What would they say about all of this? The danger we’d faced on the road, the hate crimes, the curses and secrets I’d had to uncover. The choices I had to make. Lark would be torn between scolding me for not keeping more protection around, and diving into her analytical nature to try and solve problems. Chaz would say to screw it and come back to Veridia.
Horace…Horace would be our ever-faithful grumpy guard. Doing what needed to be done and sacrificing his time and energy to keep me safe. He was also secretly a teddy bear. He’d grunt, pretend to be uncaring, and then tell me I was blind. That everything I never knew I wanted was right within my grasp.
I exhaled loudly and set my small bag and the quiver of arrows on a large, flat stone. I started with my daggers, pulling them from their sheaths at my thigh and twirling them in each of my hands as I sauntered closer to the trees and targets across from me. I hadn’t had the time or freedom to train in a while. There wasn’t much of a reason to, ever since Gayl died and I took over as empress-elect. I was no longer the one patrolling the streets at night, taking down bandits and terrorists and stopping violence before it reached those who couldn’t defend themselves. I hadpeopleto do that for me now.
I tossed one of the daggers into the air and caught it with my right hand, quickly taking aim and sending it flying into the trunk of a tree fifteen feet away.
People Icommanded.
I spun and launched the other dagger to my left mid-leap, watching it land right below the first with a satisfyingthwack.
People whoreliedon me.
The image of the woman with the arrow through her neckwho’d died in my arms flared back to life, followed by Katrine lying ashen and rotted.
I stalked to the tree and wrenched the daggers free, then repositioned myself in the clearing. Gripping one, I aimed for a trunk farther away from the first and pulled my elbow back.
I always catered to what everyone else needed. What everyone else asked of me.
Like my council.
I flung the dagger with a grunt, and it zipped through the air to find its mark.
Or Galen.
I sent the second one following close on its tail.
And I did it willingly, because that was who I was supposed to be. For the longest time, that was who Iwantedto be. The one others came to, whom they trusted in, because so many people needed that constant in their lives. They needed to feel safe. And I loved being that constant piece they could cling to.
But what happened when they took those pieces of me with them? What happened when there was nothing left formeto hold?
I strode to the trees and yanked the daggers out with more force than I intended, bringing bits of bark showering down onto the forest floor. Spinning on my heels, I took up the same spot and fired dagger after dagger, envisioning a different moment of the last four weeks with each twirl of the blade, each glint of steel.
Everen Stryker and his bigoted mouth.Strike. The assassin at the bar.Thump. The carriage driver.Thwack. Galen’s secrets.
Dion Silenus. Rhys Penworth. The wary, judgmental eyes of people afraid of what they didn’t understand.
The fox burning at the stake.
Galen’s hands on my face, his lips on my skin.
Katrine’s lifeless features staring up at me.
I threw a dagger again, but this time it fell to the ground at the roots of the tree. I leaned forward with a gasp and steadied myself. The hole I’d made in the trunk had become too wide for the blade to findpurchase.
My shoulders fell with a sigh. It was in these moments of seclusion when I could let my emotions through. The overwhelming ones I kept locked away for fear of unleashing the animal, of being unable to control my actions or words.
Thorne had said they made me strong. But he didn’t see what a mess I was half the time.
Except…he had, I supposed. When I shifted and hurt him, and when he’d watched me try and pick up the pieces. How I’d almost fallen apart on multiple occasions from panic, from memories and fears I couldn’t get rid of.
Who is strong for you?
“What did that poor tree ever do to you?” a low voice said from behind me. I whirled and almost sent a dagger straight into his chest before I stopped myself with a sharp exhale.
“It’s not wise to sneak up on a girl with daggers in her hand, Lord Reaux.”
He held his hands up in mock surrender. “Consider me warned. You're quite handy with those blades.”
