To Hell and Back (9 page)

“You had to? What does that even mean?” I pressed. Moments later, I shook my head and wondered why we were even going through the motions of he said-she said. It didn’t matter anymore. Nothing with Tallis mattered anymore.

“Ah had tae leave because Ah couldnae stay. Ah had tae leave because o’ ye.”

“So it was
my
fault that you abandoned Bill and me?” I tried to make sense of the statement, but found none because there was no part of it that was truthful. How could I have been the reason that Tallis left Bill and me? I laughed for dramatic effect, as I turned my back to him, tacitly conveying that I was giving up on him as well as the conversation. I just didn’t have the strength or energy to deal with him any longer.

“Nae,” he started.

“There’s no point to any of this, Tallis,” I interrupted him in a soft, beaten voice. “It is what it is.”

“Nae, it wasnae yer fault,” he said, blatantly ignoring my attempt to discontinue the conversation. He tightened his grip on my arm so I couldn’t go anywhere. “Boot ’twas because o’ ye that Ah had tae leave.”

“So you’ve said, Tallis,” I nearly whispered while trying to pull my arm away from him. He wouldn’t release me, which suddenly infuriated me. The whole situation began to infuriate me. “You win! I don’t care anymore and you’ll be happy to know that I’m going to leave you alone from here on out! I’m physically and emotionally too exhausted to deal with more of this!”

“Ah couldnae stand tae be near ye,” he continued, as though he wasn’t even listening to me.

“Great,” I said with mock cheer, even though his words had a much more profound effect on me than I let on. Inside, I was shriveling. His words hurt me unimaginably—making me feel like I was buckling, caving in on myself. I clenched my eyes shut tightly to hold my tears back. It became suddenly extremely important that he not see me crying again. “I’m glad to know you think so highly of me,” I managed finally, striving to retain my cool in front of him.

He doesn’t deserve your tears
, I told myself.

“Ye doonae,” he started, but I refused to listen. The pain cut too deeply.

“Just let me go, Tallis,” I interrupted him, pulling with all my strength to make him release me from his iron grasp.

“Nae,” he snapped as he gripped my other arm, holding me in place.

“I’ve heard enough!” I screamed at him. “I get it!” Although I still struggled against him, he continued to hold me until I realized I was just exhausting myself. “Please,” I said, finally, my voice barely a whisper. “You’re hurting me.”

Those three words were the most honest I’d ever said to him.

“Along a gully that runs out of it”
– Dante’s
Inferno

SIX

Tallis didn’t say anything for the span of three seconds. Instead, we just stared at each other as if we’d both been turned to stone and could do nothing else. Well, Tallis might have been stone cold and emotionless, but I wasn’t. No, on the contrary, my emotions were engaged on a battleground inside of me, anger and hurt both vying for the starring role. My heart was punctured and bleeding over the injustice of the whole damned situation. I’d stood by Tallis’s side and nursed him back to health, and for what? To discover his total lack of gratitude and then I’d had to listen to him admit that he wanted nothing to do with me? A tornado of disappointment, embarrassment, pain and resentment brewed inside me, threatening everything in its path. I felt like I was seconds away from crumbling, breaking apart, and it was all I could do to keep my tears at bay.

And I didn’t know if I were more upset with Tallis or myself. As far as Tallis was concerned, it wasn’t as though his spots had changed, so why would I have expected him to be anything other than what he’d already demonstrated he was? Why did I suddenly assume he would care about anything or anyone other than himself? I’d always known him as the quintessential loner, one who relied on no one and preferred that no one rely on him. So what could have prompted me to believe that he was really something and someone so different? Deep down, I already knew the answer to the question. I’d believed Tallis was capable of human emotions because I fervently wished he could care for me in the same way I cared for him.

I was a complete and total idiot.

Just because I had feelings for Tallis didn’t mean he had feelings for me or was even capable of them. As soon as that thought entered my head, I felt sick to my stomach. I instantly sought solitude, to be by myself, and hide my own humiliation and disappointment in privacy, as far away from indifferent eyes as it was possible to be. “I … I have to go,” I announced, my throat feeling raw. Tears burned my eyes, threatening to roll down my face, but I furiously blinked them away.

“Ye willnae go oontil ye listen tae meh,” Tallis answered. I glimpsed determination in his narrowed eyes and the way he gritted his teeth. I didn’t understand why, but he appeared unusually driven and purposeful, almost to the point of being angry. I clenched my eyes shut tightly as soon as I felt the sting of my tears.

