He Faked A Limp For Six Years To Avoid Marrying Me Chapter 07

“I still remember you slapping your own cheeks raw when you saw how every stitch pricked my fingers full of tiny wounds.”

“You swore you’d treasure that ritual shawl for the rest of your days and never fight with me over the drum honor again.”

“Yet you handed it over to her without a second thought.”

“You’ve always thought I’m unworthy of your sisterly affection, haven’t you? Out in front of the clan, you treat Elowen well, but to me, you never use that loving title once.”

Weariness seeped deep into my bones. I sighed long and slow.

“You’re free to love Elowen as your sister all you want.”

“This is the final time I address you as sisters.”

Maren spun toward me the second the words fell from my mouth, fresh tears flooding her eyes. She hadn’t even noticed she’d let go of Elowen’s arm to reach for me.

She stretched a hand out, desperate to grasp mine like she had when we were small children.

When we were young, I’d stretch my arms as high as I could just to touch her palm. Now I stepped one full step backward, and her fingers closed around thin air.

“Shay…” she whispered brokenly.

I twisted my head away from her outstretched hand and looked toward Kael’s steady frame.

“Let’s leave this place.”

In that instant, every single person gathered rushed forward to beg me to stay.

Elias aged ten years right before my eyes, tears streaming unbidden down his cheeks.

“You’d abandon this hollow, your own father and sister, Jasper and his mother, all your childhood friends, every tree and hill you grew up beside?”

“Everything we’ve built together here?”

His voice dissolved into messy sobs by the end of his speech.

Only hours earlier, they’d all cast me aside without a second thought. Now they begged me not to walk away, and I couldn’t wrap my head around their sudden change of heart. I didn’t care enough to dig for answers anymore.

“That’s exactly what I’m doing.”

“This hollow holds nothing left for me to care about. This mountain belongs to you, Pa. You see Elowen as your daughter, Maren sees her as her sister. Every soul here orbits around her needs alone.”

“You’ve never needed me. So I’m leaving for good.”

“We’ve never cast you aside,” Talen said, rushing forward to intercept my path.

For once, he was the one begging for my attention, after six years of me chasing his endlessly.

I still remembered the day the rattlesnake bit my leg, how I’d broken down crying and begged him not to leave me alone in the forbidden woods. He’d run off after Elowen without a backward glance.

I remembered the hunt when he shot an arrow through my thigh and watched me tumble down the rocky bluff, all his focus fixed on catching a boar for her instead of helping me.

Now I sat tall atop Kael’s thoroughbred, looking down at him from a higher vantage point.

“Elowen’s waiting for you. Don’t become a man who abandons the woman he promised to wed.”

I nodded toward the teary, trembling Elowen standing off to the side.

Talen didn’t spare her a single glance, something he’d never done before. All his desperate pleas were aimed solely at me.

“I’ll call off the wedding with Elowen, Shay. Just don’t ride away with him.”

“I’ll hunt a wedding boar only for you, whatever cuts of meat you could ever want.”

His expression read entirely genuine.

Elowen stared at him in stunned horror, hot tears spilling down her cheeks nonstop.

“Talen, what are you saying? My own parents traveled all this way to attend our wedding today. Are you really going to leave me stranded?”

In years past, every clansman would’ve swarmed to comfort her, ignoring my pain entirely. Now all eyes lingered on me instead, Elowen forgotten on the sidelines.

Clansmen turned to her with gentle, pleading voices.

“Let Shay have Talen, Elowen. She’s loved him faithfully for six full hunting seasons.”

“You stepped between them all these years, it’s only fair you step aside now.”

The roles between Elowen and I flipped completely in that moment. I finally understood the constant, unearned favor she’d received for all those years.

Crowds always cling tighter to the person threatening to walk away. But I would never weaponize my departure to earn anyone’s love, the way Elowen had for years. Real affection shouldn’t need manipulation to stick around.

I shook my head once, firm and unwavering.

“I already told you, Talen. I don’t want a single bite of your wedding boar meat. Save it for someone else who’ll appreciate it.”

“I’m leaving these hills today, and I may never set foot in Hollow Creek Clan lands again.”

I wheeled Kael’s horse around and galloped forward without glancing back once.

Maren screamed at her husband to mount his horse and chase after us.

“Ride after Shay and bring her home to me!”

Elias and Talen both scrambled onto their slower mountain horses to give chase. Ordinary clan mares stood no chance against Kael’s fast thoroughbred stallion. We left their distant shouts far behind us in the dust, vanishing over the hill’s crest entirely.

We rode all the way to Ironvein Tribe lands, Kael’s home clan.

The men and women of Ironvein carried bold, unreserved personalities. Their female hunters stood just as fierce and capable as every male tracker among them.

They held quiet disdain for women who broke down into tears over every small hardship.

“Ain’t soft, weepy girls all the rage with the men around here?” one Ironvein woman asked, confused. “They bat their eyes and sweet-talk every man they meet.”

Kael’s sister Lael scoffed loud at that thought.

“What good’s a woman who only cries and flatters? Can tears hunt a wild boar for a marriage proposal? Can sweet words bring down game to feed your clan?”