My gaze snapped back up. He hadn’t. But I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. And yet, I felt I needed to. To understand him better, to see what Dahlia was going through, to remember what risk I faced myself if something ever happened to Dante.
“The night she died, she reached out to me,” he began. I braced myself for the story that we’d avoided for so long. “She was a servant, did you know that? She spent her days working for House Viper.”
She’d worked for Cosmo? I blinked at Warren. It was rare for a Third Ringer to be given the privilege of serving a First Ring family, a role which was typically reserved for Second Ringers, since they were considered more ‘civilized’ and closer in values and capability.
“It was a good job, a stable job,” he continued, “one that anyone would have been envious of.
“One day, she was approached by someone. A man, though she never told me who. He offered her a deal. We’d just successfullycompleted the first Trial, and Anna, having worked for the Major Houses for so long, was certain the old families were harboring secrets about how to succeed in the Trials that they weren’t sharing with the rest of us. This man asked her to retrieve a book for him, just a dusty old tome he assured her that no one in House Viper would miss. And in return, he would tell her all of those secrets they kept hidden away. She could be the next hero. We could use them to pass the Trials together.
“She was so excited when she told me, but I asked her not to do it. It was too good to be true. If the Major Houses had had secrets to help them pass the Trials, why hadn’t they been successful in centuries?”
I held my tongue, a perfect image of the cover of Prima’s journal etched in my mind.
“But she was convinced.” Warren shook his head. “We had an argument about it, then made up. In the end, she promised she wouldn’t steal the book. But one night she was cleaning Cosmo’s office, and she found it, the book the man had asked her to retrieve for him. And on a whim—a stupid, irresponsible whim—she took it. Anna hid it in her cloak and left the house.”
He drew in a shaky breath. Warren's hands clenched where they rested over the table. Moisture gathered in the corners of his eyes, and I marveled at his pain for her even now, years later when he’d married a different girl and his life had taken a different path.
“She told me she’d taken it, told me she was leaving,” he pressed on. “You might remember the moment. I think I spilled dinner all over the table in my haste to find her.”
I nodded.
“I met her at the gates,” his voice was quiet now. I fought the urge to lean in to hear him better. “She opened her coat and showed me the book. She was so excited, going on about how much better our chances would be now, how much we couldlearn and how far we could go together as soon as she got the book to the man who asked for it. She smiled right up until a spear pierced her straight through the neck.”
I closed my eyes and lowered my head.
“I still see her at night sometimes, in my dreams,” he confessed. “Dropping the book, clawing at that wound in her throat, eyes wide and terrified, dying.
“The officer that did it just pulled out his spear, snatched the book, and turned back for the First Ring. He never even looked back.
“I held her on the ground until all her blood had spilled out and her gaze turned glassy. I shut her eyes and carried her to her family. Then I came home.”
I remembered what had happened next, the horrible wailing I’d listened to while lying in bed as my brother’s heart ripped in half.
“They never leave you,” he whispered. “Not entirely. I’ve heard stories about men who’ve lost an arm but sometimes they still feel it. Sometimes they even try to move it, flex their fingers, like it’s still there, the ghost of an appendage they once had. It’s like that but in your mind. An echo of another person, more intimately connected to you than anyone can ever hope to be again. A phantom, always there but just out of reach.”
I said nothing, though my heart broke for my brother as he relived the traumatic loss.
“That’s what Dahlia is going through.” Warren sniffled and wiped away tears I hadn’t seen fall. “And I can’t stomach telling her that he never goes away, that she’ll never truly be free of him. I can’t talk to Anna, I can’t reach her, but I can still feel her, and it’s almost worse. It’s a constant reminder of what’s missing. It’s like there’s a hole inside me, and the only person who could ever fill it is gone. I can never get her back.”
He stared at the table. He’d been that way for most of the story. As if the only thing keeping him talking was the fact that he didn’t have to see the pity in my eyes.
Warren sucked in a tight breath and finally looked up, his red-rimmed eyes meeting mine. “What you and Dante have, Adrian, don’t ever take it for granted.”
I frowned and, without thinking, rose and rounded the table. When I reached him, I embraced my brother. I wasn’t sure if it was what he wanted or what either of us needed, but it felt right. Finally understanding his pain, Dahlia’s struggle, it felt like the appropriate thing to do. He hesitated but hugged me back a moment later.
“What did you bargain?” he whispered into my hair.
I backed away, jaw tensed.
“Warren—”
“You said you had to promise them something, give them something, to keep Dahlia and I from being punished. What was it?”
I closed my eyes. It wasn’t the time to tell him this. After everything he’d disclosed, I couldn’t add to his burden. But I needed to say it aloud, needed someone outside of the estate to hear it.
“He wants Dante and I to produce powerful heirs for him,” I whispered and Warren sucked in another sharp breath. “Children who will have a better chance of advancing farther in the Trials because their parents did.”
“Adrian.”
