Exile || Sebastian Sallow

29 | When The Truth Comes Out

"I would've died for your sins,
instead I just died inside.
And you deserve prison,
but you won't get time."
-Taylor Swift

───•~❉᯽❉~•───

Check comment for TW.

29 | When The Truth Comes Out

Belle's Perspective

I couldn't move. I stood frozen from the shock of Ethan being here when I was expecting someone else, though I tried not to show how much he affected me by fisting my trembling hands on my side, badly wanting to reach for my wand.

My gaze flickered to the letters clutched in his hands to the eyes I used to call home, a feeling long abandoned since I felt the hostile suffocation of being near him.

I could barely hear myself, my heart pounding too loudly when I said, "What are you doing?"

Ethan's jaw ticked, sneering in my direction as if I was the one in the wrong. "I just wanted to understand, Belle, that's all..."

A hundred questions were running through my head. For a moment, I was convinced I didn't know Orpheus at all and he had deceived me into believing his world full of promises. That I could have a friend in him. And how all of that shattered the second I saw Ethan because I had thought he was Orpheus.

But that theory was quickly snuffed out when I recognized the handwriting on the letters. They were mine. It wasn't Ethan who was writing to me as Orpheus when midnight struck.

So that meant Orpheus was on his way here.

I needed to get rid of Ethan. Fast.

"Understand what?" I seethed. "Ethan, how the hell did you get those?"

I tried to snatch them from him but he was quicker, putting them above his head and out of my reach, a dangerous gleam in his eyes accompanied by a cruel grin. It only fuelled my irritation and fury, my eyes spearing him with my own shade of danger.

I could blast him to the wall if I wanted to. He was lucky my ancient magic was quite detained these days.

Ethan clicked his tongue. "You should be hiding your personal things better if you didn't want anyone finding them."

"You snuck into my common room?! How dare you!" I should be keeping my voice down, but I didn't care. I was turning into a mad woman, and Ethan was asking for it.

One thing I could never understand was how the Ethan I knew disappeared so quickly. He wasn't always like this. I remembered spending so many beautiful nights with him.

Perhaps we were just a stained glass window. We always have been. Beautiful from the outside, blinding me that I didn't see the wounds and blood stains he was leaving me as he dragged me along with words full of empty promises.

At this point, I didn't care enough to answer. I was happier with someone else.

I was better with Sebastian. We fit better. We had a secret language of our own. He had what Ethan could never give to me.

Ethan shrugged his shoulder. "You taught me how to get into the Ravenclaw Common Room. Getting into your room wasn't that difficult after."

I taught him alright, but not once did he ever visit me in the common room. I was always the one sneaking out and making the effort to see him in Slytherin when his roommates weren't there. The audacity this small man had was mind-boggling.