Tears for a woman I’ve never known, but who must’ve been incredibly special, prick my eyes. I’m just a weepy mess today, aren’t I?
“Of anyone, my Molly knew what it was like to fight for what you want out of life. She was never one to sit back and let this so-called Fate bulldoze her future. She may’ve walked away from the life she knew as a Magical, but she did it on her own terms. There are a lot of people out there—more than you could possible imagine, hen—who’ve done the same. But I have a feeling, even though that may be what you’ve thought is your best choice, maybe it’s not after all.”
And . . . he’s right. I barely slept last night thanks to that horrible nightmare that led me to two conclusions: 1) as scared as I am, I need to take care of the Elders, and 2) I need to make things right with Jonah (and Kellan). In order to do both, one thing is certain . . .
It’s time I go back to Annar and finally take responsibility for my actions.
“I’m afraid,” I tell Cameron, and it’s an incredible feeling, knowing it’s safe for me to open myself up to him, without fear of besmirching the family name. To know that he’s here for me. “I’m afraid that if I go back, I’ll be right back on the hamster wheel I’d been on before.”
He nods slowly, rubbing his closely cropped beard. “It is a possibility, true. But the thing Molly always stressed to me was that Magicals are just like everyone else. They’ve only tricked themselves into believing they have no choices. You have a choice, lass. You can go back and get right back onto that hamster wheel, or you can go back, chuck the bloody thing into the trash, and make your own way on your own terms.”
He makes it sound so simple.
“We’ll go with you. You won’t have to go alone.”
Will’s standing in the doorway, his shirt and hair rumpled, his eyes ringed in dark smudges which tell me he didn’t sleep much last night, either.
I simply stare at him, sure that what I just heard come from his lips was wrong.
But Cameron gives his son a nod, his smile transforming again. This time, pride curves his lips upward.
“Look. I’ve thought about this—I guess . . . I guess I can see where you and Mum were coming from,” Will says to his father. “You guys thought you were doing best, protecting me from what you perceived as an injustice done to so-called”—he shudders slightly when he says this—“half-breeds. But I’d like the same choice you claimed is available to Chloe. I want to see all of this for myself.”
Cameron’s smile grows even more satisfied.
My heart threatens to swell to unnatural proportions. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah,” Will tells me. “I think maybe this is a journey we all need to go on.” He lets out the sound of rue turned into a burst of breath. “That’s if you want us to go with you, I mean. There’s always the possibility you’ll tell us to bugger off, but—”
“Yes.” Yep. My heart’s ready to burst out in ishy, squishy goo made of pure love.
Will’s still tired, still . . . shell-shocked. His world has been rocked. But here he is, smiling that crooked smile at me, and suddenly things don’t feel so undoable anymore. “Family sticks together, you know?”
“Yeah,” I whisper back.
Cameron’ arm loops around my shoulders and I lean into his familiar, nurturing comfort. “Then it’s settled. While you two go to work, I’ll start making plans for us to return to Annar.”
“What the hell happened to you two? You look like you got ran over by a bulldozer made of barbed wire.”
I ignore Frieda while attempting to tie on my apron. She takes surprising pity on me and gently knocks my hands away so she can tie it. “Car accident,” I mumble, and I wonder—even now, even after I’ve bared my soul to Cameron and Will—when will the lies stop rolling off my tongue so easily?
All of her natural hostility fades as she turns to Will. “Your truck?”
It makes me want to laugh, the way she says this, like his truck is sacred and his life is changed forever by its destruction. Only, the truck will be fine as soon as I get the okay to fix it. Will’s life, though?
He’s refused to talk about it with me so far. No questions about the Elves I know, no voiced curiosities about what life in Annar is like—nothing. Just a resigned sense of weary acceptance that hurts to see on his face. I left him and Cameron alone after they decided to move to Annar with me so they could talk, but mere minutes after my door shut, so did Will’s bedroom door.
Will does laugh here with Frieda, though. It’s normal sounding, the kind he’d do on any other day than the morning after his world was turned upside down. Maybe Will’s as good of an actor as I am. “Truck’s fine. The important thing is Zoe and I are okay.”
Zoe. When just ten minutes before he called me Chloe.
“Obviously, you jackass.” Frieda goes to swat his arm, but pulls back with only millimeters to spare.
“I’m not fragile,” he teases her.