CHAPTER 32
All is silence. There’s only the slight rasp of Griffin’s and my breathing.
The throne room is empty apart from Mother. No court denizens occupy the long and ostentatious space. I don’t see Father, but then again, I hardly ever did. There’s not a single guard. Only Alpha Fisa, who watches us from her gilded chair. The room seems cavernous without anyone in it, and as heartless and cold as it’s always felt.
A small smile plays at the edges of her mouth. It reeks of cool satisfaction, and my pulse picks up a notch. The lack of an immediate fight makes me wonder about an even more devastating clash to come.
But I’m not scared anymore. My mind, my body, and my magic are finally ready for this confrontation that’s been my whole lifetime in the making.
Griffin and I stride forward, and I take in Mother with the same critical eye I’ve always had. Ivory gown. Loose, dark curls. A wide circlet of fat Fisan pearls. If her green eyes weren’t so hard and her expression so cold, I could be looking at an older version of myself.
Even so, I don’t feel the similarities between us like I used to, like a corrosive weight inside me leaking poisons into my system. Our paths diverged—far longer ago than I ever let myself believe. I don’t fear becoming her anymore, but I do still recognize the need to check myself at times, and to have people in my life who will do it for me.
She rises, fluid and self-assured, and we stop walking. Instead of moving toward us, though, she turns to a large, paneled screen on her left. An itch starts beneath my skin. There’s no reason for that to be hiding part of the wall.
“I’ve been waiting.” The confidence in her voice makes my stomach cramp. She grabs the edge of the panel and pushes it over. “They’ve been waiting, too.”
I don’t even hear the crash of wood on stone. Blood roars in my ears when I see the three iron cages backed up against the wall.
Aetos and Desma sit huddled together in the first cage. She looks okay—too thin, though, making her pregnant belly stand out like a disproportionate lump. He’s a brutalized mess. Despite Aetos being covered in swirling blue tattoos, there’s no hiding the bruising, and I can barely breathe through the sight of his battered face. They look at me, hope and relief exploding into their eyes. I see in an instant that they forgive me for this situation I didn’t even know about, but I may never forgive myself.
I swallow hard.
In the next cage, Vasili holds his wife. One of Vasili’s eyes is caked with blood and swollen shut, leaving three eyes to focus on me with unconditional love and to break my heart. I’ve never seen Phaedra cry before, but her eyes glisten now. A tear tracks down one of her weathered cheeks, and I can almost feel the ghost of it on my own skin.
Vasili and Phaedra were the first people to show me kindness when I needed it the most. Without them, I don’t think my broken heart would have ever stood a chance.
Looking at them, rage starts to pierce a hole through my anguish. How did Selena—Persephone—let this happen? These are her people as much as mine.
I force my gaze to the third and final cage, the one closest to me. It holds two people I hardly know but recognize anyway. My youngest brothers, Laertes and Priam. I have no idea of their worth. They look at me with some curiosity—and no hope at all.
My nostrils flare on a tight breath, and the look I turn on Mother is one of pure, scorching wrath. Lightning boils inside me, and I clench my jaw so hard it hurts. How did I not know about this? How didno oneknow about this?
“Your choice, Talia,” Mother says. “You enter one cage, and the people in it go free.”
Anger pounds through me. I want to snap and snarl, like I’ve done all my life. Instead, with utter calm but raging with Elemental Magic and volcanic fury underneath, I say, “You don’t make the rules anymore.”
Ignoring that, she gestures toward the cages. “Save a pair of them, or save yourself.”
“Don’t do it, Cat!” Desma yells.
Four of the most precious people in the world to me start shouting all at once from too-small prisons stained with their own blood and filth. They want me to save myself. My heart burns in my chest.
Two people remain silent. My brothers. They’re not that much younger than I am. Their faces are blank, their shoulders curled in. They know there’s no hope of my choosing them. My affections are already divided between the other captives.
There’s ice in my words. A storm in my veins. “I will not enter a cage, and you will not harm them.”
“You don’t make demands,” Mother snaps.
“I do. You listen tomenow.”
She chuckles, but her low laugh reveals a hint of frayed nerves underneath. Her eyes dart to Griffin and then back to me. “Who’s holding the leash now? You or your Sintan dog?”
Finally recognizing her acidic barb for what it really is—jealousy—I take Griffin’s hand in mine and then move closer to my friends, placing us in front of their cages. Mother doesn’t miss either movement, and I didn’t intend her to. I have what she doesn’t. What she’s always refused and pushed away.
“There is no leash,” I answer. “There’s a partnership. And trust.”
Something in Mother’s eyes seems to waver, although her expression remains hard. There are harsh lines around her mouth that I don’t remember from before, no doubt pinched into her face by years of unhappiness.
