by Ella M. Lee
“Because you killed innocent people,” I burst out.
He stood, paced away, and spun to face me angrily. “Yes, I did. I’ve killed many people, some innocent, some not. I was a monster when I was in Smoke, but that part of me died over the course of the year I spent being tortured each day for Smoke’s pleasure. It was gone by the time Jasmine pulled me from that cage and brought me to Water.”
“How many people did you kill for your research?” I asked, my voice sounding foreign to me.
“Nineteen,” he said. His expression was deadly. “I can tell you every one of their names, too.”
“Volunteers?” I asked, although I was pretty sure I already knew the answer.
“Two were, yes,” he said. “The rest were captives from other clans.”
“And you were fine with this until Smoke turned on you and subjected you to the same treatment,” I said flatly.
“That, yes, and because my visions and mind-reading both make me very sensitive to emotions.”
“Would be hard to tell,” I muttered.
He threw his hands up and gave me another deadly look. “It’s so easy for you to criticize me,” he said scathingly. “You know nothing about how I feel, nothing about the sort of strength and defenses I had to build up to handle my abilities, nothing about how I’ve changed and grown. You see the results of my hard work and little else.”
He paused.
“I did try to let you in. I know you haven’t read the journal I gave you. If you had, you would have asked these questions days ago. I wasn’t shy about calling myself a monster in there.”
I looked away, trying to find anything to look at other than his hurt expression. He was right—with all the drama with Daniel, I hadn’t had a chance to read his writing.
“I’m sorry,” I said, a reflexive response.
He took a deep, shaky breath. “You do know me, as I am now, the person I fought to become. I don’t like who I was, and I have changed. I swear that, lamb.”
“But why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, my voice only a hoarse whisper.
“Did you expect me to lay out all forty-five years of my life for you? Did you want a résumé?” he asked, throwing his hands up again. “I thought opening our first date by telling you how many people I’ve killed might not go so well. Clan life can be heavy. I didn’t want it to define our relationship. I wanted us to get to know one another without that.”
He paused again.
“I’m sorry,” he said, his tone much gentler. “That was the wrong call. When it comes to my own life, I make mistakes. I make many of them.”
Tears were building in my eyes. Having him here in front of me was confusing. When I looked at him, I couldn’t help but love him. He loved me, had saved me, had taken care of me, had given me everything. His eyes on me made me feel incredible—strong, confident, desired.
But could I let this go? Could I let it go that the man I loved had been what some people would consider pure evil? He had been as frighteningly cold and callous as I had always heard about members of Smoke, driven to complete his work and research without a care for others.
Could I really believe he had changed into someone better, and if so, did that wash away his past?
He came closer, kneeling and taking my hands in his. I blinked back tears. I loved his touch, I needed it. I wanted nothing more than to lean into him and have him hold me forever, but my stomach was still writhing. I didn’t know if I could forgive him for who he had been.
And what if I couldn’t?
I pulled my hands away, leaning back.
“Can I be alone?” I asked. “Please? Please?”
My breath caught at his incredibly injured expression.
“Yes, of course,” he said stiffly. “May I say something before I go?”
I nodded, shaking. He paced back to the center of the room and folded his arms across his chest.
“I’m ashamed of who I was in Smoke. When I was their captive, I thought it was karmic retribution for what I’d done,” he said. “You deserve this, Nicolas, I told myself. You tortured and killed people, and now you’re going to be tortured and killed. You cared nothing for others’ feelings or lives, and now you’re stuck seeing their futures and hearing their thoughts.”
He put a shaking hand to his face, his expression tragic.
“I didn’t want to be rescued,” he said. “I was fine being judged and sentenced, if that’s what you could call it, but Jasmine wouldn’t let me go. When she and Ryan got me back to Hong Kong, I wanted to die. I was depressed, on top of the struggles of my new powers.
“I started writing at Ryan’s insistence. I started taking long walks once I could handle my mind-reading, studying the people around me. I found that I could make connections that way, that I could teach myself to care. When Ryan told me that I could be a good person, I thought maybe he was right.”
Nicolas ran his hand through his hair, flustered. “I knew I couldn’t rise in Water by being a good person, so I decided that I would keep my reputation but work to change privately,” he said. “It was hard, but there were people in my life who made it easier, who inspired me to be better. Ryan, Jasmine, Irina, even Claudius to some extent. When I found Daniel… Mon Dieu, that boy forced me to love him as I had never loved anyone before.
“And then you. Finding you finished that transformation, change that had taken me fifteen years to accomplish. Practically from the moment I saw you, I wanted to protect you. When I got to know you, I knew I wanted you. I didn’t deserve you, but I wanted you anyhow. And to learn that you wanted me, that you cared for me despite my reputation and our rocky start and everything I had put you through? I was incredulous and frightened—because I had never had so much to lose.
“I didn’t tell you everything because it’s not relevant… and because I was afraid. Even giving you my journal was one of the most difficult decisions I have ever made. I knew it would invite questions that I’d be forced to answer. Now I’m more afraid than ever. Monsters don’t expect anyone to love them.”
