Burnt Devotion (Imdalind, #5)(33)

I didn’t stop the emotion.

I didn’t think I could if I tried.

I let it come.

I let myself feel it.

Never before had I let it out. I felt the pain of Rosaline’s murder. I felt the agony of Talon’s death, the betrayal of Thom leaving me behind, the heart stuttering loss of my brother who had been the only support I had known for my hundred years. I felt the stabbing loss that Joclyn had given me, that one look saying more than she could ever know. Not because it showed me what I was, what I had become, but because it showed me what I had given up.

I felt the pain for the first time as something snapped inside of me. A weight that I had carried around for centuries slipped away into the piles of dust that surrounded me. I let it fall away, and I let myself become stronger than it.

What Edmund had done was unforgivable. What I had lost was insurmountable. However, by holding it inside and letting it fester, I had forgotten the person Thom had taught me to be. I had forgotten my child.

I had become something else.

I was more than pain. I was more than bloodshed. I was more than joy. I was more than the confusing bits that made up who I was. Those were part of me, yes, and some day, I would explain all those parts to Jos.

I let the agonizing wail fade to nothing as I stood, my eyes scanning through the orange bathed room in search of the one thing I would take from this place. It was the only thing I wanted.

I moved through the ghostly forms of furniture, through the rooms of the small apartment as I ripped off sheets, as I opened boxes and drawers and wooden chests in a mad rush to find it. The need only grew with each step, the dust filling the air so heavily I could barely breathe.

I didn’t care.

I needed to find it.

“Wynifred?” Thom’s voice drifted from behind me in a wall of worry that froze me in place, my hands hovering over the lid of a heavy, wooden chest I didn’t remember.

I tried not to let his tone dig into me, tried not to let the deep concern that lined his face bring about the confusion I had been fighting.

It did, anyway.

It did because it was the same calm face he had always had with the same calm eyes I had fallen in love with all those years ago. The look pulled at my heart, the broken shard completely raw and jagged after losing Talon, the shards trying so hard to place themselves back together. The emotion only grew the more that I was around him.

I pressed my lips together in an attempt to keep the emotion inside and went back to digging through the belongings I had hidden in the back of the room.

“What are you looking for?” Thom tried again, the soft sound of his footsteps echoing around me as he moved closer.

“Her blanket,” I said, knowing I didn’t have to elaborate.

Thom said nothing. I only heard the sharp intake of his breath before he walked beside me, walking right up to an old trunk that had been hidden in the back, the top lifting before he had even reached it.

“I had the other one on my bed in the cave in Italy,” Thom said as he lifted the old blanket from the trunk, the heavy woven fibers as bright as the day the travelers had given them to her. The nomads had doted over her hair and the way her internal flame glowed. “To always keep her close. Keep you close.”


His voice was soft as it rolled into me. I collapsed into him, and his arms enfolded around me as he covered us with the old blanket, wrapping the edges around us and trapping us together.

“I know it’s hard,” Thom whispered, “but I will help you through this.”


“I thought I had it all figured out. I knew who I was when I ran from Edmund, but now there are friends who don’t know who I am, and my heart feels torn in two.”


“Can I fix it?” His hand moved up my back as he held me against him. The question was a deep rumble of sincerity that I had always known from him. The question, the motion, was almost like stepping back in time.

The thought, while true, was slightly ridiculous.

“What?” I couldn’t keep the awkward chuckle out of my voice no matter how hard I tried.

“This ripped heart that you speak of.”

“I don’t think that’s possible, Thom. You are part of the problem…” I felt his chest harden, the muscles tensing underneath me at my admission. I tried to move away, but he held me tightly against him, his magic flaring against my skin in warning to not move.

I could tell he wasn’t mad, perhaps only hurt.

I still owed him honesty, something, given the subject matter, that made me uncomfortable.

“I’m still in love with you.” A sharp intake of breath made me almost lose track of what I needed to say to him. Almost. He needed to hear me out. “But I am also still in love with Talon. My heart hasn’t quite gotten the memo about having lived two different lives.”

“Your heart is smarter than your head, then.” It was a whisper in my ear, the warm air of his breath rushing over my neck. “They weren’t two different lives. It was just one life. Love as many people as you want.”

The words were truth. They were honest. They were a stab in the gut and an echo of a memory of two teenage girls laughing on the floor of a punk rock bedroom. Styx had been playing in the background, and my own voice had broken over the music with advice that at the time seemed insignificant. But now?

“It’s okay to love. I think it makes you a better person. At least then you know what it feels like to love instead of living without ever knowing. I love a lot of people I know will never love me back, but I am happier because of it.”