The Lightning-Struck Heart (66 page)

“I don’t,” I said. “And I don’t care to anymore. I’m done fighting. Aren’t you done fighting?”

He didn’t answer.

“I’m done fighting,” I said again. “Fighting you. Fighting for you. Fighting against you. I’m done. It makes things easier.”

“What things?” he asked quietly.

I raised my arm and waved my hand toward the stars. “This. These things. Everything.”

“That’s… all encompassing. As usual.”

“Like a tornado.”

“Uh. Sure? Are you drunk?”

“Not this time. Maybe tomorrow night. No offense, but Gary, Tiggy, and I will probably get drunk and besmirch your name a bit.”

He took a step toward me. I refused to look at him, but I could still see him in the periphery.

“Besmirch, huh?”

“So much besmirching,” I said. “You don’t even know how besmirched you’ll be.”

“I think I have an idea,” he said. “I traveled with you three for weeks. It’ll probably get a tad vicious.” He took another step. Like he was aiming for subtlety. Nonchalance. He was failing miserably.

And it was getting dangerously close to reminiscing again. That wouldn’t bode well for my Plan of Not Caring. Nothing ruins Not Caring like Willful and Fond Reminiscing. I hoped he hadn’t capitalized the plan in his head yet. “Eh,” I said. “I won’t let it get too bad. Maybe some choice curse words here and there but nothing too bad. I won’t hex you or anything.”

“Could you do that?”

“Probably. I don’t really know what I’m capable of anymore.”

“Lightning,” he said and took another step.

I sighed. “Yeah. I’ve been through worse. Randall just likes to try and get a rise out of me.”

“It looked like he was trying to kill you.”

“Nah. He knows I’d come back and haunt his ass. He wouldn’t dare.”

“What did it feel like?”

I was starting to get irritated. “Gods, sit down if you’re going to stay here. Stop hovering. You’re making it worse.”

“You aren’t going to run?” he asked, a light tease, and I had to remind myself that
I
didn’t care
.

“You’re the one that’s been running lately,” I said.

That shut him up right quick. He sat down next to me, carefully maintaining a slight distance like I was a cornered, skittish animal. He huffed out a breath, then lay down on his back, looking up through the thin canopy of trees above.

And because I was probably a masochist, I asked, “You ready for tomorrow?”

I felt his eyes on me as he turned his head in my direction. “Are you serious?”

“What? I can’t ask questions?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t seem to know a lot of things.”

He groaned and rubbed a hand over his face. “Gods, you confuse me.”

“Oh dear.”

“You infuriate me.”

“My bad.”

“Yes, Sam,” he snapped. “I’m ready for tomorrow.”

“Sounds like it.”

“You’re a dick.”

I laughed. “Yeah. I know. If you’d like, I can go back to pretending you don’t exist.”

“Would that be easier?”

“For who?”

He didn’t answer. Instead, he said, “Did you ever think you’d get here?”

“Where?”

“Here. Where you are now. I… back in the slums, I always figured I’d stay there. I’d work there. That I would die there.”

“That’s… sad.”

“And yet that’s how it is for most people born there.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe. I spent a lot of time thinking of ways to get us out of there. Wishing for something to happen. I never thought I’d… well. I don’t know what I thought was going to happen. But no. I never expected this. To be here. Where I am.”

His arm brushed against mine, whether by accident or not, I couldn’t tell. But I had learned very quickly that very little happened by accident when it concerned Ryan Foxheart. “I never hoped,” he said. “I never wished. I never dreamed. Not until you.”

“Ryan—”

“Listen. Please, can you just listen?”

“I already know what you’re going to do. I can recognize the tone in your voice. I don’t need you to justify anything to me. I don’t want you to.”

“I’m not trying to justify anything.”

“Then what are you trying to do?”

“Have a conversation,” he said, pouting slightly. I refused to find it adorable.

