyes as the quick air we fly through presses it back, far, far behind my eyesight.
“No one yet,” Cuir reports, though, if you’d ask, she would say that she was simply scouting.
I love my dragon.
The dream is the same every time.
I hear the yell before it happens. Soleil is the first one down. Always. Fuil falls and then Soleil dies, and there’s nothing I can do about it. Nothing to stop the gut-wrenching pain that I know has overtaken Xaden.
The 107 scars on his back. They don’t go away when one of us dies—and plenty of us have. Each one remains, as if to remind Xaden of a failure that doesn’t exist. Sometimes, I wish they’d disappear—but then I wonder:
Would it hurt Xaden more to see each one disappear, to know each one of us is failing and dying…or does it hurt more to have our souls, our names, carved onto his back?
I won’t ask him, but the question lingers in the nooks and crannies of my mind.
“Wyvern incoming!” Cuir’s screech is off. I don’t even blink as dream-me goes into battle, fighting the wyvern. The venin will come soon, I know. Cuir’s voice is like a whisper of her true power. That was the only way I knew it was a nightmare, the first time around.
But…something was off.
Normally, by this time, another wyvern would come, trying to knock me off of Cuir. I knew this. I knew it well. Then Xaden would come, trying to help me.
Where is it? When is it?
Xaden should be coming to my rescue, but—Liam and Deigh touch the ground. They’re touching too early. They only drop later, not now. Liam leaps off of Deigh’s spine with such a well-practiced maneuver that my brain can’t help but think, that’s second year stuff.
“Hey, Bodhi!” he yells. Something about his smile is off, but I’ve never been in this dream before. Ever. I don’t know what to say or do or react. “The ground is safe!” if this was what had actually happened in Resson…I’d be confused out of my mind.
It was only after Liam died that we understood that the venin sucked from the Earth, like Soleil and Fuil when they’d landed.
“I…”
Cuir’s voice has gone silent in dream!Me’s head. Obviously, she can’t respond…I’m alone.
Fuck.
The dream version of me climbs off of Cuir. I —the real me—doesn’t exist here. I’m just a soul, watching from the corner.
Liam is smiling and when I finally reach the ground, the “wrongness” clicks in my brain.
There’s a red ring around Liam’s eyes.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
I haven’t had this dream, ever, and no dream similarly like it.
Liam’s gone venin. How? How, how, how?
Xaden lands behind me. I don’t see him, but I feel the familiar, gusty exhale that Sgaeyl gives when she lands. Dream her is a good imitation of the real her.
He’s also the first to speak again, reaching forward to mess with my hair as he walks around to stand next to Liam. Maybe Sorrengail and Imogen are still in the air. I don’t know.
“Hey brother,” Liam says, and the two of them shake hands. I stand awkwardly in front of them, mind racing at the lack of Cuir’s presence.
Xaden turns to me. Something in his eyes is sharp, so sharp that it hurts more than the dagger I was stabbed with on the first-ever day of Challenges. “You,” he hisses out. It’s cold. Freezing cold. Just like his shadows, I distantly think as I stare at him.
“Me.” My voice is shaky. I’m scared…and I’m willing to admit it. Not to this Xaden’s face, though; only to mine, the one who doesn’t judge me.
Or, at least, I hope he doesn’t judge me. There’s no guarantee, but Xaden keeps his promises, and he promised to protect me.
“You,” he repeats, walking closer. And closer. And closer. And closer, until he stands just in front of me. His skin is surprisingly chocolate-y in the beating sun. Why, why, why.
This wasn’t what happened.
This isn’t what’s supposed to happen!
“Me,” I say yet again, my voice shaking even more.
Xaden raises his hand as if to cup my face, and that should’ve been my first sign that something was wrong. He doesn’t cup anyone’s face but Sorrengail’s. His hand falls on my face, a backhanded slap.
Fucking Malek.
My eyes well up with tiny tears that I push backwards. My cheek stings with the remnants of Xaden’s hit, and as he backs away, I see the palms of his hands are surprisingly light, lighter than even my skin.
My skin is described as a toasted coconut, and Xaden’s is more chocolate-like—the only person that I’m related to with that skin tone is…my heart jumps into my throat, clogging it. My goddamned dead father.
And Xaden knows how I feel about my father—fuck it, that’s why my brain chose to depict Xaden like this. It’s all one bad dream, getting longer and longer. Cuir!
It’s not fucking fair, is all I can think as I realize that in this fucking terrifying dream, my own dragon can’t respond to me. I try to reach out to her, pushing deep, but there’s no sign of Cuir.
