Chapter Text
Violet is awake and her eyes are filled with fire when I return to our room after visiting Jack-fucking-Barlowe. Fuck. I meant to quietly pack my things and leave before she woke, but it's too late now, and she's obviously guessed my intentions because every word is full of soft fury as she stalks over to me. "I'm going to ask for the same thing I've been asking for years: I need you to listen to me. I need you to trust me and trust our friends so we can figure this out. It's hard to be vulnerable, and you might lose people you care about if you trust them and they reject you. But you sure as hell will lose *everyone* if you insist on shutting us out of your life."
She grabs the sides of my flight jacke, pulls me into the room, and slams the door. There is nothing I can say to make this better so I anchor my shields as strongly as I ever have and wrap my arms around her, pulling her against my chest.
I can't tell her how terrified I am. She already knows I would do anything to save her and look what that cost - more than I ever thought I was capable of losing. It would have been better if I had died because at least then I wouldn't be capable of hurting Violet anymore. Fuck. Sgaeyl hasn't spoken to me since the battle but I know she agrees. Better to be dead than to be this. An abomination.
I've been quiet too long and Violet is still waiting for me to respond. As close as we are - were - I can't take it. I can't look at her. She deserves so much better than me. They all do.
My voice is rough and my throat hurts from screaming into the bubble of a sound ward last night. "You'll be okay. I promise. You're so much stronger and braver and better than I've ever been. You don't need me and I'm glad for that because no matter what happens, I need to you live." I close my eyes and lean forward to rest my chin on her beautiful braid, which practically glows in the dim pre-dawn light. "I need to you to promise to live without me."
I'm glad I can't see her face because the pain in her voice cuts me to the core. "No. I can't. I can't believe you're even trying to make me promise that, because I know you never would, and it isn't fair and it isn't even possible. We've never been able to help how we feel about each other and that's not about to change now. I may not die the second you do but you're my sun and my sky and my stars, and if you leave me I will die a slow death every day for the rest of my bleak and empty life. You are the part of my life that makes everything else worth living through."
I hope she can't feel the tears streaming down my cheeks and into her perfect hair.
When I don't respond, she pulls back half a step and examines my face. I'm beyond caring that she seems my vulnerability in my tears, and I am utterly unable to control my expressions and emotions. Every word she says shatters my heart more, because there is no future for us anymore.
I wish she would just hate me like Sgaeyl does. I know she will; it's just a matter of time before she realizes how irredeemably broken I am. I can't trust myself ever again. Knowing that she still loves and trusts me makes me so much more afraid, because she needs to stay away from me. I need her to let me go so I can't hurt her or anyone else. I frame her face with my hands and stroke my thumbs over her cheeks, but my voice is as steady and hard as I can make it. "You can't fix me, Violence."
She blinks up at me with her soft, gentle eyes. Her trust in me is so absolute it makes me angry; I breathe deeply to calm myself but my pulse is racing and I just want to run away before I do something truly awful like shove her or choke her or throw her to the ground to force her to see how dangerous I am. She needs to stay away from me and I don't care if she hates me if she's alive and safe. Increasingly awful thoughts race through my mind and I feel power rising through the earth, fuel drawn to the spark of my rage.
Violet reaches into her pocket for a small vial and I immediately snatch it out of her hand and drain it. The liquid could be an irreversible poison for all I care, but I feel an awful quiet in place of the power that surrounded me a second ago.
"Nolon gave me some of the magic-suppressant in case I need it to subdue a Venin in a fight. I didn't tell him about you." She retrieves a nearly-identical vial from another pocket. "I also have the antidote and recipes for both, which he provided in hopes of beginning to make amends for his prior actions." I can see Violet shudder as she speaks. Even if she forgives Nolon, I never will.
The uncontrollable rage is gone, replaced by a dull, aching, emptiness. "I'm so afraid that I'll hurt you, Vi. I think I was about to just now, just to make you let me leave." My voice breaks and I turn away, towards the door.
Violet catches my hand and pulls me back to her. Her voice is quiet and resolute as she says, "What matters is that you didn't. Now let's talk about it."
Violet's voice is soft as the sea and equally inexorable as she says, "Xaden. I felt it too. In that moment, right before the end, when I was dying and everyone knew it, I felt the power of the earth rising up to meet me. I knew I could save you and everyone else and all I had to do was take the power and do it. You don't know how close I was."
Tears streak out of her eyes and she leans against my chest and sobs, but she continues. "I would have done it too. If it wasn't for my mom, who I spent years resenting, trading her and Aimsir's lives for mine. Her, and Brennan, and Sloane, and Andarna, and Tairn - each of them holding me together, holding me back, and keeping me alive. I wouldn't be here without them. I needed them, and they were there for me, and I'll be there for them when they need me too, because that's what love means."
Her final words are a plea. "Please stop trying to do everything on your own. No one is strong enough to stand alone against the threat we face, and we need each other. We will always need each other."
For the first time since grasping the power of the earth, I don't feel alone. As disorienting and isolating as it is to be cut off from my power, I feel the smallest and most fragile whisper of hope. Violet steadies me and I know she means every word she says. I'll give anything for her, and if I have to take Nolon's elixir every day of my life to stay beside her I will do it without a second thought.
I cradle her against me and stroke my fingers across her back. "I love you more than words can express. You are my salvation."
She looks up at me and when I meet her eyes there is no judgment. "And I love you more than you want to accept." With the quietest whisper she adds, "I'm afraid that I would sacrifice my own soul if it meant I didn't have to lose you again, so please don't make me find out."