“No,” I said. “You’re trying to explain yourself. Why you pledged your oath to Justin. You did it for your mother. You did it because you got out and she didn’t. You did it for her, because you thought that’s what she wanted for you, and you could never go back on your word because of how much you loved her. I get it, Ryan. I get it, okay? I know why you’re doing what you’re doing. I hate it, and I think I sometimes hate you, but I get it. I do. Okay? I promise. I do. If you need my blessing, have at it. It’s yours. Do what you have to, because in the end, you’ll have to live with yourself. Not me. Not Justin. Just you.” By the time I finished speaking, my voice was hoarse and my hands were shaking. I didn’t even have the sense to stop him when he reached over and curled his fingers in my own. His grip was tight and warm.

He tugged on my hand gently, but insistently. I turned over on my side as he was silently asking me to do, facing him. His position mirrored mine. His eyes searched my own. He opened his mouth once, then closed it. Then, “I meant what I said.”

“When?”

“When I told you that the only thing I wished for was you.”

“You bastard,” I whispered. He took our joined hands and brought them to his face. I felt the brush of his lips against my skin, and I fought against jerking my hand away. “Do you want to know what it felt like?”

“What?”

“The lightning.”

“I don’t—”

“It hurt. At first. It wasn’t like the first time when we were running from the Darks and the fire geckos. It was so easy then. So easy to take it in, wrap it around my heart, and then send it away. I didn’t understand why I couldn’t do it again. Why it wasn’t working.”

His face was so close to mine. I could feel his breath on my skin.

“And then something was different. Morgan and Randall knew why. I didn’t. Maybe I should have. I just felt it. In my bones. In my blood. It whispered to me and said that everything was going to be all right. That I could do this. That I could do what they were asking of me. And then Randall gave me more than he should have. Far more than I should have been capable of handling. But it didn’t matter because the moment it touched my skin, I knew it was different. That
I
was different. I knew I could do this. I knew what I was capable of. I took it in and it wrapped itself around my heart and it was scary and devastating and wonderful all at the same time. It felt of
power
and
strength
and I could have kept it there. No matter how much it hurt. I could have kept it there for myself. But it wasn’t mine to keep. It wasn’t mine to hold. So I let it go. I let it go and I didn’t understand. Why it felt so familiar. The electricity crawling along my heart. I didn’t understand at first. But I do now.”

“What is it?” he whispered.

“It’s you,” I said, not able to look away. “It’s how I feel when I’m with you. How I think I’ve always felt. You’re my lightning-struck heart. It doesn’t matter about the cornerstone. It doesn’t matter about who I am or who you are. Not to me. I think it would have always been this way for me. Even if we had never escaped the slums. Ever since the beginning. Ever since I’ve known you, you’ve struck my heart, and now I have to let you go because you’re not mine to keep. I need someone that I can be strong for. But I need someone who can also be strong for me.”

“Sam,” he croaked out, his eyes bright and wet.

And I’d said enough. I’d had enough. Much like Randall’s lightning had arced along my heart, Ryan did the same. The only way forward was to expel him from me because he wasn’t mine to keep.

And because I would never get another chance, I brought his hand to mine, brushing a kiss against his knuckles. I said, “I think I love you.”

I let him go.

I pushed myself up.

I looked up at the stars, but I did not make a wish.

And then I left him there in my mother’s secret garden.

The Lightning-Struck Heart

“W
ELL
,” G
ARY
said, as he posed in front of the floor-length mirror in my room. “Today should be a fuckton of shits and giggles.”

“That was sarcasm,” Dad explained to Tiggy. Tiggy still hadn’t quite got the hang of sarcasm yet, even though Gary had made it his singular mission.

“Got it,” Tiggy said, frowning in concentration. “Fuck shit giggles sarcasm.”

“Tell me I look pretty,” Gary demanded of Kevin, who was sticking his large head through the window. We were lucky my room was at the back of the castle so that Kevin could actively participate in discussions of a serious nature, like telling Gary he looked pretty.

“You are like the sun and the moon combined to make a creature so astoundingly beautiful that the world can’t even contain its—”

“Oh my gods,” I groaned as I lay on my bed. “Gary, make him stop.”

“Never,” Gary said. “This is probably as close as I will ever get to looking like a princess so I expect to be treated as such.”

