“I do not need you lecturing me on any of this.” My voice grew callous. “Youwere the one who told me to come here, to not fight, promising that the Lysians would not harm me nor those I carefor. And now you dare to speak as though you judge me. After all that I have been through.”
Edda scoffed, a cruel smile finding its way to her lips. “You are still no more than a child. Tell me, do you fancy this Lysian King? Giggling like a little girl instead of behaving like the Leader Superior of the Bavadrins. Think he will protect you from the evils of the world? Because I can tell you he cannot do that for you. No one can truly protect you, not anymore, not with what is coming. You need to pull that head of yours from the clouds and start using it.”
Her words opened a wound within me. It took a long time for me to stop doubting myself. Ever since my mother’s death, I began questioning myself and my existence. Edda was the one who helped me the most, supporting and helping me grow from within. She always had her odd ways, but she was also always nurturing. Yet now, she’s trying to tear me to pieces? For what reason?
There had to be a reason.
I hid the pain within myself, locking it in some deep, dark corner of my mind, and surrounded it with fury.
“I do not need anyone’s protection, including yours,” I replied, sounding oddly calm though my heart cracked.
“Really?” It wasn’t just a question—it was a gauntlet thrown, a flicker of defiance that shimmered like the edge of a blade. Her gaze locked on mine, unyielding, as if daring me to falter under the weight of it.
“I have no idea what is going on with you today, Edda. But I will not be made to be some foolish girl by you. The fact that I do not absolutely hate the Lysians is not a weakness. I do not let prejudices cloud my judgment, and you should know that better than anyone, for you used to share that view with me.”
I paused, shaking my head gently in disbelief. “I feel as though I have always been a decent judge of character, and I believe thatthere is an opportunity that we could work with the Lysians.” I took a step back from her, feeling as though I did not know the person before me. “The way you have been behaving—so willingly offering Bavadrin lives as a sacrifice for farming parties, and this, now, today—never in my life have you spoken to me in such a way. I do not even recognize who you are. You are not the woman I grew up loving. Why are you doing this?”
A look of hurt briefly passed over Edda’s features before disappearing altogether. “This is who I have always been, child. I am doing what I always have: helping to direct you to do what is best for you.”
Though a sliver of something other than bitter peeked through her words, it did nothing to help the pain in my chest.
“You no longer have that authority. If I am chosen to ascend, then you will be an adviser, but you do not direct me anywhere. I will choose whether to heed your advice, and that privilege will only be if I don’t lose all recognition of who you are. Frankly, Edda, you are scaring me. Never have you been so unnecessarily cruel.”
Her black eyes were shadowed. She offered no explanation. No apology.
My voice lost some of its edge. “It’s clear that you are trying to hurt me, and I have no idea why. But I think it’s time for you to go now.”
Edda approached me without an ounce of emotion. I half expected her to say some sort of snarky remark. Instead, she raised her hand, placing a featherlight touch on my cheek. Tears swirled in her dark gaze, though she did not shed a single one.
She stunned me, for never in my life had I seen her with tear-glazed eyes.
“I am proud of you, Ariana,” she said before dropping her hand back to her side. “But you are right. I am only an adviser to you, nothing more.” A sad sort of smile softened her features andthen she simply left, leaving me alone in my room, completely dumbfounded.
I am only an adviser to you, nothing more.Those words swirled in my mind, and they cut me deeper than anything else said.
Edda always had been so much more. She was a shelter from the storm, something warm within the cold. She was the family I chose. And with her words, she stole all of that, as though it were nothing. As though she was not the reason I survived all those years under Fraser’s rule.
Everything shifted.
I stood in the room motionless until I heard the door leading into the hall close and I knew Edda truly left. I remained there a few more heartbeats before finally finding the strength to move. Walking out to the balcony, I greedily took a deep breath of fresh air.
I was completely fine until I wasn’t. Tears filled my eyes till there was no more room and they spilled over. Edda never attacked me before. And though in life I experienced so much worse, her words were strangely more painful than most of the darkness I lived through.
She was my shield until that moment. At that instant, she became a blade that was shoved into my heart.
The door to Erik’s balcony opened with a soft creak.
“How much did you hear?” I pointlessly asked while continuing to look over at the distant forest, knowing with my balcony open and his keen ears that he heard everything.
Erik was not quick to answer. “Lysians were raised to hate and distrust the Bavadrins, just like the Bavadrins were taught the same of the Lysians,” he replied, trying to offer Edda some form of defense. He believed that she acted so aggressively because I did not outright despise Lysians, but that was not the case.
“No.” I turned to find him standing in the center of his balcony. A short iron wall separated us. “You were just a convenient cover.She used it as a reason to attack me with her words. Edda’s mind is not clouded with prejudicial hate. Her point was to wound me. That was her goal.”
And she so easily succeeded.
“Why would she do that?” He moved silently until he stood next to me. The slightest hint of concern swirled in his deep blue eyes.
“Why would she try to sever the single tie I have to something familiar, something that has always felt safe, and to do it while I am trapped in a foreign and unknown land? I have no idea.”
