For a long minute, Elin just watched her brother. He was no longer fitful and restless, at least for the moment. He was still, quiet. Utterly beautiful rang in her head as she stroked his cheek with the back of her fingers. His face smooth, angular, precision-made, like he had been sculpted by hand. His skin the color of alabaster. She hadn’t had a moment to really look upon him until now, never in one place long enough, or if he was, he was in constant motion. She may never have an opportunity again to study him, to know him. And oh, how she wanted to know all the things that made up the man he was.

She closed her eyes, hoping to see a memory of his. Her gift was seeing happy memories of others. From Zeph, all she saw was darkness. And then…tiny dots appeared, flickering, like lamps just lit. She concentrated harder, trying to pull the image closer. Not dots. Stars.

“Zeph,” she whispered, lying down beside him, curling herself protectively around him. She began to gingerly stroke his hair.

“Elin, what are you doing?”

“Letting him know he’s not alone,” she said.

“You promised you wouldn’t touch him,” Lochlan said. Her eyes shot to his. “I know you mean well, but if he wakes, he may not…you don’t know how he will respond,” he said, treating his words ever so delicately, like they were made of eggshells. Or maybe he was treating her that way.

Her eyes drifted back to her brother, where her fingers continued the slow ministrations through his ivory hair. “Do you know,” she said, “how many times I wished to touch you before the curse was broken? How many nights I lay awake thinking about holding you, comforting you?” She closed her eyes, biting back the sting of tears…her nose tingling, and her throat burning. “I couldn’t comfort you, Lochlan, for so long. I can comfort my brother. He needs me. I can feel it in the marrow of my bones.”

“Yes, he does. And you will be here for him. But you must not do what you promised him you wouldn’t. If you want him to trust you.”

“I want to hold him.”

“I know,” Lochlan said tenderly.

“He will never let me hold him when he wakes. This is my only chance.”

Lochlan moved to the edge of the bed, the side where Elin lay. As she stroked her brother’s hair, he stroked hers. “Honor, Elin,” he said, quietly. “We must honor our promises. Even when it hurts us to do so.”

A beat...and then… “I can’t make myself move,” she said.

Lochlan bent down and scooped up his love. “You can hold me,” he whispered in her ear. He carried her to a chair in the far corner of the room and sat her on his lap, his arms wrapping securely around her. “You can hold me.”

Zeph opened his eyes. His sister’s presence was a palpable thing. He was thankful for it and that thankfulness drew him up tight, and for the briefest of moments, Zeph held his breath as he listened to hers.

Slowly, Zeph turned his head toward her. Her back was to him. She stared out the window while he stared at her. Her voice had been the one to cut through the fog of his visions the night before. Or was it still the same night? It was dark out, not a sliver of light, save for the moon and one flickering candle on the windowsill. She stared at the pearl in the sky, fixated on it, as though it was the one firm object in a chaotic, disordered world. Perhaps it was. All Zeph knew was that he was glad for her presence. He had hoped she would be there when he awoke. His heart ached, like a tiny fist had squeezed it. He didn’t deserve her, and yet here she was.

“Do you feel better?” she asked without looking back.

He turned his head and stared at the ceiling. “I don’t know how I feel.” But I feel better with you near. Why?

“I’m so sorry,” she murmured, her back still facing him.

“Why are you sorry?” he asked, his voice rough and a bit raw.

She shook her head, folding her arms across her chest as though she were hugging herself. “Where to start? I’m sorry for whatever happened to you—for what happened to you as a child. I’m just…so sorry, Zeph.” She turned to him then. She looked so young, so hopeless. “Tell me how to help you now. Tell me what I can do, and I will do it.”

He felt a sharp poke in his chest.

He sat up slowly, bringing his legs to the floor, and pressed the heels of his hands onto the bed. “You being here is enough.”

“Is it?” she asked, facing him.

“Yes. More than I deserve.”

“I am your sister.”

He nodded. “You are.”

“I will always be your sister.”

He nodded again.

“And you will always be my brother.”

“I am not the brother I once was.”

“No,” she said. “You’re not. Nor am I the sister I once was. But siblings we still are. Twins, even.”

“Good and evil,” Zeph said remotely.

“No,” she said. “I don’t think of it as that.”

“You should,” Zeph said. “It is what we are.” It was what he had become. Evil. Through the night, he had walked through his memories, the spell forcing him to go where he had not wanted to venture. He swallowed, nearly choking on his emotions.

