Tyrant

(𝟹2) 𝙱𝚒𝚛𝚝𝚑 𝚘𝚏 𝚊 𝙱𝚛𝚘𝚔𝚎𝚗 𝙷𝚎𝚊𝚛𝚝

The world seems to shatter around me, razor-sharp shards penetrating my sweater and grazing my skin.

I'd prefer to forget about anyone from Before.

His statement echoes and echoes and echoes around in my mind, as though my head is an empty lot, a vacant chamber.

"What do you mean?" The quiet words are uneven as I stare up at my best friend. My best friend who is acting as though I mean nothing to him right now.

Caspian, his tired, creamy face set, crosses his leather-clad arms. "I would think the meaning is clear."

My deep, shaky inhale is the only steadying thing that keeps me from collapsing to the hard floor in shock, in confusion.

What the hell happened to him? Why is he like this? Who would wish to forget about a past they had loved? A past where everything was better?

He turns around to leave again, as though his words did not just strike a blade deep into my heart—like a desperate, frantic woman, I grip his upper arm again, the taut muscle tensing up beneath that black leather. 

His gaze slides to me, a spark of impatience lighting those eyes that I know so well. The eyes that had been all I thought of when I had been separated from my family fifteen years ago. 

"What's happened to you?" I ask with a small voice, my hand still around his arm, refusing to let him go. To let him be taken from me again. To let him leave me behind. 

"Nothing's happened to me, Phoenix. I should ask what's happened to you." My fingers release his arm at that, my hands shaking too much to continue their desperate grasp. 

"What do you mean."

He looks me up and down again, assessment in his eyes—the opposite of the care and affection I had always expected would be there. "Why are you still holding on to the past? Onto Before? Haven't you realized it's time to move on from our previous lives and face the reality that's been thrown at us like grenades?" The words come out with an accusatory edge, and I stand still, absorbing every syllable like a sponge.

I'm holding on to the past?

And my face must appear pale and shaken and devastated beyond measure, because, with a strained sigh, he says, "I do not hate you, Phoenix. Don't misunderstand me. I just don't have the desire to speak with anyone from my past. Whether it be you or another person." Another rub at his familiar eyes. "These previous few months have been enlightening for me, and I won't live in Before. I won't hold on to my memories. I'll only move forward." 

I swallow, fisting my hands to stop that inexplicable trembling. Okay, it's fine. It's fine. Maybe he just needs some time alone, to recover from whatever he went though.

Whatever changed him like this. 

Six months back, in that dark alley with the injured arm, he had seemed like a different person. 

And he knew it was you that saved him back then.

I try to stop the words that wish to escape my lips, but fail. "We can remain friends without having to always recall—recall our memories. With that attitude, you're letting The One win. You're giving him what he wants—the separation of families and friends and loved ones."

His white eyes pierce my own, and he dodges every other word I said and focuses on one. "You mean what your uncle wants."

I step back like I've been slapped, as though a blade has been pressed to my neck.

He knows.

Is that why he's acting like this towards me? Because I'm related to the man that is the sole cause of misery on this continent?