I studied him, his glassy eyes, his nervous posture. I had never seen Nicolas undone in quite this way, and it frightened me a little.
“You love me,” I said.
He nodded. “I do. I love you.”
“And I love you,” I said, choked up, “but I still need to be alone. I need to think about this. Please.”
He nodded. It was agony to watch him turn and walk out the door, his magic swirling darkly behind him, his silencing spell crumbling into frail mist.
It killed me to let him go without another word.
I thought I would feel better without his presence, but the building was suffocating me. The clan house was not my favorite place. We hadn’t started out on the best of terms, and it had too many magicians in it, making the atmosphere charged and intense.
I had to get out. I needed a couple of days away.
I sighed, going to the bedroom to pack a bag. I eyed my phone on the kitchen counter. I didn’t want Nicolas to contact me, and I didn’t want the temptation to contact him. I needed to distance myself, even for just a little while, so I left the phone where it was.
As I made my way to the elevator, I passed Chandra’s door and had an idea. I knocked.
“Hi,” she said, leaning against the frame, studying me curiously. “What’s up?”
“Hey,” I said. “You know, I haven’t really been sleeping. Do you have any sedatives? Valium? Ativan?”
I was an anxious person, and I had used prescriptions for Ativan and Xanax on and off throughout my life. I hadn’t had any since coming to Water, but my body definitely craved that sort of calm in situations like this one.
“Yeah,” she said.
I waited in the hall, praying Nicolas wouldn’t emerge from his apartment, while Chandra got a bottle from her bathroom.
“Here you go,” she said, holding it out to me. She paused, then added, “Don’t take them all at once. They are pretty strong.”
>
Chandra and I weren’t close enough that she would care about what I was going to do with the pills. There were at least ten of them in the little plastic container. That was plenty for a day or two away with some sleep and silence. I didn’t know if they would help yield any answers, but I would figure that out as needed.
An hour later, I shut the door of my hotel room at the Eaton Hong Kong. It wasn’t fancy, but I liked that. It meant it wouldn’t remind me of Nicolas, nor would he know to look for me here.
I popped two Ativan and crawled into bed. It only took ten minutes for the sedative to kick in, for the world to get a little fuzzier and easier to tolerate.
I was sick to my stomach and shaking.
I loved Nicolas. I loved him immensely. I wanted to forgive him. I called up every moment he had been kind and compassionate toward me. Even from early on, when he had no reason to, he had mostly handled me gently. And these days? No one had ever treated me better than he did.
He had given me second chances. I had tried to kill him. I had betrayed him with Daniel. Both times, he had hardly hesitated before allowing me to apologize and change.
Didn’t he deserve that in return? Couldn’t I give that to him?
The night flew by. As did the next day. And the next night.
The sedatives put me into a relaxed half-sleep state that felt amazing and let me ignore the questions plaguing my mind. Whenever I felt the world sharpening, I popped another pill and slipped back into meaningless bliss.
I knew I would have to get back to my life eventually, but after nearly six months of nonstop stress and hard work, nothing felt better than not thinking for a couple of days.
I desperately wanted to forget the endless questions that ran circles in my mind, and I was starting to wonder if all the faith and trust I’d placed in Nicolas had been a massive mistake.
Chapter 19
I awoke to bright morning light filtering through the windows and sharp knocking.
“Fi, I will break down this door if you don’t open it.” Daniel’s voice, angrier than I had ever heard it before.
Well, shit. Vacation was over.
I unlatched each lock slowly and cracked open the door. Daniel’s expression was deadly, his brows drawn together, his lips pressed into a thin line. His dark eyes were stormy, and the shadowy circles under them were quite pronounced.
He shoved the door open with a firm hand and pushed me further into the room. I watched warily as he shut the door with a click and spun to face me.
“How did you find me?” I asked, sighing.
“I had Teng track your building key card,” he said, his tone dark. “Then I had him pull your credit card transactions.”
“Teng can do that?” I asked.
“Fiona,” he said, exasperated.
“What, Dan? It’s rich that you’re chiding me about disappearing when, according to Nicolas, you are good at dropping off the map.”
“I always told my commander what I was doing,” he pointed out. He thrust an annoyed finger in my direction. “You did no such thing. I get that something is going on between you and Nicolas, but you answer to me, and I will make you regret it if you worry me unnecessarily again.”
“You’re threatening me?” I asked, turning away. “Learned well from your monster of a mentor, didn’t you?”
“He’s not a monster,” Daniel said.
His tone had softened slightly. I turned back to look at him, incredulous. He was standing straight and proud, studying me, his feet turned into an effortless and graceful “L.” He was tense, upset, and I thought I was not getting off the hook so easy with him in this mood.
“He’s not a monster anymore,” Dan said, adding a frustrated eye roll with his emphasis.
He sat down heavily on the bed and patted the space next to himself. I hesitated.
“I’m not coming near you if you’re angry,” I said, crossing my arms. “You’re deadly.”
“I would never hurt you,” Dan said, his eyes narrowing.
