I swallowed hard, keeping my cool. “Your sister?”
“She was a lot like you. Defiant. Misunderstood. ” He looked at me, and the desolation in his eyes made me forget myself for a moment. “She tried hard, but there was something in her that was too . . . gentle. These girls, they scent weakness. Charlotte never had a chance. ”
I glanced down, unable to hold his gaze. My heart broke for him.
But embarrassment skewered me, too, making me feel ashamed. Ronan had lost his sister, and yet I couldn’t get away from my own selfish disappointment. I’d thought he was going to tell me something else. I’d thought he’d felt a different kind of connection with me.
I felt him reach for me, his movement tentative. He traced a single finger along the line of my face. His touch was warm, and it made my throat clench. My body tingled, but it wasn’t because of any supernatural powers. It was because this was Ronan, and he was touching me.
I dared a glance, and his hand cupped my cheek as I turned to him. The eerie twilight made his hair appear darker, his eyes deeper.
“But Charlotte wasn’t nearly so beautiful as you. ”
The air whooshed from my lungs. My body prickled to life, heat spreading through me. Ronan had called me beautiful.
He sighed and pulled away from me. “You are lovely, Annelise. And you are strong. I believe you can win this. But you must believe it, too. ”
I gave him a tight nod. Ronan wasn’t a vampire. Not a monster, not a Draug, not an undead creature of the night. He was a guy, and he thought I was beautiful.
Granted, he had some crazy powers that made him more than your average person. But he’d believed in me when nobody else had. Even if he had used his supernatural mojo to get me here, it was because he had faith in me. Believed I could do it. Part of me suspected that maybe he even thought I’d realize some sort of potential here.
You are lovely, Annelise. And you are strong.
He put a finger beneath my chin, tilting my face up. “Are you ready?”
I knew he spoke of the fight. But in my fantasy, he meant more.
“Yes,” I said, my voice barely a whisper. I was discovering uncharted territory, and I’d survive to see it to the end.
It wasn’t until we’d driven almost all the way back to the dorm that I found myself once more capable of speech. Our conversation had felt special. That feeling hung between us, and it gave me courage.
I couldn’t allow what’d just happened to let me forget what this was all about. That this, more than ever, was life or death. Ronan was serious about me winning, and it’d bolstered me. Made me serious, too. “So, fire is Lilac’s special gift?”
Ronan stared straight ahead. “Fire is her skill,” he said in a flat voice. “Lilac has a different gift. ”
I sat forward. I’d just assumed her thing was being some kind of pyromaniac. If she had a different talent, I had to know. “What is it?”
He hesitated. “I shouldn’t tell you. ”
“I know, I know,” I said impatiently. “But now you have to tell me. ”
“Truly, Annelise. ” He caught my eye, his face like stone. “Disclosing confidential information is a breach of Eyja law. They’d think nothing of slaughtering me for it. ”
“I understand. ” My heart was a heavy weight in my chest. What hideous thing was he concealing from me? “Please, Ronan. You have to tell me. What’s her gift?”
His grip tightened on the steering wheel. “Pain. ”
“She knows how to give it?”
He shook his head. “She doesn’t feel it. ”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
I never thought I’d be jealous of von Slutling, but by the third day of the challenge, I’d have given anything not to feel pain. I’d never ached so badly in my life. Not even in my first weeks of training.
At least this was it—the final day. And thank God, because I couldn’t keep up this level of fighting, even with the blood to sustain me.
Naturally, they hadn’t considered holding the fights in someplace as mundane as the gym. Instead, we girls were duking it out at the standing stones, atop the massive, flat center slab.