But I can’t. Not when Briar’s bone is being set in the servants’ quarters, not when an entire family line has ended, not when a dozen people died, some by my own hand. My own hand, which burned and cut under the idea that it was a necessity, that violence such as this must have a purpose and not merely justifications, but grappling for either, I only come up empty.
We walk in silence until we reach the grand door to her apartments. But I am not done.
“Let’s break Dominik back,” I whisper. “Then we’ll see if he’s a worthy opponent of yours.”
Kassandra glares at me. “We’re not speaking of this again.”
The truth in the tapestry. The bronze-haired faerie with her bronze-haired boy, Maxian.
The diamond dagger,I think.That was the beginning of the end.
“The coronation,” I say. “Your power—”
“People have died.” She throws her hands up.
“And they will continue to die unless you take action.”
“Why me? Why do I have to be the one to do it?”
“Because,” I spit, my heart wilting. “You are in the most privileged position—you have more power than any faerie. More power than most High Fae.”
“No,” she grits out, voice tense. “You barely survived this past week. Have you ever thought that perhaps we females get fucked because we’re meant to?”
But I refuse to accept this—not anymore, not after the oily feel of Dominik’s power, not after the king’s genius cracked at the right angle, not when the males have been trying so hard to push us down down down.
“Why are we on the bottom?” I snap. “If we are truly weaker, lesser, why do they create laws to enforce what is supposedly natural? Why harm and kill us over and over? Why does Dominik want you—yes, you, Kassandra—to bear his child?”
She covers her mouth, no doubt holding back vomit. I feel it, too. But a plan falls into place in my mind that could save us both, that could free Benji and heal Briar, and prevent war between the Houses, avoid more bodies. We won the game, even when it was rigged, and faced consequences. We tried to rig the game back and faced more consequences still. What if the only way to stop them is tobecometheir consequences?
“Because he’s sick,” she says.
“Yes, and he’s weak,” I push. “Why hasn’t he married you toanother? He could write up the contract tomorrow. If not the king, why himself?”
“He enjoys torturing me.”
“Why?”
“Because my mother told him so.”
“And what did they both see in you that threatened them so? If you are truly foolish and weak, why expend so much of their energy curbing yours?”
Kassandra watches me, eyes flicking to her hand on the door. “I don’t know.”
“You told me only last week that you seek to be untouchable.”
“And I have failed!” she cries. “Many lost their lives because of my desire to do more, be more. Dominik proved he will always control me.”
My heart aches for her. With my battered body, my exhausted genius, and the sea of blood on the other side of the door, I want nothing more than to curl up in bed and never move again. Yet Lila’s words come to mind.We have been burned, badly, and what does it mean? That we are closer to the fire than ever before.I think of a moth in a mountain, chipping away away away at the right pressure points. I think of Lila’s niche that she carved with years of patient, relentless work. We cannot give up now.
I try again, softer this time. “If you did not expend all your energy healing, then how large can you loom? Dominik said so himself—if there is ever to be an Illusion king, it will be because you have birthed one.”
“I don’t want to birth one.”
“So become one.”
Kassandra’s face blanches.
“Stop this,” she hisses. “This is treason.”
