Chapter 50 Black

Chapter 50 Black


LILY'S POV

It was by midnight when Atlas finally came inside.

I was lying on this makeshift bed that Boar had scrambled together from old blankets and who knows what else. It was lumpy and it had a smell, a distinctive one that I was trying very hard not to think about. But I had no right to complain. None at all. So I just laid there and blocked my thoughts every time they wandered to imagine where that smell might have come from.

Boar was on the wooden floor near the fire, stretched out like he didn't have a care in the world. Raven sat on that rickety chair by the wall, watching the door like he expected something to come through it any second. We were all arranged in front of the burning chimney, the fire crackling and popping, and Boar kept managing it, poking at it and adding wood. Raven kept throwing these little pieces of foam into the flames, I don't even know where he found them, and every time he did, Boar would glare at him. When Boar's eyes caught mine, I would just shake my head ,and he would keep his mouth shut going back to tending the fire.

Anya was still on the bed across the room, wrapped in that thin blanket, facing the wall. Her stomach kept grumbling, loud enough that I could hear it from where I was, but none of us said anything. It wasn't like there was any meat left anyway. Boar had eaten the last of it hours ago.

I was almost asleep. My eyes kept closing, my mind kept drifting, and I was right on the edge of that place where I wasn't really awake anymore but not quite dreaming either. I had been waiting for so long. My body was tired and my eyes were heavy and I just wanted him to come back so I could stop wondering if he was okay.

Then the door opened.

A gust of heavy wind came rushing in, making the fire flicker and dance, and Atlas walked in like he owned the place. His black hair was all tousled around his face, windblown and messy, and there was something different about him. Something in the way he held himself.

He walked in with his hand still on the knob, and behind him, someone else stepped inside too. A stranger. He had a hood covering his face, over his features, hiding him in shadow.

My head sank a little. Who was that? Was that one of the men he was supposed to kill? Or someone else entirely?

The door was still open, cold air pouring in, when Atlas glanced around the cabin. I knew he was searching for me even before his eyes found mine. So I raised my head up from that smelly mattress and let him see me.

When he found me, he held my gaze.

He just stood there, looking at me, searching for something in my face. I didn't know what he was looking for. But whatever it was, it made something burn hot inside my chest. Like a fire catching, spreading, warming me from the inside out.

"Can someone please shut the door?" Boar grumbled from the floor, already turning back to stroke the fire that the wind was trying to quench.

A smirk played at Atlas' lips. Slow and deliberate. He opened the door wider, just for a second, just to be difficult, and then he let it swing shut behind him and the stranger.

Then he started walking toward me.

My stomach clenched with every step he took. One step, two, three. The sound of his boots on the wood floor. The way the firelight caught his face. The way his eyes never left mine.

He stopped when he was right there, standing over me, close enough that I could feel the cold still clinging to his clothes.

I sat up slowly, pushing myself upright, and I looked at him. Then I looked over his shoulder at the stranger I had never seen before, standing there by the door with Raven already moving toward him. Then I looked back at Atlas, at that intent gaze of his that made me feel like I was the only person in the world.

It was like back to the first time I sat with him in that dining room. That same pull, that same draw. Like a black hole I wasn't afraid of falling into because it felt like the night itself, covering me, shielding me from the harsh light that was the reality of my life.

The silence stretched on between us. Too long. I could feel Boar's eyes on us, and Raven's too, and probably the stranger's. We were definitely attracting attention.

"You're late." The words came out of my dry throat, raspy and quiet.

His smirk widened just a fraction. "Miss me?

"Miss you?" I stared at him like he had grown two heads. "I was worried about your safety! You can't be that dumb to see it was already getting too late and you were out there doing who knows what."

He crouched down in front of me, right there on the floor, and raised a finger up toward my face. I flinched before I could stop myself, a quick jerk backward, and I saw something flicker in his eyes. He let his hand hang there for a second, like he was waiting to see if I would relax, and then he moved it slowly to my hair. He tucked a piece behind my ear, real gentle like.

"I can take care of myself, Princess." His voice was low, meant just for me. "But I won't mind you being worried. Every time."

How foolish and dense could he be? Did he not hear what I just said? Did he not understand anything?

I caught blood on his clothes. "Are you bleeding?"

My fingers were already working to move his shirt to the side to inspect the injury when he caught them in his grip, squeezing lightly. "I don't want you touching the blood of the dead."

My eyes widened a bit as it dawned on me that he really killed them. I don't why I felt relief over someone, no cross that, people dying.

"You are annoying." I said it flat, but my face was hot.

He scoffed, that rubbish smirk still playing on his lips like he knew something I didn't.

"Ahhh! Just stop!" Raven's outburst made me jump. He was standing by the door with his hands thrown up in the air. "Get yourselves a room, please. I can't watch this anymore."

Atlas turned his head and gave him this sharp look, the kind that would make most people shrivel up. Raven just stared back, unbothered.

Boar was laughing loudly from his spot on the floor, slapping his knee like it was the funniest thing he'd ever seen. "Please continue, don't mind him. I can't believe I'm sitting here watching a romantic play happening right in front of me. This is better than the fairs."

I stammered, my words coming out all jumbled. "There... we... it's not romantic." I waved my hands around helplessly in the air, like that would somehow explain everything. "He saved my life. I was just worried about him. That's all. That's normal."

To get the attention away from us, away from my burning face and his stupid smirk, I pointed at the quiet stranger still standing by the door. "Who is that?"

Atlas didn't even look. His gaze stayed on me, steady and intense, as he answered.

"That's Black."

I inhaled so sharp I almost choked. "Black?" My voice came out higher than normal. "Black as in... Black?"

The same person I had met in the garden that night, the one who held me while I cried, the one who listened without judging, the one who made me feel safe when everything else was falling apart.

Mr. Night Garden Stranger.

I couldn't move. I couldn't breathe. I just sat there on that mattress, staring at him like he was a ghost.
I felt his eyes on mine and something passed between us, something I couldn't name.

"You." The word came out barely a whisper. "It was you this whole time?”