In The Woods ➳ H.S.

☙ f i f t y - o n e

God help us it's already July. If you were reading my story since I posted the sneak peek on March, you are the real MVP.

Btw by august onward updates would be slow bc 3rd year in college so yeah.

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"You're going to break my brother's heart, you know?" Gemma speaks up just as we past the gates with almost no problem.

The only hinderance that we met was the fact that they argued that she should be guarded, but she insisted that I was enough. We would have been there longer if I didn't launch an arrow at one guard thirty feet away and almost took his eye out - which evidently proved to the guards that their princess would be safe.

"No, I won't. Harry doesn't care for me." I say, the words tasting horribly bitter on my tongue and causing my chest to almost cave in on itself. This is exactly why I should have been smarter and kept my distance from the start - I was better off hating him.

Gemma scoffs and I glanced at her, which was a horrible mistake seeing as the horse I was riding on follows the direction of my body. "Woah!" She yells just as I started cursing uncontrollably trying to steer the damn thing. "Careful! Just keep your body straight to where you want her to go." Gemma scolds as she tries to calm down her own horse who was spooked by mine suddenly stomping in their direction.

"I don't know how to ride horses." I bite my lip trying to follow her instructions and stopping myself from yanking on the ropes to take out my frustration - pretty sure that would just backfire on me.

"I could see that." Gemma replies and when I don't answer she continues, picking up the subject at hand before my horse went wild. "I could also see how my brother acts around you - who couldn't? He loves you, and running away like this would break his heart." She says, though no concern was laced in her voice.

"He doesn't." I say, my jaw tensing. I'm no one special. "And if he does, then why are you letting me do this? I thought you couldn't stand broken hearts." I question.

I see her shrug her shoulders. "I care more for broken hearts when it belongs to a girl. Men are filth to my eyes - and I don't really care much for my brother." She says. Her last statement strikes a nerve within me and I feel like trampling these horses over her body for her words against Harry, but that was before my mind slaps me with the fact that Harry wouldn't do the same for me.

He doesn't care for me.

I shouldn't be this surprised - only my family has ever given a damn about me, And everyone else wouldn't have blinked twice if I dropped dead - I should have figured Harry wouldn't be any different.

We've been decent to each for what? A couple of days? A week at most, right? How stupid was I to actually fall in love with someone in that laughably short amount of time. Have I been deprived of affection that much that I was unknowingly desperate enough to jump into the arms of the first man who looked my way twice?

"I don't love him, you know?" I say. "My heart is not broken - hell, I have no heart."

Gemma, once again, scoffs. "Even a deaf man would be able to say that those words are lies."

I could physically feel my eye twitch. "I am not lying." I insist.

"That'll be true when hell freezes over and the gods fall from the sky." She says, her tone softening at the words that follow after. "There's nothing wrong about falling love." She says, and now I could feel her gaze burning the side of my face.

I kept my head turned straight forward, not wanting to fall for her bait, but I guess even I was too prideful to let her get the last word. "I am not in love!" I snap. "How can one even fall in love in such a short amount of time? And even if I am, it just makes me weak! And I can assure you, Gemma, that that is the last thing I would ever be."