Chapter 110: A Line Too Close
Sunset
Ezra leaned against a fractured tree trunk a quarter mile from the apartment, just beyond the edge of the clearing, where the light turned to rust and the air thickened with pine and quiet dread. Smoke curled faintly from the old chimney vent. The wind stirred the needles in the high branches, but he remained still, half - shadowed, watching.
He rolled a dry root between his fingers — chewed, spit the fibers out. His eyes stayed fixed on the trail winding from the cabin, where footprints still held the memory of bare feet and soft treads.
It didn't take long.
Aria stepped into view, her gait cautious, canister in hand. Her curls were pinned messily back, some strands escaping in coils around her neck. No weapon. No coat. Just a threadbare linen shirt that fluttered with the breeze.
Ezra pushed off the tree with the casual arrogance of someone who hadn't yet decided whether to mock or menace.
"Didn't think I'd catch you without your bodyguard," he said.
Aria stopped. The steel canister shifted slightly in her grip. Her gaze locked on him — not startled, but sharp. Cool. Calculating.
"She'll be here in three seconds if I scream," she said.
He smiled, spreading his arms in mock surrender. "No harm intended."
"Then don't come any closer."
But he did.
Two slow steps. Just enough to test the line between tension and trespass.
"I heard stories, y'know," Ezra murmured. "Before I ever laid eyes on you. About something out there in the ruins. A ghost. A girl who left no tracks, who made grown men forget their own names."
Aria didn't move. Her voice came quiet. "Stories are easy. You came for something else."
He didn't deny it. His eyes narrowed slightly. "I came to see why Selene looks at you like she's already chosen her grave."
Her lips pressed into a faint line. "She doesn't belong to you."
Ezra let out a humorless breath. "No. She never did. But she used to listen to me. Used to follow orders. Used to be… sharp. Now she hesitates. Because of you."
Aria tilted her head slightly. "No. She chooses. That's what terrifies you."
He stepped back a pace, letting his hands fall. His voice softened, almost nostalgic. "She was cleaner before. Empty, maybe, but clean. Purpose - driven. And I knew how to use that. She's still a weapon. She just doesn't know it anymore."
There it was — the truth he didn't mean to say out loud.
"You never loved her," Aria said.
Ezra didn't flinch. "Didn't need to. She was useful. Predictable."
"And you want that back."
"I want her alive. You're a distraction."
"No," Aria said, her tone ice-edged. "I'm the one she didn't survive without."
He stared at her for a long moment. Something flickered — resentment or recognition, maybe both.
"She's bleeding because of you," he said finally. "I saw the way she stepped in front of you. She'd die for you without thinking. That's not loyalty. That's weakness."
Aria took a single step forward. The air between them tensed like wire.
"She was already dying when I met her," she said. "You just never noticed. I didn't make her bleed. I just didn't look away when she did."
Ezra's jaw tightened.
"I don't want her dead," he said. "But I sure as hell don't want her soft. And you — You're the breach."
That word hit like a dropped blade.
Aria said nothing.
Ezra nodded toward the apartment, the faint plume of smoke still visible through the trees. "She was steel. Now she's rust. You did that."
"And still she chooses me," Aria answered quietly.
A pause.
"I wonder how long that lasts when the world burns again."
He didn't say it as a threat, but the implication dripped between the words like venom.
He turned away then. Not fast. Not like a man escaping.
Just slow, deliberate retreat. Like he knew she wouldn't follow. Like he'd said enough.
Aria stood still until his figure disappeared between the trees, swallowed by dusk and pine and whatever silence he carried back into the dark.
Then she moved.
The canister was heavier now, but she didn't feel it.
When she reached the apartment, Selene wasn't in sight — likely still pacing the other room, muttering to herself, scouring the edges of her mind for threats she could shoot before they touched Aria.
Aria stepped inside, closed the door.
This time, she locked it.
And checked it twice.
Selene emerged from the bedroom as Aria placed the canister down on the counter. Her eyes were fire - edged, searching Aria's face before she even spoke.
"You were gone too long."
Aria didn't answer immediately. She took a cloth from the hook, wiped her hands — mechanical, practiced, slow.
Selene stepped closer. "You saw him."
It wasn't a question.
Aria's eyes lifted. "He was waiting just off the trail."
Selene's mouth went taut. "He touched you?"
"No."
"What did he want?"
Aria hesitated. Then: "You."
Selene's breath hitched just enough to notice. Her hand hovered near her side, then lowered, useless.
"He said you were rust," Aria continued. "Said I made you weak. A distraction."
Selene looked away.
Aria followed her. "Is that what I am to you?"
The silence that followed was not absence — it was pressure, like the air between them had thickened to something unspeakable.
Selene shook her head slowly. "You're the reason I remember how to breathe."
"And you still didn't want me to see him."
"I didn't want him near you."
Aria stepped forward. "I'm not glass, Selene. You don't have to break yourself trying to keep every crack from showing."
Selene's laugh came bitter, short. "It's not about cracks. It's about breaches. He's right about that part. You opened something in me I didn't think could still feel."
Aria reached out, touched Selene's wrist gently. "And you're afraid I'll close it."
"I'm afraid you'll bleed for it."
"I already have."
Selene's gaze snapped to hers, sharp. Aria didn't flinch.
"He said you were cleaner before. But I don't want you clean," Aria said. "I want you honest. Even if that honesty is fury and guilt and fear."
Selene's hands trembled before she tucked them away in her pockets. "You didn't scream."
"No."
"You could've."
"I didn't want you to see what he looked like when he thought he had power."
Selene blinked. Her voice was nearly a whisper. "And what did he look like?"
"Small."
The word broke something in Selene's posture.
Aria stepped even closer, the distance between them now breath-warm.
"I won't leave you to face him alone," she said. "And I won't let him rewrite what you are."
Selene's jaw worked. Her chest rose once — twice — then steadied.
She exhaled.
"Then we move. Tonight."
Aria didn't argue. She just nodded once. "Where?"
"There's an old comms tower in the southern ridge. Partially buried, but it still has defensive shielding. Signal blind. We can reset. Hide the trail again."
Aria turned toward the kitchen. "Then I'll pack. Food, gear, medical."
Selene's voice caught her before she stepped away.
"I wasn't steel," she said.
Aria looked back.
"I was hollow."
Then Selene added, almost inaudible:
"You filled something I didn't know was empty."
Aria didn't speak.
She didn't need to.
Instead, she turned back, crossed the distance, and rested her forehead lightly against Selene's.
One breath. Then two.
Then they moved.
Together.
Out of the apartment. Out of the known. Into whatever dusk awaited.
Because whatever Ezra thought he could unravel —
Aria had already stitched back stronger.