TWENTY-TWO
DO AS YOU’RE TOLD
“The full moon,”Creatchin announces dramatically. The crowd idolizing their queen murmurs just as excitedly. “Tomorrow night is an exciting time indeed, but do not shy away from the dedication I will show. Instead, match it! The Goddess speaks to me and we will find what we’re searching for!”
“Fuck,” Zilo whispers at my side.
His hand pushes to his temple, and as the followers clap and encourage their reckless leader, the three men surrounding me all pass a serious look among themselves.
I knew I wasn’t the craziest bitch in the room.
I’m just pleased someone else is finally agreeing with me.
“It’ll be anarchy,” Avian says casually under his breath.
“Just...” Zilo smiles and nods, and it takes me a second to realize Creatchin has beckoned him over to her. Like the fucking dog that he is. “Just keep Cersia safe. Stay in the room tomorrow. And Avian, don’t leave her side.”
I blink as he starts to trot away toward his master.
Is he serious? That’s his epic plan to protect these people and the realms this woman will surely destroy if given enough time? And he just wants to keep me out of sight, out of mind, while everything here in Hell flies out of the handbasket!
“No!” I nearly shout it, and only my sister seems to recognize my voice within the rambunctious crowd. Her big eyes snap to me but only for a moment. Just long enough for Vanitee to grab her attention and whisper sweetly in her ear.
Well... Nyra notices as well as the three hellhounds who are now pinning me hard with the simple weight of their gazes.
And glares.
“No?” Zilo stops in his tracks and then slowly, predatorially comes back in long, lazy strides.
Ready to pounce at any moment.
“Whythe fuck,” I hiss those two words like they’re a major secret the rest of the realm has never heard of, “would I just hide away? I could?—”
“No one likes you, Cersia,” he says so loudly and bluntly that a few of my peers nod along in agreement.
A sort of ‘that-is-true’, unanimous nod that makes me roll my eyes at the ass fucks.
“I know that!” My arms fold hard because if I don’t, I’ll reach out and slap the person nearest me.
Poor Avian doesn’t deserve that.
Roman, yeah, maybe a little.
And Zilo, definitely.
He comes closer and closer until his chest bumps my arms, and he’s a mere few inches from my face.
“You being there will just make tensions worse.” His quieted words are hot against my lips as his head dips low, and he gazes into my eyes so deeply, it suddenly doesn’t feel like we’re arguing at all.
It feels like... a different sort of tingling passion.
I just need him to know that I want to protect my sister. I want to be there for her. For all of them.
“I can’t just?—”
“You being there will make tensions worse,” he repeats, and his whispered words drop to an impossibly soft, gravelly tone. “And it’ll distract me so much that I’d be useless to protect you. We all would.”
The heat that blooms through my chest melts every single part of my little black heart—I swear it.
