Until recently, I’d barely gone a day without spending time in her presence. With the exception of Marc, she was my oldest and closest friend. And without a doubt, she was my most loyal accomplice. Her history was my history, our lives interwoven as only those who were childhood friends could be. I knew everything about her, all her stories and secrets, and she knew me equally as well.
As our eyes locked, I remembered what I had told Cécile before the sluag attack – that Ana?s and I had never been more than friends. Technically, that was true. But it was also a lie. Ana?s was the first girl I’d lusted after, the first I’d ever kissed, the first of many things. But I’d never loved her, not like that.
Almost as though she could sense my thoughts, Ana?s bolted up the last few steps and started down the street toward her home.
“Ana?s,” I called, hurrying after her. “Ana?s, wait!”
She ignored me, and in another few steps, she would be in sight of the guards at the gate.
“Ana?s, please.” I broke into a run. “I need to talk to you.”
She slid to a stop and rounded on me. “I suppose that’s the key word, isn’t it? Need? Did you ever talk to me because you wanted to?”
I opened my mouth to speak, but she raised a hand. “I don’t want to hear it, Tristan. I don’t want to hear you. I don’t ever want to see your face again. I’m tired of you using me.”
“Ana?s.” I closed the distance between us, my pleasure at seeing her alive tempered by the fury in her eyes. She had never looked at me like that before. “We’ve been friends our whole lives; how can you say these things?”
“Friends?” she scoffed. “Friend is just a label you give your favorite tools. I see that now. You only pretended to care so we’d assist with your plans.”
“You know that isn’t true.” I searched her face, looking for a trace of something that wasn’t anger. “I care about you. I…”
“Right.” She rolled her eyes, but I could see her hands were clenching her skirts. “The only person you care about, the only person you love, is her. And sometimes I wonder if that isn’t just out of some sense of self-preservation on your part.” She laughed wildly, and it sounded strange and off-key in my ears. Not a laugh I’d heard before. “Except that can’t be right,” she said, her shoulders shaking. “Because you loathe yourself, don’t you? You despise your very nature.” The corner of her mouth turned up. “Well, now you are in good company, because with the exception of that imbecile, Marc, there isn’t a soul in Trollus who does not hate you.”
She was the last person I’d ever expected to turn on me. Had I not known her as well as I thought? Or was what I’d done worse than I believed? “If I don’t care about you, then why was I so happy to learn you had survived? Why am I here now?”
“I really don’t know, Tristan.” Her eyes filled with tears that spilled down her cheeks. I hadn’t seen her cry like this since Pénélope died – she always said she hated public displays of emotion. “You left me there to die. Left me there even though you knew…” Her voice cracked, and she wiped the dampness from her face.
“Even though I knew what?” I asked, though the answer had already oozed up from the depths of my subconscious.
She swallowed hard before answering. “Even though you knew I could be saved. You knew that witches could heal trolls from iron wounds, because Cécile healed you.” She sniffed, squeezing her eyes shut. “Your father had a witch in Trollus, but you didn’t stop to think of me. You just took her and left.” Her eyes snapped back open. “After everything I’d done for you, you left me to die. If not for your father, I would be rotting in a tomb. He only stabbed me out of desperation – he never had any intention of harming me.”
The moment replayed through my mind. She was right – I hadn’t even stopped to consider that her life could be saved. My one and only concern had been getting Cécile safely away from Trollus.
“I didn’t know where he was keeping the witch,” I said. “If I had known…”
“If you had known, you still would have chosen Cécile over me.”
Denying it was impossible.
“I’m sorry,” I said, searching her face for some sign that this was an act. A strategy she’d employed while I was in prison to protect herself from punishment. But there was nothing. “I have no right to even ask for your forgiveness.”
“Then spare me and don’t,” she hissed, wiping her hands on her dress. I fixed on those hands, her usually perfectly manicured nails bitten down to the quick. “If you want to make it up to me, stay far away.”
Words were incapable of undoing what I had done to her. What I hadn’t done for her. But part of me couldn’t reconcile the Ana?s standing before me with the girl who had calmly ordered me to take Cécile and go. Ana?stromeria, no more tears. My last command to her echoed through my mind, and I fixed on the damp streaks marring her face.