I looked over at him and tried not to laugh because he would find ways to eviscerate me. Gary had gotten it into his head that his mane and tail needed to be permed for the wedding, and he looked like two gigantic cotton balls were consuming him from either end. They were adorned with dozens of fresh flowers and his hooves had been painted blue and silver to match the flowers. I wanted to tell him I thought he looked like he should be working for Mama, but I valued my testicles so I kept my mouth shut.

“Exactly like a princess.”

Gary narrowed his eyes. “I can tell when you’re being sarcastic, Sam Haversford. I’ll have you know that big hair is in this spring. Everyone has it.”

“Gary, no one else in this room has it.”

“I would have big hair,” Mom said. “But I don’t have the lady-balls to pull it off.”

“I have lady-balls,” Gary said. “I’m a fierce fucking princess.”

“You look like you pooping snowmen,” Tiggy said.

I laughed until I cried. Which, on a day like today, I sorely needed.

Gary glared at me.

I laughed harder.

It felt good.

So when the knock came at the door, I was as ready as I could ever be.

My mother fussed with my dress robes, brushing off invisible things so she could calm me (and most likely herself).

She leaned in and kissed me on the cheek. She whispered, “We get through today and then we’ll move on to the next. I am so proud of you, my son.”

I hugged her close.

Pete waited for us on the other side of the door. He smiled quietly at me, his armor shining, the decorative sword and scabbard fastened at his side. “Morgan and Randall are waiting for you in the lobby. The ceremony will begin shortly.”

I nodded and let the others out before I followed. I looked back at Kevin. “They’ve opened the Great Doors to the gardens,” I told him. “There should be more than enough room for you there.”

“Should I light something on fire?” he asked. “Like Justin? Or the wedding party?”

“No fires,” I said. “This wedding is going to go smoothly and then we’ll get drunk and I’ll be sad and then tomorrow, I’ll wake up and start again.”

“I am also proud of you, my son,” he said seriously. “In addition, your ass looks great today.”

And that was something I would never get used to. “Ew, and you’re still not my dad,” I called out, closing the door behind me.

I could hear the thrum of people seated in the throne room. The King’s Court, the heads of state, dignitaries from across Verania. At last count, there was to be over a thousand people attending the wedding of Grand Prince Justin of Verania to Knight Commander Ryan Foxheart. They’d all been seated earlier, waiting for the procession. The King would speak, Randall would speak, and we’d all sit in stifling heat wishing for death. I could hardly wait.

I descended the staircase to the lobby and saw my family waiting for me. Morgan looked stately, his robes a deep burgundy, his beard newly trimmed. Randall looked like an ancient pimp, his robes a bright green that I was sure Justin was going to take great offense to. He wore a large hat with a wide brim. A purple feather stuck out the top of it. I thought it was awesome.

“About time,” Randall grumbled. “You’d think it was
his
wedding day by the way he was dallying.”

“Hello, Randall,” I said. “Make sure your women give you your money so you don’t have to pimp slap them.”

Gary snorted. It came out violet and chartreuse, and I thought it paired with the flowers in his mane very well. Only a gay unicorn could match his uniquely visible sarcasm to his floral accessories.

Randall narrowed his eyes. “And what foolishness do you speak of now?”

“Nothing,” I said. “Tell me, Randall. What street corners are yours, because I don’t want to overstep my bounds.”

“I’m onto you, boy,” he said. “You think you’re being clever, but I’m onto you.”

“Ah,” I said sympathetically. “It’s hard out there for a—”

“And this is probably indicative of how today is going to go,” Randall said with a sigh.

“Is it?” Mom asked. “This certainly bodes well for today’s events.”

“I don’t think that’s quite what he meant,” Dad said to her.

“I’m maintaining a positive outlook,” she said. “Denial is such a comforting place to be.”

“Well,” I said to Morgan, “I
tried
to get drunk first, but
some
people wouldn’t let me.” I glared at my parents. And Tiggy. And Gary. “You know I’m much more tolerable when I’m intoxicated.”

“Wizard Spaghetti Face,” Tiggy reminded me.

“Okay, that was
one
time. And Betty and I
bonded
.”

“You called her a sexy grandma,” Gary said.

“In my defense, I’d had a lot of wine.”

“And you think that makes you tolerable?” Randall asked me. “Canoodling with elderly ladies?”