Please.
“You are a disappointment,” Xaden hisses out, eyes narrowing.
No.
No.
I’m not.
Right?
This time Liam approaches, swinging his arm around Xaden’s shoulder. Xaden doesn’t look bothered—no, in fact, his eyes light up with love.
“You suck the oxygen out of the air with your attempts at jokes; you make people feel worse, not better.” His lip curls upwards distastefully. “Loving you was a mistake.”
No.
Garrick, this time, joins in. He stands over Xaden and Liam, and he looks so “part of the family” that the tears threaten in my eyes again.
“You just copy Xaden,” he says. His lips move; his eyes are hollow when he looks at me. “You try to mimic him in every way and everyone knows it. No one appreciates it, too, because you aren’t nearly as close to his power as you think you are.”
No. No. No.
I don’t mimic Xaden.
Imogen and Masen both say something, but I’m too caught up in Garrick’s words and the tears falling down my cheeks in free-flowing rivers.
Next is Soleil, who I used to be close to. She swings her arms over Imogen and Masen’s shoulders so she’s hugging both of them at the same time, as if to say, you’re not welcome.
“We all know you're trying to walk into shoes that are too big for you—Xaden’s, Auntie’s, your dad’s…we all know you’re failing at it, too,” Soleil says.
Soleil— I want to yell out her name, demand she take it back, because she knows it’s not true.
Right?
Eya’s hollow eyes stare into mine, the piercing in her eyebrow glinting in the sun. I can barely make her out, my tears bubbling up and gliding down my rough cheeks, dropping from my chin to the edge of my ripped shirt collar. “You…” she starts. It’s so close to what Xaden said earlier that I flinch, expecting a physical blow, but none comes and Eya acts like nothing happened. “You are failing,” Eya delivers the final blow. “You…
“You are failing so badly, and everyone around you is too polite because you make everyone feel awkward with your horrendous jokes—” I can’t resist the part of my brain that says, you don’t complain about Garrick’s jokes. I’m the polite one “—and we all see you drowning in responsibilities you aren’t ready for.”
Eya. Please.
I can hear soft footsteps behind me, but I don’t turn around, figuring it’s just someone’s dragon…until a pale hand lands on my tensed arm.
Violet’s sweet voice rings in the air, apposing, clear and loud.
“He’s none of that,” she declares…and I feel a flare of appreciation for Violet Sorrengail. Xaden really did pick well with his girl. She’s gusty, I give her that. But she’s only a dream. Would she stand up to Xaden if he was actually hurting me?
Xaden’s lips curl, as if it’s all amusing to him.
Something is amusing to him, something about Sorrengail defending me.
“Really,” he purrs out. He himself doesn’t span the small distance to us, but his shadows reach out to Violet and I can see her heart tugging to be closer to him. “Really, Violet? After what he’s done?”
What did I do?
But Violet steps forward as if Xaden struck a blow, and I can see Xaden’s cockiness spread over his face, even if no one else can see it. I slip a glance to Liam; nevermind. I’m not the only one.
Fucking Liam Mairi can also see it.
Something warm spreads in my chest—warm and uncomfortable.
Welcome, Jealousy, the green-eyed monster.
Or maybe it’s not jealousy, I can imagine Cuir’s chuff so realistically that for a moment I imagine she’s back, but when I reach out, she’s not.
Violet still looks stricken. “I—” she seems to choke, as if not talking, not confessing, will help both of us. “You’re—”
No.
If she tells Xaden “you’re right,” this dream is going to go to shit real quickly. Xaden has an ego, something we all know, and we also know that we’re the ones who have spent time pulling it down. He gets too cocky. But Violet strokes his ego. Too much.
She doesn’t say the words, but she still steps to Xaden, standing between him and Garrick, declaring her alliance loud and clearly: she’s not with me. Sweetly, full of genuine meaning I can’t comprehend, she says, “Sorry.”
My only hope of allegiance in this dream is gone, crumbling away into a chasm beneath my touch.
“Bodhi.” The yell slams into my dreamscape. I ignore it.
“BODHI.” Now it thunders, and it sounds like Cuir in a way I can't describe.
“WAKE UP!”
My eyes flutter open with the final call of my dragon. I’m hesitant to leave the dream, as down-putting as it was, because it meant I could see the people I loved.
“Cuir?” even in my head, the question sounds too unconfident, as if I’m completely, utterly lost.
