As forZelena, she remained struggling under the weight of a dresser that unnaturally kept her pinned under my control.
“There is something to be said for you.” Mywords came out cold and dispassionate. “What wasit that you hoped toaccomplish? Was this all a way for you to feedoff ofasibling rivalry? Or was it all because you could not bear that I did not become a slave to your affections?”
Her labored breaths continued to struggle as she gasped out words withagonizingeffort. “No… I needed…wanted… to restore balance.”
My fingers were poised, ready to snap her off into a similar fate as Patrick, but the words piqued my curiosity.
“Restore balance?” I tilted my head, betraying the interest in that proffered explanation.
She groaned out a noise of something that sounded like an affirmation. Several shuddering breaths later, she strained to further explain. “You chose something soft… and weak.”
Clenching my jaw untilmy teeth ached, the thought that anyone would call myHeartspitesoft or weak rekindled the embers ofmy wrath. Charlee’s guidance over hearts and desires might be mistaken as a fragile existence, but as myHeartspite? She possessed the perseverance to endure my jagged edges and the tenacity to withstand every cut I had inflicted upon herheart.
“You seeweakness, Zelena. However, when I look at your commitment to envy as your religion, all I see is hollow devotion to your own shortcomings.” I straightened and inflicted my judgment on her with a damning snap of my fingers.
Enjoy a hell where jealousy eats at you from within until you cave in on yourself.
The two of themdeservedfar more than Ihad inflicted upon them. Come the day that my hold on their punishment was released, if they crossed mypath again, they’d understand how much restraint I had shown in not wrapping my discord in Mother’s shadows.
Light flooded the room,illuminating the wreckage as the space remained in disarray. Fixtures were covered in drywall dust, furniture was tipped over, and bloodied swords were in a violent pile on the floor.
The only unbroken thing I saw remaining washer.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Even thethickestofnightscan’ttouch the darkness of the mind. Unconsciousness surrounds me.I breathe it in, and I float freely through the nothingness.
Somewhere in the distance, I hear voices, but they’remuffled. It’s like being caught in the undertow, the ocean’s hold on you coming from everywhere and nowhere at all. Adding to the disorientation is knowing there is no moonlight to reach up toward.
“Eros.” Awoman’s voice cuts through the depths of my awareness like a finely tuned instrument.
I am not even sure that I have turned to face whoever just called out to me, but I respond just the same. “That’s not my name.”
A sharp correction is hurled at me. “Do not argue with me, child. You became Eros at your creation. The mortals do not dictate the identity of the gods.”
There is no pressing the issue further, not unless I dare to press the limits of this presence’s patience.
Even speaking quieter than a feather in the wind, my words echo around me and through me. “Who are you? Where am I?” I’m not sure which answer is more important, so I allow both to linger between us.
“One of the first of us. One who has been watching,” she responds with an ease that suggests this is her domain, where she is most comfortable. “You are here because I wish you to be.”
If what she says is true, she’s old, and that means she’s powerful.
Defying all logic in a way I could never explain to another, somehow the dark moves with liquid shadows to coalesce into the shape of a woman. The outline of her body is voluptuous, with beautiful curves rounding her hips, and swells,filling out her shapetoreflect an unwavering confidence.
An outstretched hand cups my chin, the contact lighter than the air itself but no less anchoring. “He sees you now.”
I don’t dare pull away from her touch. Respect for this deity demands compliance, not cowardice.
“Who?” I ask, even if my heart knows his name. A name etched into a heart that has never known a heartbeat other than its own.
“My son.” Even in the absence of light, I can almost feel the proud smile she wears as she says the words.
Then, it comes to me. Recollections of the woman castin marble, overseeing the front of Eryx’s property. Nyx, the goddess of night, who is the fabric that wraps itself around the universe, is here before me.
A part of me should know better, but I shake my head in hesitant disagreement as Idipmy chin.
I murmurin defeat, “How can he? He’s been nothing but?—”