He remembered all of it, even why he had cast the spell, what had prompted a child to do something so desperate. Why it hadn’t worked until now was the mystery. When it was too late.

Zeph stood and began careful steps to the door. He felt worn, frayed at the edges, and if truth be known, he felt the lingering effects of his memory. He paused at the door, laid his right palm against it and pinched his eyes closed.

“Where are you going?”

“To the bathing room,” he croaked. He felt dirty. The need to wash the filth from his skin was all too familiar.

“Can we please talk?”

“I need to be alone.” He opened his eyes and then he opened the door.

“Zeph—”

“Don’t,” he said. “Don’t ask me to tell you what happened.” He couldn’t bear it.

“I…all right,” she said. “Shall I wait for you here?”

“No. Go to bed, Elin. I’m fine.”

“Zeph—”

“I’m fine,” he said once more, and left to find the bathing room before he risked falling to pieces in front of her all over again.

Once he entered the hallway, he made it only a couple of steps before his knees went weak. He caught himself by bracing his hands on the wall. As a child, he had endured so much abuse for so long. And when he could no longer endure it, he had finally given in to the Unseelie. He had known when he pledged himself to them that he would lose himself, forget himself; even most of his powers would be forgotten. The Unseelie would mold him to their legion. He would become a monster like them. He had known this. So, at a moment when he was alone, before his pledge, he had cast a spell. If he could hold on to a sliver of himself…his innocence would call out to him through reality, shifting, and his memories would return and hopefully, hopefully, his soul would return as well. He had thought he would be strong enough. He had just wanted the torture to stop.

An internal scream lit within him like a fuse and he ignited into a flame of grief all over again as two images formed in his mind.

Two graves.

His parents.

Dead. By his hands.

He had not been strong enough.

“Put your arm around my shoulders,” a female voice said.

Zeph blinked, confused, feeling soft hands band around his waist. He should have felt repulsed by the touch. He didn’t. He knew the voice. There was nothing repulsive about the owner of it.

“Arwyn,” he croaked, letting her drape his arm around her slim shoulders. He leaned into her, feeling guilty about doing so. She was so small, and he was much larger than she. Surely, she couldn’t hold him up.

“Let’s get you to that bathing room.”

His feet seemed to move on their own accord even as his mind fought to stay put. “How did you know that was my destination?”

“I lived in your keep for quite some time. I know you. When you are upset, that is where you go.”

The corner of his mouth tipped up a fraction. Whenever she was upset, she liked to shoot her arrows. She likely did not know he knew that.

Once they made it to the bathing room, he expected her to depart, to leave him. She did not. She closed the door behind them, surprised to see the tub had already been filled, ready for him.

He blinked once, then twice. She cleared her throat and moved past him and repositioned the folding screen around the tub.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

Once the screen was where she thought it best, she smoothed her hands over her skirts. “Giving you a bit of privacy.”

He pointed toward their point of entry. “I would have plenty if you were on the other side of that opening. It’s called a door. Marvelous thing, a door.”

She jutted her chin forward. “I’m not leaving.”

One dark brow rose. “No?”

“No.”

“I am capable of taking a bath by myself.”

“I never said otherwise.”

“Then why are you staying?”

“We need to talk.”

“While I take a bath?”

“Yes.”

“This is entirely inappropriate.”

“I do not wish to make you uncomfortable. Hence the screen.”

“Hence the screen,” he repeated.

“Yes.”

Frustration bloomed. Not for the reason he should be frustrated: her being in the bathing room with him—alone. But for her insistence that they talk. He did not want to talk.

“No,” he said.

“No?”

“I do not wish to talk.”

“Well,” she said, “I do.”

“Arwyn—”

“Take your bath.” She turned her back to him. “Go on,” she said. “The water will get cold.”

He stood there, staring at her back, the moment pulling at him, irritating him, like a loose thread against his skin.

“Devil take me,” he mumbled, stepping behind the screen, removing his tabard with a hard pull over his head. Once completely divested of all his clothing, he sank into the water, submerging himself, luxuriating in the feel of it. His eyes instantly drifted closed, his head finding purchase against the side of the tub, and for a full five minutes, not a single word was spoken between them.

