by Lindsay Nall
Before she even knew what she was doing she had reeled back and punched him with her injured hand. She danced around once again waving her hand in pain. She had forgotten how hard his head was.
“Owe…dammit…owe…dammit…owe…” Tadum reached out to stop her and to try to assess the damage but she shrugged him off. “Leave me alone.”
“No.” He grabbed her again but she pulled away. “Stop that!”
“No! Dammit, I needed you!” He froze in his attempt to grab her a third time. Her eyes had become laden with tears, her face angry but it was the pain behind her eyes that did him in. “I needed you to tell me why, I needed an explanation, I needed you to keep checking in with me to let me know you were okay.” She shook her head turning her back on him. “Call me selfish if you want but after Father died I needed you most, I needed someone I could trust, someone there that loved me…”
“Marinique was there.”
“Marinique Didn’t meet me until after Father was already dead. I’d heard of him sure, Mother had spoken of him once or twice but I didn’t meet him until after.” He hadn’t known. District-wide alerts were sent out to everyone every time a member of the Silhouette died, he had known when her father had passed but he had also heard of Marinique’s visit to the east district. He always thought he was there to help her through things.
“I didn’t know.”
“No you didn’t and why would you? It took two years before you even spoke to me again.”
“I wasn’t avoiding you, I was on assignments you know that.” She shook her head.
“That never stopped you before. You disappeared. You’re a coward.”
“Maybe I am but how was I supposed to know all this?! You never contacted me either!” Hadn’t she figured out by now that this had hurt him too? He hated himself for not checking in with her, for not being there for her especially now that he knew about Marinique but what could he do now to change any of that? He had needed space from her, he knew if he had broken his resolve and contacted her before he could build his walls back up that he would have fallen in love with her all over again.
She spun back to him spitting fire with her eyes. “You told me not to.” Wiping at her face she cleared the tears that had escaped her eyes and continued. “You told me that it should be a clean break, that we should go our separate ways and if in time we came back together we would protect each other but nothing more…” Growling at her own emotions she wiped her face again. “We never came back together, I broke down and called Nevelyn to check up on you a few times, he was the one to make sure and take that last assignment that brought you to my district. I was hoping for this conversation then, hoping more than anything that we could talk like adults but you carried on as if nothing had ever happened between us…”
“That’s not true.” He ran a hand through his short black hair making a mental note in the back of his head to maim Nevelyn later. “Mari, that weekend nearly killed me.” As her anger ran its course and came to a close so did the tears running down her face. “I was afraid that you would bring this up, that this conversation would happen and I was more afraid of that than anything. Maybe that makes me a coward in your eyes but I was still in love with you dammit.” He sat down on the bench leaning on his knees to look at the ground as he spoke. “Every time we talked I was afraid I was going to slip up and tell you. I didn’t want to give you false hope that we had a future, that I had changed my mind about ending us.” Slowly she made her way over to him sitting far enough away that she could angle her body towards his but not touch him. “I am not proud of the decisions I have made, sometimes I wish I could change them.” He what now? He couldn’t mean what she thought he meant could he?
“Leaf?” He shook his head with a sigh then ran his hands over his face as if he were trying to scrub away the day. She didn’t know what to do, she knew what she wanted to ask him but she wasn’t sure if she wanted the answer. They had been through so much, too much.
“I can’t do this.” He shook his head again as he stood. “I just can’t.” He took two steps away from her before she realized what he was doing.
“You are not just walking away from this.”
“I am.” He didn’t stop forcing her to get up and run after him, once she reached him she grabbed his arm pulling him to a stop. They stood in the middle of the walkway arch that ran around the outside of the main building.
“The hell you are.” Mentally she damned herself for even bringing this up, what right had she had to open these wounds? “You know better than to run from me.” He nodded though his face was still turned away from hers. “Talk to me.”
“I needed you too, I still do and it scares me.” Her eyebrows furrowed as she stared at the side of his face. He seemed almost defeated but slowly he turned to look at her. His eyes were filled with emotions telling her just how hard this conversation was on him. She was such an idiot, she should have just let this go, believed things happened the way they were supposed to and left it alone but no, she had to bring up old history.
“I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you.” He gave a soft sigh then placed his hand on her cheek. “I won’t bring this up again I promise.” She tried to give him the best smile she could muster but it was a useless act before she could crank up the wattage he grabbed her and kissed her deeper than he ever had before. All the emotions she had kept bottled up for so long came rushing back to her making her react in a way that encouraged his actions.
Slowly he backed her up against the wall of the building pressing his body against hers as tightly as he could, reminding them both how long it had been since they had been in someone’s arms. She let her hands run down his chest over the buttons of his shirt opening the top few as she went to spread her fingers over his bare chest. He let out a throaty growl as he pulled the two of them into one of the spare storage rooms off the walkway.