Don’t cry, Lily!
I scolded myself.
Don’t you dare break down in front of him! Keep yourself together! Whatever it is he has to say, you’re going to make it through! Just keep your chin up!

I managed to force my tears back and sighed in relief. Opening my eyes, I faced Tallis with an expression of impatience clearly conveyed by my frown and furrowed brow. I figured the sooner I listened to whatever he insisted on telling me, the sooner I could be on my way again to being alone.

“Make it quick,” I snapped, pleased to appear so cool, calm and collected from the outside, even if on the inside it was a completely different story …

“Ah couldnae stand tae be near ye because Ah,” he started, but the words died on his tongue. All the determination he’d exhibited earlier fled just as quickly as his words deserted him. I silently begged him to continue because I didn’t know how much longer I could maintain my façade of strength. He focused on his hands, and seconds later, picked up the trail again. “Ah hated mahself fer actin’ the way Ah did an’ sayin’ the things Ah said tae ye,” he finally managed, exhaling deeply. Then he faced me with an expression of anticipation, as though he expected me to understand whatever he’d just alleged.

While I didn’t fully comprehend his meaning, I was beyond surprised to hear him say he hated himself for anything having to do with me. “Acting the way you did and saying the things you said to me?” I repeated, trying to be more patient with him because there was obviously more he wanted to tell me. I could see it burning in his eyes. “I don’t understand, Tallis,” I managed, matter-of-factly. “Please try to be more specific.”

“This isnae easy fer meh, lass,” he confessed as if I weren’t already very aware that Tallis and language didn’t exactly get along. He ran one of his hands through his short hair and sighed, shaking his head with visible frustration.

“Just take your time,” I offered, trying to be supportive because it was fairly obvious that whatever he had to say wasn’t coming easily. I glanced up at his face and witnessed his knotted brows and tightly drawn lips, which were pressed into a straight white line. Clearly, he’d been trying to formulate his thoughts into words for a while. But unlike me, Tallis had a hard time expressing his feelings. He wasn’t good with emotions; they choked him.

“At the tavern, lass,” he continued. I lifted my eyebrows, urging him to continue being more specific. “In yer bedchamber,” he persisted, clearing his throat when I frowned at him. But his idea of “specific” and mine didn’t even share the same zip code. He took another few seconds to spit the rest of his sentence out. “Ah told ye Ah wanted ye an’ …” he started, his voice dying away again as a red blush flooded his cheeks. I almost wanted to smile, being so unaccustomed to seeing Tallis struggling so hard and looking so uncomfortable. Usually, as the knowledgeable and determined bladesmith, nothing could ever get in his way.

“And?” I prompted him once I worried that the cat really had gotten his tongue.

He sighed again and looked away from me for a few seconds, seeming to gather his words. When he finally faced me again, he wore a look of resolve. “Ah took liberties wif ye that Ah shouldnae have taken.” He spat the words out as if they clung to his tongue like drowning victims and wouldn’t have come out otherwise.

I swallowed hard, remembering the incident he was referencing. I could still see the tavern in the Dark Wood as if it were only yesterday that we were there.

I’d just finished bathing when I heard a knock on my door. When I opened it, Tallis showed himself in. He’d been drinking and I could smell the whiskey on his breath. Seeing me clad in nothing but my towel, he’d waited maybe two seconds before yanking the towel right off me, without so much as a raised brow to ask if he could. But that was just the beginning of our liaison. Seconds later, he’d slipped his fingers between my thighs. But it wasn’t as though I hadn’t welcomed his touch. The pleasure I’d received at his masterful fingers was, in a word, overwhelming.

The only reason we hadn’t had sex was because Tallis had been too inebriated and I hadn’t wanted our first time together to happen like that. I’d imagined having sex with Tallis so many times and, in the course of each waking dream, excessive alcohol and a dirty, noisy tavern never once entered my vision.

Even though I’d eventually turned Tallis down that evening in the tavern, the incident, nevertheless, had burned itself into my memory. And I couldn’t say I hadn’t revisited the memory on numerous occasions. “Whatever happened, happened, Tallis,” I started, wanting to let him know that I was okay with the unpermitted liberties he’d taken with me, and I forgave him. But he shook his head adamantly, indicating he wasn’t finished with the conversation.

“Ah have nae business havin’ any sort o’ feelins fer ye,” he admitted staunchly.

