“I know what it’s like to feel vengeance that can’t be contained. The emotion was new to me at the time, so I didn’t know how to stop it. When I saw what you did to that Murkovin earlier, I knew that wasn’t you. Something else was in control of your mind. You would never torture someone else, not even a Murkovin. You’re not that kind of a person.”
“I don’t think I am,” I say. “I’ll kill to protect my life or the people I care about. I’ve proven that. But I never thought I was capable of doing something like I did. I don’t know what happened to me.”
Sash looks down at her hands. “After seeing how you were, I think I better understand what happened to you and Tela in the Barrens. I just want you to know that.”
Rubbing my temples, I try to figure out how to explain better what happened in the Barrens. Sash picks up the pitcher and refills my cup. I take a few sips and then set the cup down.
“When I saw that Murkovin,” I say, “something went off inside me that I couldn’t stop. My body acted without the permission of my mind. I blamed him for hurting Tela, for trapping us in the Barrens, and for the bad decisions I made. I wanted him to suffer.
“The wild sap gives a person a sense of power,” I continue. “Part of that is the desire to have power over others. That’s how some people in my world are. All they care about is power.
“As we grow up on Earth, we learn to control things like anger, jealousy, greed, and revenge—everything you call irrational or extreme. But not everybody in my world learns how. A lot of bad things end up happening to people who don’t deserve it.
“I told you that the wild sap magnifies everything to extremes. The longer I was out there, the more a lot of my old fears were revived. But they were ten times stronger than I’d ever felt before.”
“What fears?” Sash asks.
“Like, do I belong here? Did I make the right decision giving up my life on Earth? The more I thought about those questions, the more blurred the answers became. I lost my ability to think rationally and ended up getting so mad that I was filled with nothing but rage.
“The only relief I felt was taking care of Tela. It gave me a sense of purpose. I think that’s why I gave in at first when . . . when we kissed. All the negative emotions I was feeling were so overwhelming that I believed you tricked me into coming to Krymzyn.”
Sash frowns and shakes her head. “How could you ever think that, Chase?”
“Unless you experience it, you can’t understand what it does to your mind. I could control it sometimes, but not others. I kept trying to answer a question that I thought I had the answer to a long time ago. Out there, I believed there was no answer.”
“What question?” she asks.
I take a deep breath. “How could someone like you ever love someone like me?”
Sash holds my gaze. For the first time since our fight after I got back from the Barrens, her face softens with sympathy. “You saved my life in the river. You’ve defended Krymzyn against intruders. You’ve risked your own life to protect me and others. Those are all reasons to respect and honor you, but none of them is a reason to fall in love.
“The first time we went to the Tall Hill, you drew a picture of a sustaining tree in the air. You made sure that I saw a healthy tree because you said the trees seemed important to me. When we sat on the Hill, you asked me if it’s hard on me to be the way I am. I told you that no one had ever asked me that before.
“Over and over, you’ve shown how much you care about my feelings. You’re the only person to ever fully understand me. You accepted Krymzyn to be with me despite all that you had to sacrifice. Those are the reasons I fell in love with you, Chase. I’ve always felt safe with you. Safe on the inside.”
“And now I’ve betrayed you,” I say.
“I don’t think you betrayed me. I’m angry. I’m hurt. But I still love you. It’s going to take time, but we’ll find a way to put this behind us.”
“Like I said,” I reply, “I’ll do whatever I need to and wait as long as it takes. Even as messed up as my mind was out there, I never stopped loving you and Aven. That’s the only thing that got me back.”
After rinsing out our cups in the fall and putting them on the shelves, we climb on the bed on either side of Aven. Sash doesn’t kiss me, caress my hair, or rest a hand on me the way she usually does when we go to bed. Understanding that it will take time for her to trust me again, to repair the emotional damage I’ve caused, I drape an arm over Aven and go to sleep.
Chapter 26
Early the next morrow, I finally get to spend a little time with Aven. While having our morning sap together, I help her with a simple puzzle consisting of putting the right shapes in the right holes. As the last remnants of sleep fade away, my mind feels sharper than it did the prior morrow. The long trek through the Barrens seems to have cleaned