An hour later the two were laying in a pile of extra blankets they had pulled from one of the shelves to the floor. Tadum lay flat on his back with Mari curled around him with her head on his chest just as she had been in the sparring room the night before. Lazily he ran a hand up and down her spine as he thought about what had just happened between the two of them, an inner battle raged with what this all meant.
“You’re gonna give me a migraine.” Mari’s growl brought him out of his thoughts and back to the woman who was now glaring at him. “We need to talk about this don’t we?” He nodded. “I figured as much.” She let out a sigh and turned her head back to lay with her ear over his heart.
“We’ve never let it get this far before.”
“Not true.” He stared at the top of her head. “A year ago we did.” He had almost forgotten about that night out in the courtyard of the East District after too much wine.
“How do we keep ending up in places that aren’t bedrooms?” She waved a hand at the question.
“Bedrooms are boring.”
“Marisol…”
“I know, I know.” Sitting up she wrapped one of the blankets around her. “I think the better question right now is where do we go from here? I mean hell Leaf we were practically yelling at each other and well, now we’re here.”
“In a storeroom?”
“Naked you jerk.” She glared at the smile playing around his lips, he was teasing her, and she knew it. “Still, where do we go from here?” She looked away from him to stare at the wall of the room losing herself in her thoughts. Tadum sat up slowly and took her hand in his drawing her attention from the wall to his face.
“If I were to propose to you again what would you say?”
“I would probably punch you again.”
“I’m serious.” He traced the scar under his eye unconsciously as he waited for an answer.
“I don’t know, I kind of like the way we are.” She did. They both got the emotional and physical interactions a couple would give each other but kept boundaries, except for what had just happened. “But it’s so hard to explain espec
ially to people who don’t know our past.” He gave her a long-suffering look. “Alright I filled them in mostly but still…”
“I thought you said you didn’t care what other people think.”
“I don’t I’m just trying to figure out what I think.” She pulled her shirt on as she thought about how to voice her concerns. “What if one of us falls in love with someone else? Or one of us realizes they want to be with the other?”
“Is that how you feel? Do you want to be with me again?” She thought long and hard keeping her gaze locked on him the whole time. She wasn’t opposed to it; she wasn’t even opposed to the idea of marrying him but something in the back of her mind had her shaking her head no. “Then we will cross that bridge when it comes, for now, we are what we are.” She finished getting dressed and turned back to him as he was pulling his shirt over his head, she never undid the rest of the buttons.
“And what are we?”
“Friends.”
“Yeah like anyone is going to believe that.” Taking a seat on one of the crates in the room she waited for him to finish dressing trying to look anywhere but at him. It was bad enough she had just slept with him, she didn’t need to be ogling him like a prepubescent. Tadum folded the blankets and put them back on the shelf before taking a seat next to her on the crate. “Still I’m angry with you.” He nodded knowing she had every right to be. She had been right to call him a coward in the way he had ended their engagement, but at the time he thought he was doing what was best.
Reaching out quickly he pulled her to him holding her as tight as he could without injuring her. “I’m sorry…” It was a whisper but it was enough to make her freeze. “I took the coward’s way out. I should have come to you and told you why; I should have explained how I was feeling about us and how afraid I was to leave you a widow.” She couldn’t move. In all the time she had known him Leaf Tadum had never apologized to anyone, at least not sincerely. “Can we put this to rest now?” She didn’t say anything for a long time; she just sat there silently letting what had been said sink in. After enough time had passed she slowly leaned back from him, not enough to be out of his grasp but enough that she could look him in the eye. Just as slowly as she had moved she reached up and traced a finger along where she had punched him earlier and then moved on to trace over the scar she had given him.
“I was so confused on why you had fought so hard to get me to agree to marry you and then didn’t fight at all when it came to losing me… but I understand now.” Her hand came to rest on his shoulder and she squeezed it. “I can put this behind us if you can make me a promise.”
“What is with you and all these promises lately?” She pinched his shoulder.
“I just want you to promise we’ll keep protecting each other, that we’ll keep on as we are, whatever we are. It’s been the only constant in my life.”
“Now that is a promise I can make.” He kissed her forehead and pulled her close. Maybe this had been a good thing. Maybe getting closure on what had happened between them would make her worry a little less about him. Maybe he would keep his promise and be more careful when he fought demons.
She knew better.
Still, as they left the storeroom and she watched Leaf return inside to find Nevelyn and confirm his departure date she couldn’t help but smirk at the fact that she was the voice of reason in his head… now if she could only find a voice of reason of her own.
Five
Nyght and Marclay found Mari sitting in the same spot she had been in last night watching the waves roll in and out. Marclay flew off to go and see her but Nyght hung back for a few minutes taking in the sweet smell of flowers and just watching her. To anyone, even him, she looked like a normal young woman but with what he knew now he couldn’t help but wonder if she was one of The Fourteen. Did she even know of The Fourteen? The district she came from was renowned for its need to keep the Shadows from everyone there, but she had been engaged to one. That meant she had to know about them right? If he was going to train with her and eventually fight beside her he had to know what she knew.
