And I refused to give him that.
I had to deal with him like I did Isbeth. Keep calm. Give nothing away.
I forced the tension out of my muscles. “That’s not my name.”
He laughed, spitting blood. “Would you prefer I called you Poppy?”
“I’d prefer that you crawl back into the hole you came out of and die, but I have a feeling you won’t do that for me.”
“It is the same,” he said, ignoring my comment. “Sotoria. Poppy.”
My brows furrowed. The same?
“Come now, Sotoria,” he said in an almost singsong way, the bloody smile increasing as his gaze swept over the shadows surrounding us. “You weren’t the smartest when I first saw you here.”
I drew back my head, offended.
“You were naïve, gullible, and easily frightened,” he continued, his tongue skimming over his bloody teeth. “But you learned. You became smarter. Stronger. And now, you’ve awakened. You have the knowledge inside you to answer your own question.” He paused. “So…toria.”
The way he said it. As if the name were two words… Because itwasin the language of the gods—the Ancients.
So’meantmyormine.
Andtoriameant garden. Flower. Or…
I inhaled, but it didn’t feel like I took a breath.Toriameant pretty flower.
Poppy.
My pretty flower.
My pretty poppy.
I was hot and cold all at once, moving back another step without realizing it. That rhyme. It reallyhadbeen him. My ears buzzed, drowning out all other sounds. I couldn’t feel the cold ground beneath my feet or the breeze lifting the strands of my hair for a moment.
The sharp, humming noise ended as abruptly as it’d started. “Were you there that night? In Lockswood?”
“I’ve always been there, Sotoria.” He almost sounded…disappointed. “Why don’t you believe me?”
Anger and disgust rose and began swirling around one another. I knew I would lose control the moment they collided. “That’s not what I meant. Did you have something to do with that night?”
“No,” he answered, just as I heard the faint crunch of a bone fusing itself back together. “I need and want you alive. Why would I have had anything to do with a situation that could have so easily gotten out of hand?”
That sounded way too logical. “Because you’re insane?”
The crimson burned in the Revenant’s pupils. “Careful,Sotoria.”
“Go fuck yourself,Kolis,” I retorted, mimicking the exaggerated rise and fall of his pitch.
His smile faded. “I see the bitch’s blood has tainted your tongue.”
“Are you speaking of my mother?” Thicker clouds gathered overhead.
“Notthatbitch,” he seethed. “The other bitch. Seraphena.”
“Do not,” I said, grabbing his healing arm, “call her a bitch.”
“Which one?”
