Chapter 52 52
Annabeth's POV:
Three weeks since everything fell apart and I was a completely different person physically. Stronger, faster, able to summon and control fire that would've terrified me a month ago. Marcus had pushed me past every limit I thought I had, and my body had adapted, my dragon nature becoming something I could actually use instead of something that used me.
But, emotionally, I was still a wreck.
Training helped, gave me something to focus on besides the constant ache in my chest. Every morning at six AM I met Marcus in that clearing and burned away my rage until I was too exhausted to feel anything else, and almost every afternoon he would also pick me up after my classes to train again. By the end of each session I was empty, hollowed out, and that emptiness was better than the alternative of sitting with my feelings.
But the bond wouldn't let me forget. Wouldn't let me fully compartmentalize or move on or pretend Kaelen didn't exist. I felt his pain constantly, this low-level grief that bled through our incomplete connection and mixed with mine. Some days I could block it out, push it to the background and function almost normally. Other days it was overwhelming, his anguish so sharp I had to stop what I was doing and just breathe through it.
Like four days ago when he'd shown up at my door.
I'd heard his car pull up, had felt him through the bond before he even knocked. That desperate hope combined with terror, the way his heart was racing, his hands shaking. And when I opened the door and saw his face, God, for just a second I wanted to fall into him and let him hold me until everything stopped hurting.
But then I remembered. The lies, the secrets, the way he'd looked at me every day while hiding something so damn important about who I was. And I closed the door because I couldn't do this, couldn't listen to apologies or explanations when I was barely holding myself together.
I'd stood on the other side of that door crying while he stood on the other side doing the same, both of us suffering separately but together through the bond. Then I watched him walk away from my window, watched him get in his car and drive off, and hated myself a little for how badly I wanted to run after him.
Marcus had noticed I was distracted during training the next day.
"Something on your mind?" he asked after I'd fumbled the same defensive pattern three times in a row.
"No. Just tired."
"You're a terrible liar." He sat down and gestured for me to do the same. "What happened?"
"Kaelen came to my house yesterday. I didn't let him in."
Marcus was quiet for a moment. "Do you want to talk to him?"
"I don't know. Part of me does and part of me wants to stay angry forever because it's easier than dealing with how much I miss him." I picked at the grass between my feet. "How do you forgive someone for lying about something that big?"
"I don't know if you do. Some things break trust permanently." He looked at me. "But you're bonded to him, Annabeth. Even incomplete, that connection is there. You're gonna feel his emotions for the rest of your life unless you complete the bond and learn to control it, or cut him off entirely and let the incomplete bond slowly destroy both of you."
"That's a shit set of options."
"Yeah. It is."
We'd trained in silence after that, me pushing harder than necessary and burning circles in the ground until I was too exhausted to think about Kaelen or bonds or impossible choices.
The stories about my mother helped, gave me something else to focus on. Marcus had told me more over the past week: how Sammy would dance around their apartment to terrible pop music, how she made him watch every documentary she could find even when he complained, how she'd insisted on learning his native dragon ancient language and then used it to curse when she stubbed her toe.
Little details that painted a picture of someone vibrant and alive, someone I wished I'd gotten to know. Every story made me love her more and made the grief of never meeting her sharper.
"She wanted to name you Phoenix," Marcus had said during yesterday's training. "Thought it was poetic, the whole rising from ashes thing. But she decided on Annabeth because it meant 'grace' and 'favor,' and she said you were both those things."
I'd cried then, couldn't help it. Sitting on the scorched ground while Marcus told me about the mother who'd loved me enough to die for me, who'd chosen my name carefully and wanted me even knowing the risks.
My relationship with Marcus was complicated, probably always would be. I didn't forgive him for leaving, for all the years he'd been alive while I thought he was dead. But I was starting to understand why he'd made the choices he did, starting to see the impossible position he'd been in. Loving my mother, wanting me, but knowing the Order would kill us all if he stayed.
It didn't make it okay but it made it human, made him human instead of just the absent father I'd built up in my head.
Aunt Sarah found me in my room on Thursday night, a week before Thanksgiving, sitting on my bed and staring at my phone where Kaelen's contact was still saved with that stupid photo of him laughing.
"Honey," she said, sitting next to me. "You need to talk to him eventually."
"No I don't."
"You love him. And he loves you. That doesn't just go away because he made a mistake."
"It wasn't a mistake, it was a choice. He chose to lie to me every single day for weeks." I set the phone down. "How do you come back from that?"