“Feelings?” I repeated, stunned. “For me?” I couldn’t help the surprise that suddenly overcame me. As a rule, Tallis just wasn’t an emotional man, so to hear him admit he had feelings for anything threw me. But to say he had feelings for me? It almost seemed like I was in the midst of a very realistic dream. True, I didn’t know if his feelings were simply sexual in nature, or more, but I also couldn’t say I really cared. It was enough for me that Tallis thought about me at all, in any capacity. Baby steps, right?

“You can’t help developing feelings for people, Tallis. It’s natural to get close to someone, especially when we have to rely on each other. It’s sort of par for the course, right?” I started, feeling like I was explaining the way life worked to a five-year-old.

But he shook his head again, clearly not buying what I was selling. Then he inhaled deeply, exhaling long and slow several moments later as he faced me with a pensive expression. “Lily …” he started, but silenced himself again.

It was the first time in a long time that he’d said my name and my eyes widened in surprise. I didn’t know why, but I loved the way he said it, how the word dripped off his tongue with familiarity. The way he said my name made it sound like it was comfortable to him, as if it were a name he’d said all his life.

“Yes, Tallis?” I asked, my voice whisper soft.

He swallowed hard, piercing me with his eyes as he focused them on mine. His were unblinking. “Ye are the light.”

All I could feel was shock. At first. Then after a few seconds, the shock gave way to the most intense happiness that I remembered feeling in a very long time. I was the light? I didn’t fully understand what the comment even meant, but the way he said it, and the words he chose were enough to send waves of bliss splashing through me. Reeling inside, amazed and confounded by what Tallis had just admitted, I was speechless. I thought I should probably have said something … anything … but words failed me. And, apparently, I wasn’t the only one, because we both just stood there, staring at one another as if in a shared stupor.

“Tallis,” I said at last, finally finding my tongue. Taking a step toward him, I reached for his hand, but he stepped back from me and pulled both of his hands away, as if the idea of touching me were one that didn’t appeal to him in the least. I frowned in confusion.

“There is naethin’ boot darkness in meh,” he explained immediately, his heavy gaze moving from the hand I’d tried to touch him with to my face. His tone of voice was deep, but pained. “Ah am an aberration, ah sickness, ah plague.”

“No,” I argued immediately, shaking my head fervently and barely aware of the tears unabashedly streaming down my face. He cleared his throat as if it were hard for him to admit any of this and then he looked away again, almost as if he couldn’t bear to look me in the eyes. “No, Tallis, you are none of those things,” I started again, but my throat constricted, cutting off my voice, as a tide of sadness washed over me.

How could he think of himself in such a horrible way? How could he call himself darkness and disease?
I thought.
Why doesn’t he see the man that I see—a hero, my hero?

“Nae, lass, Ah am whit Ah’ve described,” he said as he smiled sadly, as if to say my words, while they were meant to be consoling, couldn’t breach his impenetrable walls. He reached forward and caught my tears on the pad of his thumb, wiping them away.

“Please don’t say that about yourself,” I managed between the tears that now streamed down my face. “I don’t believe any of it for a second,” I continued, shaking my head and wiping my eyes with the backs of my hands. “You have no idea what you are to me, or how much I care about you.”

“Ye cannae say these things tae meh, lass,” he announced, his expression suddenly hardening.

“Why?” I demanded, searching his face for an explanation.

“Och aye,” he continued, shaking his head as his eyes aimed for the ceiling only to return to mine moments later. His expression was unreadable. “’Cause ye are the sun,” he whispered. “An’ Ah am nuffin’.”

“Tallis, you are everything,” I started, smiling up at him despite the tears that continued to flow from my eyes. A strange mix of powerful happiness and extreme frustration seized me. “And I’m not the sun,” I protested as I shook my head, hating the fact that he’d put me on some sort of pedestal. “I’m human and very flawed just like every other person is.”

He brought his hands to my face and cupped my cheeks as he stared down at me and shook his head as if I were just a silly girl who didn’t get it. When he spoke, his voice was commanding, strong and unrelenting. “Ye are purity, beauty an’ innocence,” he continued.

“I feel the same way about you!” I insisted.

“Nae,” he said and shook his head. “Ah am oogliness,” he began as his lips grew tighter. “Ah am the oogliness o’ the darkness.”

“No,” I interrupted, fresh tears of frustration burning me anew. I hated hearing how he saw himself when he was none of those things at all! I just couldn’t figure out how to tell him what an amazing person he was, how I could show him the way in which I saw him. For the first time in my life, words actually failed me. “You are beautiful, Tallis,” I finally managed, thinking the words paled in comparison to my feelings for him. “I wish you could see yourself the way I see you.”