Great, now he was angry and offended. Regardless, I didn’t move.
“None of us would,” he said. “Especially not Nicolas.”
“He already has. Or have you forgotten? He hit me in front of the entire clan, he slit my best friend’s throat, he dragged me here and ruined my life. He’s not a nice person.”
“No one in a clan is really a nice person,” Dan said.
“You are.”
He shook his head. “You think that because you don’t know me. I’ve done terrible things too. I’ve killed people. So have you. None of us are truly good. Isn’t it enough that we’re good to each other?”
“I don’t know,” I said sadly. “Is it?”
He beckoned to me again. I sighed and went to sit next to him. He took my hands in his. His touch was gentle despite his anger.
“Nicolas told me what happened,” Daniel said. “That was a shitty thing for Irina to do. She had no right to ask you about your relationship or reveal details that were Nicolas’s to share, but we all thought you knew. It didn’t occur to me that Nicolas wouldn’t tell you, although I understand. He loves you, Fi. He seems strong and confident, but you are a weakness for him. You scare him.”
“I know. He scares me, too.”
“If you abandon Nicolas over his past, I think you need to reassess your life within a clan at all,” Dan said. “Even Verdant is not entirely pacifist, and they are the best of the clans. Nicolas has been a better person than others I could name, inside Water and out of it. In the end, we all hurt people.”
“There’s a difference between killing people because they are a threat to you and killing people because you want to run insane science experiments on them.”
“No,” he said. “We’re only threats to each other because we make it that way. You killed Andres. You could say it was self-defense to make yourself feel better, sure. You killed him because he was trying to kill you. He was trying to kill you because you were trying to kill him. You were trying to kill him because he was the target of your mission. And for what? You didn’t even know the point. You just did your job, what your clan told you, something to fulfill its goals.”
His eyes were dark and serious, and his jaw was twitching. I rarely saw him so emotional.
“That’s what Nicolas was doing,” Daniel said. “Smoke furthers magical development. For all of us, not just themselves. He was fulfilling that. You killed people to do your job, and he killed people to do his job. Tell me, honestly, if there’s a difference you’re willing to stand behind.”
I was breathing fast, shaking, trying to find a flaw or a loophole in his argument, trying to figure out if he was gaslighting me or manipulating me into doing what he wanted.
“I don’t like killing, Fi,” he said. “I really, really hate it. But I made myself okay with it years ago if it protected myself or the people I loved. That was my decision. Some people are okay with killing for other reasons too. I’m not.
“I don’t agree with Nicolas’s purposes for what he did in Smoke, but when he told me about his past, I chose to forgive him for it. That was also my own decision, one that I would not force on you or anyone.”
His fingers were now twined in mine, calming their shaking.
“I’m not here as Nicolas’s advocate,” Dan said. “He can handle himself, and the two of you are adults who can make your own decisions. I’m here as your commander because you ran off and didn’t tell anyone and didn’t take your phone, and I’m pissed about that.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know what to do. I just had to get out of the clan house.”
“Next time, you text me and tell me where you’re going and why,” Dan said sternly. “It’s that simple. You know I have your back. You know I would never say no to you. But I can’t support you if you don’t let me, and I can’t trust you if you’re not going to tell me things.”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I said.
I threw my arms around him, and he caught me
awkwardly. He held me stiffly, not as comfortably as he would typically interact with me.
“I love you,” I whispered, tears in my eyes.
“Yeah, I know. I know you’re going through a lot, Fi.”
“What do I do?” I asked after a few moments of silence.
“Be thoughtful,” he said, his tone still hard.
“I lose you if I lose him, don’t I?” I asked.
Dan pulled away so he could look at me, frowning. “It makes things harder. But… I don’t know what would happen.”
My chest constricted. Tears filled my eyes again. “I can’t lose you.”
I didn’t need him to tell me that he thought similarly. His expression was serious and sad.
I nudged myself closer to him again. He looked like he was trying very hard to stay mad at me and failing.
“I’m sorry. Please forgive me for leaving,” I said. “I’ll never do it again, I promise. Please.”
“I was beside myself worrying about you,” he admonished. “There are rules in our group, and you are bound by them. You will remember that in the future, or next time we will be having a very different conversation.”
I nodded, wiping tears from my eyes. “I will, I swear. I’m sorry.”
“Nicolas is intolerable right now,” Dan said, sighing. “He won’t answer my texts. He knows you’re gone. He told me to find you and make sure you’re all right, and then he stopped responding. Not much of a loss, since he won’t speak in anything other than half sentences. We’re due to meet at five tonight, and he hasn’t called it off, so I assume he’ll show up in a terrible mood.”
“What are the two of you meeting about?”
“The two of us? It’s supposed to be the four of us,” he said, meaning me and Sylvio as well, “but you haven’t been checking our chat channel.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“Do you know any other words?” he asked, studying me.
I flinched. Daniel never treated me this way, but he was very obviously channeling a bit of Nicolas’s intensity.
“Of course, but these are the only ones I want to say to you right now.”
