The pizza will be here in an hour. Tommy will bring it up to her. She will eat. She will survive another day.
And tomorrow, I will sit her down and extract every piece of intel she has.
That is the plan.
That is all this is.
I head down the stairs, my footsteps echoing in the quiet house.
She is my enemy's daughter.
Someone who will sell herself for a meal. Getting intel from her will be easy, sure. But why do I feel like this will be a lot more complicated than I originally thought?
15
ZARIA
Istare at the door after he leaves. The silence in the room is noticeable, like a hand closing over my ears.
I need to stop thinking. Stop replaying the way he just handed me the robe, the disgust in his voice when he said we don't do that here.
My eyes drift to the TV mounted on the wall.
The remote sits on the dresser and I pick it up, turning it over in my hands. My thumb finds the power button and I press it.
The picture is huge.
A woman in a bright yellow dress stands in a kitchen, smiling at the camera while she stirs something in a bowl. Her teeth are impossibly white. Her voice is cheerful, almost musical.
TV was forbidden on the compound. Cormac said it corrupted the mind. Poisoned it were the words of the Order. A distraction for weak minds. A portal for the Morrígan's enemies to slip into your subconscious. Only Cormac and the Brothers wereallowed to watch news broadcasts, and even then only for coded messages they swore existed.
We had books, old ones, leather-bound histories and religious texts, but no screens. No connection to the outside world except what Cormac allowed.
I back up slowly, my legs hitting the edge of the bed, and I sink down onto the mattress without taking my eyes off the screen.
The woman disappears and a man in a suit appears, talking about weather patterns and storm warnings. I don't care what he's saying. I just watch the way his mouth moves, the way his hands gesture at the map behind him.
I press another button on the remote and the channel changes.
A cartoon. Bright colors and exaggerated voices.
Another button.
A talk show. People laughing and clapping.
I keep flipping. My thumb presses the button over and over until something makes me stop.
A man with a scruffy beard and a round belly stands in front of a massive fireplace, gesturing animatedly at a table piled high with roasted meats and pastries. The title at the bottom of the screen reads: Feeding the Tudor Court: A Feast Fit for King Henry VIII.
I set the remote down on the bed beside me and lean forward.
The man has an accent I like, his voice enthusiastic as he describes the kinds of foods that would have been served at a royal banquet. Whole pigs roasted on spits. Swans stuffed with herbs. Pies filled with exotic spices brought back from distant lands.
A smile tugs at the corner of my mouth.
History. I love history.
I always have. Before everything, before the Order, before fear and blood and rituals shaped me into something unrecognizable, I used to read history books at night with a flashlight.
