Page 54 of A Spark So Bright
"I cannot leave this realm without fear," she said. "I cannot seek safety in my mind without needing to be safe. I used to beg those men. I would throw something at them if they were kind, just to enrage them enough to hurt me so I could leave. I don't remember any of what came after, so there is no excuse other than my own desire to leave. But now there is nowhere for me to go when I feel like this. No way to stop these feelings."
A grating sound echoed from Gunnar’s chest, and then his hands came up to frame her face. He made her look at him, at the tortured expression marring his usually handsome features.
"Forgive me for touching you," he said, his voice low and broken. "But you need to hear this, Rose. They raped you. What they did was wrong, disgusting, and cruel. You say you participated, but you were hiding, Rose. You were trying to find some relief from the captivity that was tearing at the very fiber of who you are. None of this is your fault."
She gulped down the anxiety that made a knot in her throat. "It is my fault, Gunnar. I could have killed myself. Maybe that's why I'm always flirting with the edge of a cliff. I could throw myself off the edge like I should have a very long time ago."
"And it takes an immense amount of power to not do that," he replied. His bright green eyes searched hers. "You are strong, Rose. So strong. I have never once thought of you as fragile."
She smiled sadly. "We both know that's a lie."
His grin back made her feel a little stronger. "It may be. But I have always seen that there is strength in you, and I have watched you grasp that strength with both hands for the past few days. I know, without a doubt, that you will find it again. You should not berate yourself for being tired after doing something new for that long."
She reached up her hand, slowly, allowing herself time to gauge whether or not it would make her worse. Then she wrapped her fingers around his wrist. Just feeling him.
His heartbeat was right underneath her fingers. Pulsing just as fast as hers as they both stayed frozen in this moment for a few seconds.
It was the first time she'd ever willingly touched him. The first time she had reached out for comfort from another human being in such a long time.
Swallowing, she waited for familiar emotions to overcome her again. She would remember what it was like when all of those men had held her down. When they had forced her to do things she hadn’t wanted to, but that moment never came.
All she felt were the claws brushing her face. The calluses that had simply been not there on the hands of even the gladiators. This was not a human man in front of her, and Gunnar had never touched her in a way that would make her afraid of him.
At least, while he knew it was her. He had attacked her when he'd thought she was following him, but she couldn't blame him for that. And she'd stuck a knife in him for it.
Rose blew out a very long breath, allowing the tension to leave her muscles with the air. Gunnar watched her with those kind eyes. Like he always did.
"Why are you so patient with me?" she asked. "I have turned your life upside down. There had to be a point when you realized it was a massive mistake to make any kind of vow to me."
He snorted. "You are the least of my concerns. I grew up trailing behind a woman who threw herself into far worse situations. She was a warrior like myself, but without the common sense needed to keep herself alive."
"Who was she?"
"A dear friend. Tindra. Older than both Ragnar and myself by quite a bit, but she trained us how to fight. Mostly me as we got older, since Ragnar was sent with the others who had some healing capabilities to learn with them." His brows softened abit, and she knew these were happy memories for him. "She put me in the dirt more times than I could count. Everything I know came from her and her immense knowledge of battle."
It all seemed past tense. Rose was certain there was something deeper here. A wound that she had never seen, and somehow her presence was helping to heal that wound.
"What happened to her?" she asked.
"She died. I couldn't save her. And I suppose in some way, I see her spirit in you. I see a fighter and I don't want to lose someone like that again." A sheepish smile crossed his face. "I shouldn't put my own issues on you, I suppose. But I piece things back together, Rose. And I watched your soul leave your body the first time I saw you. You were an empty shell with nothing in it, just waiting for an order, even if that order was cruel. I stayed with you all night until your soul came back and I knew I wouldn't stop chasing it until I could anchor your soul for you."
How strange it was to understand his reasoning. His terrible reasoning.
"You have kept me around this long, bothering you for this long, because you like putting puzzles together?" she asked with a soft laugh. "That's a stupid reason to keep a problem like me, Gunnar."
He tilted his head back and laughed so hard it was like thunder. Her eyes followed the line of his throat, the muscles there working with his glee at what she had said, and she almost wanted to smile as well.
She didn't laugh. Rose wasn't sure she still knew how to do that. But she knew that she enjoyed making him feel such mirth. It made her feel powerful, in a way. Stronger. Because she had made him see the world in a better light, and she wasn't some broken thing wandering around and almost getting herself killed.
Making him laugh gave her a presence, an anchor in this realm. Just the one. And it wasn't much of one, really. But it was a start.
Gunnar released his grip on her face, but it was a slow glide of his fingers as though he didn't really want to let her go. "Now, you continue to surprise me. I didn't know you'd have such dry humor."
"You don't know much about me at all."
"I only know what your sister has told me, actually." He stood up, dusting dirt off the knees of his pants. "How accurate are those stories?"
She made a face. "Probably not very accurate. Or... I don't know. I was a little shit of a kid who had no idea what the world was going to hand her."
