“Thorne?” I ask softly. “When you were out here last time, when you ran away, did it let you back in?”
“Yes,” he says. “In all the times I’ve ventured into this realm since then, that’s never happened.”
“Maybe it was just a mistake then,” I say, rolling back onto my feet and striding straight for the wall of magic.
All of them yell at me to stop, but I don’t. I walk straight towards the wall with all the determination I feel in my gut. Exactly the same thing happens again. As soon as I hit that wall of magic, it repels me backwards. I try to dig my heels into the ground and stop myself, but the magic is too strong and I end up back with my mates.
“Fuck,” Beaufort says. “Fuck. She’s trapped us out here. We can’t get back in.”
“Who?” I say.
“The Empress,” he says, lowering his head.
“What the hell is going on, Beau?” Dray hisses.
Beaufort takes a long, deep inhale and then blows out his cheeks. He rubs his hand through his hair, glances toward the professor, and then looks at Thorne, Dray and, finally, at me.
“I think we’re in danger,” he says.
“From Bardin?” Thorne questions. “She doesn’t have the power to alter the magical barrier. And I don’t think she’ll come for us again. We’re stronger than her. She’s outgunned, even with those demons.”
“No,” Beaufort says. “From my mother.”
“Your mother?” I say. “Why is your mother a threat?”
“Because,” Beaufort says, “she wants you dead, Briony – just like she wanted all the other gifted students from Quarters outside Onyx dead.”
“What the fuck?” Dray scoffs. “Have you lost your freaking mind?” He scowls at the professor, clearly wondering if Fox has influenced his bond brother’s thoughts.
“No, Bardin has been killing gifted students from Granite, Iron, and Slate on my mother’s orders. And now my mother wants Briony – and by extension us too – dead.”
“And you know this because?” Thorne asks.
“Bardin told me.”
Dray bursts into laughter. “She’s a psychopath. She a pathological liar.”
“But I think she’s telling the truth about this,” the professor says.
“And even if Bardin was lying, can we afford to take the risk?” Beaufort says. “We have to proceed with caution.”
“So it wasn’t the Madame,” I say, as realization dawns over me and I feel a little lightheaded with it all. “It was the Empress, the Empress all along. She was the one ordering it. She was the one behind it.”
“We can’t know for sure,” Beaufort says.
“But it makes a lot of sense,” Thorne adds.
“Yeah,” I say. “I suppose it does, but where does that leave us?”
“In danger,” Fox says. “A lot of danger.”
I bite on the side of my cheek. “No,” I say. “It puts me in danger, the rest of you and Blaze–” But I don’t finish my words because all four of them are talking over me at once with promises of ‘we’re in this together’ and ‘we’re bound by fate’ and ‘we love you, Briony,’ and ‘we’re here to protect you’.
I shake my head and look down at the ground. It’s what I’ve always wanted to hear, words like that. I was alone for so long, with no one looking out for me, with no one who cared. And to be here in this position with four men who I adore, all declaring their unbound loyalty to me, is overwhelming.
But I have to be realistic. Their lives are at risk. And that’s down to me. That’s because of me. My four mates are in perilous danger, but only if they stick with me. Only if they stick by me.
“I could hand myself in,” I say. “I could beg her to spare me. I can try and make her see that gifted students from other Quarters like me aren’t a threat, we’re an asset. We can help. We can help in the battle against the demons. Maybe she’d listen.”
