Her lips part, but she hesitates. When she finally speaks, her voice is quiet, careful. “And what’s the right kind, Sai?”
“Depends on who you ask.” I shrug, bracing myself. “My mother would say only the Light.”
Her jaw tightens, the shadows twitch, and that quiet flare of anger makes my chest ache. Because it’s for me.
“I don’t think I like your mother, Sai.”
“Me neither, baby.” I laugh the words, because dislike will never be strong enough. “And she definitely didn’t like me.”
Her thumb stills on my skin. “What happened?”
I stare at her, because the words are right there, but they’re stuck behind my ribs like thorns.
I could lie, joke, shrug it off. But she doesn’t deserve that. We promised her the truth, shedeservesthe truth, and the firein her gaze—that fierce, loyal fire that I don’t deserve—burns straight through my defences.
I breathe out.
If I start this, I’ll have to keep going. I’ll have to tell her everything.
“My mother is a light fae, and a Purist,” I begin, eyes focused on her thumb brushing my hand. “She pushed for regimes that kept the dark and light segregated. Meaning she did anything and everything she could to keep the dark beneath her, putting them in separate factions with separate rights, always ensuring any rulers were of the light. Always.”
I drag in another breath. “So when I revealed as dark at thirteen, the only one in our family with barely any light...” I try to smile, but it fractures halfway. “She saw it as a sickness, and she decided to fix it the only way she knew how.”
Red leans closer. “What did she do?”
“She hid me.” It comes out flat, like it’s just another fact. Just another scar. “Locked me away… in a cage.”
But the word hits her, making her touch pause… then it resumes.
“One day I was there, in the Light Realm, laughing with my friends, training with my siblings. The next, I was just… gone.”
“But someone must have known?” she murmurs. “You couldn’t have just vanished. Someonemusthave tried to find you?”
I shrug, the motion casual, empty. “The guards knew. She knew. Maybe some Purists in her party did too. Doesn’t matter. No one ever came.”
I can’t look at Red, so I stare at her thumb still brushing my hand.
“My memories from that time are fucked, Ezekial said trauma does that to your mind, but I remember…” I shake my head. “I remember her sitting beside my cage and telling me thatothers had started showing signs of darkness—of the sickness. My friends and… my brothers.”
“…you infected them. So they had to go. Every single one of them…”
I bite my tongue, use the pain to push through. “They were kids. Fucking children.”
“We purged them of the Dark, Sai. It was wonderful. We made them clean again, worthy. And they begged the Goddess of Light for forgiveness, every last one of them, even when their skin began to melt…”
“She burned them,” I say. “Burned them all alive.”
Jasmine stills.
“And I could… I couldsmellthem. I can still smell it. Their burnt flesh clinging to her robes, her hair, her skin.” My fists clench as I remember this part. “And then she poured what remained of them into my cage, a pile of ash no bigger than my hand. And she left me there.”
“I won’t be visiting you anymore… No, no tears, you brought this upon yourself…. No, I’m not your mummy, not anymore... You must suffer… Pray to the Goddess of Light, pray for her forgiveness…”
“She left me alone, in the dark, inside a cage with the ashes of my friends and brothers.”
I stare into the distance. “And my cage was so small, I couldn’t stand up, couldn’t do anything but curl up and pray to a goddess that never came.”
I close my eyes. “I begged. I begged and cried and pleaded for someone, anyone, to save me. But no one came. No one ever came.”
