"Are you staying?" Her pale eyes are huge in her thin face. "Or are you leaving too?"
The question punches the air from my lungs. "What? No. No, Ami, I'm not leaving."
"Papa left." Her voice is small, factual. "Everyone leaves."
"I'm not going anywhere." I gather her closer, press my lips to her forehead. "I promise. I'm right here."
"But Uncle Val is your boss now." She says it so matter-of-factly, like she's commenting on the weather. "Right? Like Papa was?"
Bile rises in my throat. I swallow it down, force my voice to stay calm. "That's... complicated."
"But it's true, right?" She pulls back to look at me, confusion written across her features. "You have to do what he says?"
"Yes." The word tastes like ash. "But that doesn't mean I'm leaving you. I promised I'd take care of you, and I meant it."
She considers this with the solemn gravity of a child who's lost too much too fast. Then: "Do you hate him? Uncle Val?"
The question catches me off-guard. "Why would you ask that?"
"Because you won't see him. And you sound angry when people mention him." Her brow furrows. "I don't want to see him either. But I don't know if I hate him or if I just... miss Papa too much."
My heart cracks. I pull her back into my arms, rest my cheek on top of her head. "I don't hate him, Ami. He's a good man. He tried so hard to save your father."
"Then why won't you see him?"
Because I'm a coward. Because seeing him hurts worse than avoiding him. Because every time I think about those months we spent growing closer, all those moments I thought meant something, I want to scream or cry or break things.
Because I fell for him like a fool, and now I have to live with the knowledge that I was never anything more than property.
"It's complicated," I repeat weakly.
She doesn't push further. Just curls against me and sighs, a sound too world-weary for someone so small.
We sit in silence as morning light crawls across the floor. Outside, I hear the household stirring—servants moving through hallways, the distant clatter of breakfast being prepared, life continuing despite the grief that's hollowed us both out.
And somewhere in this house, Valas is probably sitting alone. Probably blaming himself for Daryn's death. Probablywondering why we won't see him, why Amisra flinches from his name, why I've locked us away like he's the enemy.
Part of me wants to go to him. Wants to offer comfort, to remind him that he did everything he could, that some things are beyond even magic's reach.
But I can't.
Because the moment I see him, the moment I'm in the same room with him, we'll both remember. We'll both know.
Master and slave.
Owner and owned.
Everything I ever feared. Everything I tried so hard to avoid.
And now there's no escape.
15
VALAS
I'm unraveling.
That's the only way to describe this sensation—like someone's found the thread that holds me together and they're pulling, pulling, pulling until there's nothing left but loose ends and empty space.
