Book Two: KOTLC One-shots and More

The End

"Wow, you look terrible," Vertina announced when Sophie stepped in front of the mirror the next morning. "Did you sleep at all?"

Instead of responding, Sophie stepped back out of Vertina's range.

In truth, she had barely slept.

She knew things couldn't continue the way they were. Her genuine feelings for Fitz had, at first, been enough to enable her to ignore her feelings for Keefe. And being with Fitz had been...

Really nice at times.

Scary at others.

Anytime she felt uncertain about being with him, she'd convinced herself that it was just nerves at not being matched.

But then when she got her list and found him on it, she was forced to accept the truth.

Of course they were compatible. They were good friends. They trusted each other. They couldn't be the Lost Cities' youngest and most powerful Cognates if they didn't.

But she didn't want to spend her life with him. Not romantically.

And what was worse was the fact that she had spent her entire relationship with Fitz having feelings for someone else.

She couldn't keep doing that to him. He deserved so much better.

So when she hailed him that morning to see if he was ready for her to come over, it was with a heavy heart.

She leapt to Foxfire and he let her into his room in the Gold Tower. The smile he'd given her looked forced. In fact, he looked very weary, like maybe he hadn't slept much either.

That was probably her fault.

Before she could say anything, Fitz took her by the hand and asked her, point blank, if she felt she would fall in love with him.

Sophie squeezed his hand and told him, honestly, "I really don't know."

She explained that she'd dreamed of little else, at first, apart from spending all of her time with him. How she wouldn't have imagined that he'd ever like her too, and how it had been too wonderful for words when she found out he did.

But then...as time went by, as much as she enjoyed being with him, something never really felt right. And she was only recently starting to figure out what it was.

She thought about admitting to her feelings for Keefe, but she wasn't sure how helpful that would be.

Besides. The first person she needed to talk to about her feelings for Keefe...was Keefe.

Fitz pulled his hand from hers and tore both hands through his hair.

The tears she saw in his eyes nearly broke her.

"So...this is the end, isn't it?"

Sophie hoped not—not completely anyway.

"I don't see how it's fair to you to keep dating when my feelings haven't grown the way yours have," Sophie said carefully.

The truth was that she still liked him. This was costing her something, breaking up with him.

But she knew she couldn't give him what he wanted.

What he deserved.

Fitz turned away, and when he spoke, he sounded like he had a bad head cold. "I just...I don't know what else I could have possibly done, Sophie," he told her. "I...I thought I was going to marry you. I wanted to marry you. And now you're telling me our whole relationship was a lie?"