“Marisol?”
“I was wondering how long you were going to stand back there.” He couldn’t help but wonder if she could sense him or if maybe Marclay had somehow told her he was there. “I heard you.” Well, that explained that.
“Sorry.” She shrugged then patted the ground next to her.
“What’s on your mind?” She asked after he had taken a seat. “Don’t even give me that look.” He smirked and shook his head.
“I just, alright I have to ask, I mean being with where you’re from and all but then you know Tadum and Marinique and…” His rambling was cut off mid-sentence when she put her hand over his mouth.
“Nyght just spit out the question okay?” He nodded making her retrieve her hand.
“How much do you know about being a Shadow? Or a member of The Fourteen?” She balked not expecting that question.
“Nothing I guess.” She thought for a long time as they sat there before she spoke again. “If I tell you what I know can you fill in the blanks?” Nyght nodded. “I know it’s my life now, protecting the people of this world and the people I love. I know no matter how hard I train it may not be enough. I know in the end all Fourteen of us will die.”
All Fourteen?
“So you are one.” Mari unbuttoned the top four buttons of her shirt and pulled the collar to the side to expose her right shoulder, on it was a faint scar connecting ten of her freckles in a unique pattern. Nyght had spent his life documenting and cataloging everything he could and never once had he seen this mark in reference to The Fourteen. Still, it looked familiar for some reason. “I think you know enough about it.” She smiled buttoning her shirt back up as Nyght stood. “So are you ready to start training?” She tilted her head back and looked up at him with a cocked eyebrow. “We decided you’d be doing most of your training with me. If you’d rather rest another day...”
“Let’s begin.” She cut him off as she stood and started walking away. Nyght followed her to one of the practice fields on the other side of the courtyard.
“How about defense first? Have you learned any combat moves?” She nodded never taking her eyes from him; it was unnerving and reassuring at the same time. “Then shall we?” She didn’t wait for him to prepare and attacked catching him off guard, he looked up to her from the flat of his back.
“The first thing I learned was never to let your guard down.” He grinned knocking her feet out from under her twisting so he landed on top of her straddling her stomach and holding her shoulders down. It was her turn to grin. Using her legs as leverage she rolled them over her head and landed on him with her knees on his shoulders.
“Fair enough. You’re going to be a handful aren’t you?” She smiled and hopped up holding out a hand to help him to his feet.
“More than likely, shall we try this again?”
“Definitely.” He said striking a defensive pose. Over the next five hours the two learned quickly that they had both been well trained. Nyght couldn’t help but wonder as they exchanged blows back and forth if she was this controlled when using her fractures. If that was the case her training wouldn’t take long. “Alright, I think that’s enough for today.” He whispered taking a seat in the grass only to flop onto his back. Mari laid down next to him watching the evening clouds coast through the sky.
“Hey, Nyght?”
“Yeah?”
“Does Vander ever talk about Marinique?” He thought over the conversations he had had with Vander trying to recall any time Marinique came up in conversation but not finding anything that jumped out at him.
“Not too much.”
“Are they still in touch?”
“I don’t know you’d have to ask Vander.”
“Okay.” Nyght wanted to ask her questions about her past, he wanted to ask her about Marinique Rayne and Bart, why she kept getting that far off look in her eye that made him wonder what she was really seeing.<
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“I think tomorrow we’ll work with your fractures.” She turned and looked at him then. “What? I won’t hurt…”
“No, you said fractures, plural. Who told you?” He blinked several times not sure what to tell her. “Nyght?” Knowing telling her the truth was the best option he filled her in.
“Marclay did…sort of, and Karter. He just wanted us to be prepared because you’re the first person to…”
“Be special.” Mari finished sitting up as she pulled her knees to her chest. “Marclay showed you what happened the first time I used my abilities didn’t she?” Nyght nodded. She glared at Marclay. “Traitor.” Marclay flew off to hide in a nearby tree at Mari’s look.
“It’s only right that we know what you’re capable of, otherwise we wouldn’t know how to train you.” She nodded but there was a set to her jaw that made him nervous. She stood and motioned for him to do the same. “What?”
“You’re right, you should know the full spectrum of my abilities. You’ve seen the elemental half of my abilities, the power that comes from the fracture in my heart…”
“Your heart?” She nodded.
“I am the only Shadow known to be born with a fracture. It’s where that whole special thing started, the second fracture just made it worse…” She sighed then shook her head.
“How did it make it worse?”
“When I was four my parents took me on a trip with them to a neighboring town, nothing out of the ordinary just going to pick up supplies but I bolted off. I had sensed something in the woods and without a second thought just tore off after it.”
“You sensed a fracture.” She nodded. All carriers of Paranus could sense wild fractures in the world, that’s what made them so good at locating other Shadows.
