“Very good, Cadmus. Like Arim, you have an instinctive ability to pierce an opponent’s weakest point.”
Surprised to hear her admit any vulnerability, I realized my small victory stung more than it should. My interactions with Lexa had always cast her in the role of the villain, a strong and crafty opponent not to be trusted. But as she stood so still before me, I saw in her a woman who’d been hurt in the past.
Images flashed, of Lexa and Arim laughing and holding hands, of their shared kiss and deep well of affection. Flickers of innocence, of the timeless bond of young love before age tore innocence apart. And then a woman’s body, covered in blood, her throat slashed, her entrails covering a stone floor. More bodies, these of a man, and worse, a young child, denied the joys life would have provided. Lexa’s horror, Arim’s anger. Harsh words and heart-rendering pain…years passing…
“You never really knew me.” Lexa’s eyes flashed. “And you never will.”
She pierced Arim’s shoulder with a bolt of blue flame as they battled against Tanselm’s dark, starry sky. Atop the northern castle’s eastern wall, Lexa danced and flowed with the wind, her Dark energy seething as she trapped Arim in a binding so tight his essence began to blend with the night.
Arim’s eyes rolled back in his head, and I feared him dead. Then, in the next breath, Sin Garu appeared wreathed in smiles, his teeth canine-sharp, his white-blond hair waving in the brewing storm.
“Sister mine, perhaps I was wrong about you.”
Lexa stared at her brother, her features in shadow as the clouds suddenly covered the moon. “You’re late.”
“Ah, but I brought along some entertainment.”
He tugged on a rope, and suddenly, three wraiths appeared, creatures like the ones Jonas and I had battled in Ellie’s apartment. The creatures held something between us.
“Arim, wake up. I’d like you to watch as the Dark swallows what you prize most dear.”
In their arms I lay, blood covering my body.
“Let him go,” Ellie commanded in a deep voice from behind us. Her hair shimmered like lightning as she flashed in truth. Yet within her gaze, Arim’s stare shone bright with fury.
My head hurt, and I was so confused. I’d seen the past and the future? Or was Lexa fucking with my mind?
“Cadmus?” Lexa stared at me with concern. “What is it? What did you see?”
I gritted my teeth and clenched the hair at my temples, blindsided by this unexpected and unwelcome vision—because that’s what it was. I forced myself to gain control.
“Blood, senseless death, you and my uncle, but many, many years ago.” I tried to see her through tears of pain but couldn’t see more than her blurred image. She reached out a hand, and I recoiled instinctively.
“Easy.” She touched my forehead. Instead of the hurt I’d come to associate with Lexa, gentle ease flushed my pain, providing a strength and fortitude I’d been missing of late. “Now tell me again what you saw.”
I repeated my vision, up until the last few frames. At my pause, she frowned.
“Continue.”
“And then, Dark Mistress, I watched you wound and prepare my uncle for the torture and amusement of your dear brother, Sin Garu.”
Her start of fear surprised me. But anger soon replaced it. “Go on.”
“I was near death in the claws of Sin Garu’s new hybrid-wraith creatures.”
“He calls them his wraintu. A combination of wraith and forli, one of the more vicious Shadren and a cousin to the Nocumat.”
Nocumat. It figured. That explained how one of the hybrids had been able to launch a Nocumat at me from within itself.
“Yes, well, the next thing I know, Ellie’s growling a warning at the Dark Lord, and she’s not herself.”
“Meaning?”
“I don’t know. She’s Ellie, but I’d swear Arim was looking out at me through her eyes.”
“Yet you saw me bind him, saw me wound him.”
“Yeah.” I glared at her. Despite her promised help fighting Sin Garu, there was too much about Lexa that confused the crap out of me. Her Dark nature precluded trust, and the visions I’d had of her made me doubly wary of the pretty schemer. Half the time it was an exercise in energy to simply keep my wits about me. Who knew what she made me think and feel, especially when she weakened me past my endurance?