“Bodhi.” I can imagine the way Cuir purrs the sound, a deep rumbling filling her chest as her tail sways just a bit. “There’s someone at your door.” her tone means he knows who it is, but I’m too focused on a different part: it’s probably five in the morning, an hour before we have to be in formation, but also half an hour after curfew ends. Who in the world would want to talk to me at this time of day?
I only register the fact that the only clothing I’m wearing is black boxers when I open the door. Then I realize my hair is a mess, my breath probably smells bad, and I’m in a horrible mood—but the person who decided to open my door better have a good fucking reason.
I don’t see anyone.
What… Oh.
Realization comes a bit slowly.
I tilt my head down.
When I make eye contact with the person there, my heart stops.
Fuck.
“So,” Sloane Mairi says, “when were you going to tell me you loved my brother?”
No, no, no.
No, she’s just joking. I wait for it to come, but it doesn’t—Sloane keeps standing there, hands on her hips, right fingers crushing small slivers of paper.
Papers that…
“Uh…” my response is not, in fact, eloquent. “Sloane—”
“Shut up,” she barks out, stomping the four steps forward and placing a firm hand on my chest, as if trying to physically stop me. Or maybe she’s feeling my muscles.
Her eyes close, as if she’s trying to count to ten.
Fine, maybe twenty.
It doesn’t work, though, and she opens her eyes with just as much fury in them as before. “Why did I have to find out from letters?” her voice cracks.
There’s nothing I can say. I can only remember that Sorrengail had rescued Liam’s letters for Sloane from his room before they burned all his belongings. Some of my letters to him had been…obviously kept in the same pile.
The tears have started, small, slick pearls running down her face. “W—why,” she gasps out.
“Sloane—” I cut myself off. There’s no easy way to approach this, not with the memories that are pounding through my head as I remember.
Me and Liam, Liam and I.
Fuck, Liam.
Sloane forms fists, scrunching the papers even more. “Why, Bodhi?!” and this time it’s more of a howl.
I bite my bottom lip anxiously. “In,” I ordered, moving out of the doorframe so she could enter. With a glare, she does, and I close and lock the door behind us.
“Why.”
“Because…” my gaze wanders to the window. There’s so much I can’t tell her, so I say nothing.
Sloane takes it personally. Not only do her fists bawl even more—I doubt the paper is even readable, now—but she draws a sharp breath in, pouting her cheeks adorably.
“Was I just a replacement?” She beats me with the questions, each one hammering into me harder than the last. “Do you care at all?”
Fuck.
The thing is, I do care. And I always thought she knew this. But if she really thought I was just using her as a replacement for Liam, then I’ve been doing stuff seriously wrong.
Like, seriously seriously.
“Sloane—” Her eyes burn bright, as if she’s daring me to contradict her. “Sloane, of course I care.”
“Really?” she fires back, “Because the letters give the impression that you don’t.”
Unfortunately, Cuir takes Sloane’s side, the massive fucking green she is. “She isn’t wrong,” Cuir is too amused for my liking.
“Shut up,” I fire back.
“Sloane…” my eyes close. “Those letters feel like that for a reason. They were written while I was riding on the waves of love.”
“And you aren’t now?” She challenges.
She’s got me there. I sit down on my hastily-made bed. I pat the space next to me— “Sit.”
“I’ll remain standing, thank you very much,” she snipes back, and I cringe back.
(Sloane Mairi collapsed with quiet wails by her boyfriend’s deception. He’d told her that she was his first love. It wasn’t true. He had lied.
He had loved Liam Mairi, her older—and now dead —brother.)
I’m not an inntinnsic—
“Thank Dunne for that,” Cuir snorts.
—but even I can tell what kind of thoughts are running rampant in her head.
“Sorry.” It’s probably the fakest apology I’ve ever uttered.
“Right,” she raises her eyebrow.
“Look, Sloane—” I try, but she cuts me off.
“ Look, Bodhi,” she states clearly. “I love you. I fucking love you. But you’ve literally rocked my world upside down, denying that you love me—” No! That’s not true… I want to yell. But she’s on a roll. “…and I don’t know what else you’ve lied to me about. About Ar— home, about here, about your position. This isn’t a right-now thing, but I need you to know that most of my trust in you has completely evaporated.”
My heart stops.
Trust. Evaporated.
Everything is going by so fast I can’t register the words except two: trust. Evaporated.
Sloane, Sloane, Sloane, my heart calls.
Sloane turns around, hiding her furious face from me. Sloane.
“I’m going,” she tosses over her shoulder. “When you figure your shit out, come to me.”
The door slams shut and Cuir’s voice fills my head, her voice short and sweet. “I am sorry, Gentle One.”