Finale (Caraval #3)(107)

“Don’t stop.” Jacks jerked her hand so she was flush against him once more. She willed her feet to run with him. To go wherever Jacks went. He was the boy she wanted to follow to the ends of the earth. But her body was betraying her to Legend, again. Her legs wouldn’t move, and her toes had dug into her slippers, as if begging for purchase against the ground.

Jacks yanked harder on her hand, his icy grip tightening around her fingers. But Tella couldn’t even look away as Legend approached.

He looked like the ending of a doomed love story. His dark clothes were ripped, there were fresh burns on his chest, and eyes that had once been full of stars were desolate, black with desperate gray cracks, and painful red lines snaking through the whites.

Her throat went tight. It shouldn’t have hurt her. She hated him—she hated him for all those months he’d played with her heart. Even now he still held a piece of it. He’d always hold a piece of it, said a tiny voice inside of her. But Tella ignored the voice. She wanted to take her heart back and give it fully to Jacks.

“Why can’t you leave us alone?” she cried. “Haven’t you tormented me enough?”

Legend’s eyes met hers, wide and pleading.

But Tella was done giving in to him.

“Undo whatever you’ve done to her!” Legend roared at Jacks.

“He hasn’t done anything,” Tella said. “You’re the one who keeps hurting me!”

“I think that’s her way of asking you to leave.” Jacks smirked and gave Tella’s hand a gentle squeeze. He no longer held her as tight—he knew that she belonged to him.

“Tella, listen to me,” Legend begged. “You can fight what he’s done to you.”

“The only one I want to fight is you!” She pulled free from Jacks, prepared to finally shove Legend away forever. But as soon as she let go of him, Jacks vanished and the world shifted. Magic filled the air, thick and sweet. The glass courtyard beneath Tella’s feet turned into smooth moonstone steps as the golden tower behind Legend disappeared and a new illusion took its place. A temple made of glowing white, topped in a domed roof covered in outstretched wings—the Temple of the Stars. Above it, radiant red fireworks mingled with more stars than Tella had ever seen, re-creating the moment that Legend had walked away from her, right after saving her.

Tella’s heart stopped beating altogether. She could still picture the flat way Legend had looked at her that night, and the coldness in his voice as he’d told her that he wasn’t the hero in her story. But now his eyes were brilliant as stars once again, full of bits of gold that glittered in the night. He was gazing at her the way he had in the painting on his wall, as if he never wanted to leave her, as if he adored her, as if he wanted to be her hero after all.

“Undo this illusion!” Tella said, unable to stand the sight of it—or him. He wasn’t a hero. And she’d never wanted a hero. She was the hero of her own story, and it was time to save herself from him. “Bring back the courtyard and Jacks.”

Legend’s brows slashed down, the feeling in his eyes intensifying. Once upon a time, the brilliant look in them could have convinced her that he had the ability to give her the world. But now Jacks was her world, and there wasn’t room for Legend. If she was being honest, there had never been enough room for him; he was too all-consuming.

“I know you think you want him, but he’s controlling your feelings,” Legend said, his voice growing lower and deeper with every word. “You have to fight against it.”

“You’re just jealous! You don’t want me, but you don’t want anyone else to have me.” She tried to shove against his chest, to push him away at last. “Please, stop torturing me. Just let me go.”

The edge of Legend’s mouth slowly lifted. “You’re the one holding on to me, Tella.”

“No—I—” She looked down to see her fingers gripping his frayed shirt.

Two warm hands wrapped gently around her shoulders as Legend held her in place.

Her heart beat faster. She really needed to pull away. But she couldn’t move. Her body was remembering a time when he wouldn’t get this close to her, when he wouldn’t put his hands on her. All she’d wanted was his touch, and now he was holding her as if he planned on keeping her for a very long time.

His smile grew. “I’m not jealous of Jacks. I know your feelings for him aren’t real. And you’re wrong if you think I don’t want you. I’ve wanted you for so long, and I’ll never stop wanting you.” His grip grew firmer as he pulled her even closer, until she was pressed against his chest.

Her breaths came out short, in tiny, angry gasps. But no matter how hard she tried to push him away, she still couldn’t manage to do it. When she thought of Jacks, her heartbeat calmed, but then it craved the way that Legend made it pound. Because he didn’t just own part of her heart—it belonged to him fully.

No! Tella tried to shake the thought out of her head, she tried to remember Jacks and the way he made her feel, but all she could feel right now was Legend as one of his wonderfully warm hands traced down her spine. “Do you still want to know why I walked away that night on these steps?”

No, she said, but somehow the word “Yes” came out instead.

His palms heated, and the hand on her shoulder slid to her neck and into her hair, tilting her face up, forcing her to look into his eyes. They were still glassy and dark with flecks of gold that looked like shattered stars, and she told herself she hated them.