"I don't know. But you won't figure it out by avoiding him forever." She put her arm around me. "I'm not saying forgive him right now. I'm just saying maybe listen to what he has to say. Hear his side before you write him off completely."
"What if hearing his side doesn't change anything? What if I listen and I still can't forgive him?"
"Then at least you tried. And you'll know for sure instead of wondering what if for the rest of your life."
She left after that and I sat alone with my phone and the bond pulsing with Kaelen's constant grief.
Mara had been texting me all week asking if I was okay, if the flu was better, when she could see me. I'd been putting her off with vague responses because I didn't know how to explain any of this. Couldn't tell her the truth and didn't want to lie more than I already had.
"Still recovering," I'd texted yesterday. "See you at Thanksgiving?"
"You better be there. I need to meet hot literature boy remember?"
Right. I'd told her about Kaelen weeks ago when everything was good, when we were happy and I thought we had a future. Now I didn't know what to tell her, how to explain that the boyfriend I'd been gushing about was someone I couldn't even look at anymore.
The bond flared suddenly, a sharp spike of pain that made me gasp. Kaelen was hurting, really hurting, and I could feel it like it was my own. My hand moved toward my phone automatically, wanting to call him, wanting to make sure he was okay.
I stopped myself before I could unlock the screen.
This was the worst part, this constant pull between loving him and hating what he'd done. The bond made it impossible to fully separate from him, made me feel his suffering and want to ease it even though I was the cause of it. Or he was the cause of mine. Or we were both destroying each other and neither of us could stop.
I lay back on my bed and closed my eyes, trying to breathe through the pain bleeding through the bond. He'd be okay. He had his siblings, had his life, would survive without me the same way I was surviving without him.
Except neither of us was really surviving, were we? We were both just existing, going through motions, pretending we could function when really we were falling apart in slow motion.
My phone buzzed with a text from Marcus: "Training at five AM tomorrow. Order activity increased. Need you sharp."
Great. Earlier than usual, which meant he was worried about something. The Order hadn't made contact since that day on campus three weeks ago, but Marcus said that didn't mean they'd given up. Just meant they were watching, waiting for the right moment.
I texted back: "Okay."
Another buzz, this one from a number I didn't recognize: "This is Marlen. Kaelen's sister. Please talk to him. He's not okay and I don't know how to help him anymore."
My chest tightened. She'd somehow gotten my number, was reaching out because her brother was falling apart. And I should've felt vindicated, should've been glad he was suffering the way I was suffering. But all I felt was tired and sad and guilty for making his little sister worry about him.
I didn't respond. Didn't know what to say that wouldn't be a lie or a promise I couldn't keep.
The bond pulsed again, softer this time, just a constant ache that sat in my chest and refused to leave. Kaelen's pain, my pain, all mixed together until I couldn't separate them anymore.
Aunt Sarah was right that I needed to talk to him eventually. Couldn't avoid him forever when we were connected like this, when his emotions bled into mine every hour of every day. But I wasn't ready yet, didn't know when I would be ready, didn't know if I'd ever be ready.
Maybe that made me cruel. Maybe I should've been able to forgive him by now, should've understood that he was trying to protect me or honor Marcus's wishes or whatever justification he had for lying. But I couldn't get past the betrayal, couldn't forget all the times he'd looked at me and kept silent about something I deserved to know.
He'd said he loved me. Had looked me in the eyes and said those words while hiding a secret that shaped my entire identity.
How was I supposed to trust that? How was I supposed to believe anything he said ever again?
I didn't have answers. Just questions and pain and a bone-deep exhaustion that training could temporarily erase but never truly fix.
Tomorrow I'd get up at four-thirty and drive to the clearing and let Marcus push me until I couldn't think about Kaelen or the bond or impossible choices. I'd burn away my rage and my grief until there was nothing left but ashes and smoke. And then I'd come home and do it all again the next day, and the day after, surviving but not living, functioning but not whole.
One week until Thanksgiving. One week until Mara came home expecting to meet my boyfriend and I'd have to explain why there was no boyfriend anymore. One week until I had to pretend to be grateful for things when really I was just angry and hurt and so fucking tired of feeling this way.
I turned off my phone and buried my face in my pillow, blocking out Marlen's text and Mara's expectations and the constant pull of the bond trying to drag me back to Kaelen.
Maybe someday I'd be ready to forgive him. Maybe someday I'd be able to hear his explanation without feeling like my heart was being ripped out all over again.
But that day wasn't today, and I didn't know when it would be.