But he could feel her—feel the residual warmth of her from when she had held her body close to his. And he could still smell the scent of her hair, sweet and earthy, like wild berries. His nostrils flared. He ducked his head underneath the water, staying there until he needed to breathe. When he emerged, he brushed back his hair with his fingers and reached for the soap, wishing the scent of wild berries did not suddenly consume his thoughts. He supposed he should be thankful for the distraction, at least.

“I have a secret to tell you,” Arwyn said, cutting through the sound of sloshing water.

Zeph paused lathering soap over his left arm. “Pardon?”

“You won’t like it, I’m afraid.” Her voice sounded less sure than it had only moments ago.

“I’m listening,” he said, uncertain.

“Finish washing. I need to get my thoughts together.”

Slowly, Zeph returned to his task and finished lathering his arm. Then he lathered the other. He washed his torso, neck, face. Then he started on his legs. He washed his entire body before he responded to her. Setting the soap back where he’d found it, he leaned against the tub once again and closed his eyes.

“Tell me your secret, Arwyn.” He didn’t care what her secret was. He was just glad she chose him to tell it. And if her secret would give him a moment not to have to think on his own, then more reason for him to listen.

“Please don’t be mad,” she whispered.

Zeph’s eyes opened. He sat up, finding her shadow behind the screen, sitting on a chair, her spine curved, not straight and sure, as was her usual way of sitting.

“Why would I be mad?” he asked, feeling nervousness settle underneath his skin.

“Because I never told you.”

“Did I ever ask?”

“No.”

“Then why would I be mad, Arwyn?”

When she didn’t answer, he prompted again. “Arwyn?”

“I’m an empath.”

Zeph swallowed. “So you—”

“Internalize the feelings and pain of others.”

He let that sink in. Internalize the feelings and pain of others…the feelings and pain of others…the feelings and pain. His eyes followed her as she stood from her chair, a silhouette behind the screen.

“Your heart is racing,” she said so softly. If he hadn’t been Fae, he probably wouldn’t have heard her.

Zeph’s hand covered the thumping organ. “You know my heartbeats?”

Arwyn laid her palm flat on the screen. “Sometimes,” she said, “I don’t know if they are yours or mine.”

“What does that mean?” he asked. She was confusing him. And maybe scaring him a little. How much about him did she know?

She turned away from him. His eyes stayed fixed on her silhouette. “Zeph, I…”

“What do you know, Arwyn?” he hedged.

“I know you are not a monster.”

“Then you know nothing.”

“I know what they did to you.”

He started to stand, to go to her, to turn her around, make her look him in the eye, and then remembered he was naked. He wasn’t sure he could trust himself to stand anyway. “What do you know?”

“Zeph…” she said, her voice thick as porridge. “I’m so sorry.”

“What do you know, Arwyn?”

She was quiet for so long that Zeph thought she would never answer. Finally, she spoke. “Remember when I said that one day, you would tell me how you got those scars? And when you did, I would listen?”

“Yes,” Zeph said, his eyes fluttering with emotion.

“Tonight…” She paused, her voice cracking on the word. “I listened to every single word.”

Zeph’s head was spinning. “I told you nothing. I said nothing.”

“Somehow,” she said, “I could see it all through your eyes.”

“What?” Zeph felt ill. Violently ill. He wrapped his left arm around the lip of the tub, brought his left leg up and over, and tumbled onto the floor.

Arwyn startled. “Zeph!”

“Don’t...” Zeph croaked. “Don’t come near me.”

Zeph reached for the linens neatly folded and stacked beside his head and wrapped one around him haphazardly.

“Zeph, please...”

“No, stay where you are.” He pushed himself up, slipped on the water puddled on the floor, and caught himself with a funny twist of his arm. He suppressed a growl in his throat, but he could not suppress his fangs from descending. Panic blackened the edges of his vision. “Don’t come anywhere near me.”

She knew?

She knew?

Zeph wanted to scream. She had no right knowing his secrets—his shame.

“Stay away from me,” he said, feeling betrayed. Then he did what Zeph always did. He let the shadows take him away.

Arwyn bit down on her trembling lip while she stared at the puddle on the empty floor. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for knowing. I’m sorry for telling you.

She had made a hash of her confession.

She had to tell Zeph, though. He had to know. It was not something she could keep from him. And part of her had hoped he would have been relieved that someone knew—that he wouldn’t have to say the words— and that someone else in the world had known what he’d been through—that he wasn’t alone.

I’m sorry you had to suffer it.

She should have known how much he would hate her knowing.