Prologue
SOFIYA
Song: 16 Psyche by Chelsea Wolfe
Blood.Sand. A day that no longer exists as time but as a constant loop in the back of my mind. I relive it so often, it feels like the only real thing in my life.
I can still feel the grit of the sand pressing into my knees. The acrid stench of gunpowder. The metallic taste of my own blood coating the back of my throat. My tears had dried long before the boots began their final circling—I learned in that moment that crying is a luxury, that pain can dry your tears faster than anything.
I still feel the wind like a whip against my back. Still hear heavy boots stomping in a broken rhythm around a broken girl. Big men. Dangerous men. Men I once called friends. They stood over me like I was prey, which I suppose I was.
I remember looking up, seeking a distraction from the pain, to see a bird soar through the sky. Oh how wonderful it must be to fly away from this world.
Ten Years Ago
The morning starts like so many others. Irina hovers by my door.
"Yelena, breakfast."
This means oatmeal and orange juice are waiting on my nightstand, and I have exactly twenty minutes before the tutor arrives.
"Your father is in a mood," Irina whispers as I drag myself out of bed. "I would make sure you are prompt this morning."
I eat fast. Clearly there can be no mistakes today.
I dress carefully, choosing a simple cotton summer dress with light pink flowers. I pull my long, dark hair into a bun. Something feminine and demure. I choose pink Converse over ballet flats, a small rebellion, something I don't think will matter. However, in a few hours, they will be the only part of me left untouched. The only small piece of protection I have.
"Hurry," Irina says, and I know something is very wrong. She is radiating tense energy, casting cautious looks toward my doorway. She rarely speaks this urgently and hushed, a clear indicator Father is angry.
I walk toward the dining room, past Father's office, and I feel it immediately. The air is different. Thicker. The hair on my arms rises, and s shiver runs down my spine. If only I can make it past this door, my tutor is waiting for me in the dining room. Something inside me screams to stop, to run, to hide.
Then Father shouts my name, and I know I'm out of time.
The hallway feels impossibly long as I continue my approach to his office door. It's made of something heavy, oak, maybe, or something worse. Its thickness is double any other door in the house. I can barely push it open, then the handle is yanked away from me.
Volk, my father’s second in command, is standing in front of me, his hand gripping my bicep, hard enough to let me know I have no escape but not enough to hurt. He pulls me the rest ofthe way in, pushing the door behind me easily shut. It makes a sound like a distant cry as it closes behind me.
I hear crying and smell the copper tang of blood before I see anything.
There's a body on the floor. Well, what's left of a body. The man, at least I'm pretty sure it used to be a man, is barely recognizable—someone in a suit, wearing an expensive Rolex. The shiny metal of the watch is now dull, splattered with blood. One of Father's men then. At least until the moment he stopped being useful. All of Father's men get watches to welcome them to the fold. Father calls it an incentive. But I've heard rumors about listening and tracking devices.
Then I spy her. Shivering and blood dripping onto the carpet, the rasp of her heavy breathing barely audible. MyMomochkasits on her knees in the center of the room. Blood pours from a wound on her head, and her nightgown is torn. She is such a bloody mess that at first I can't see her face clearly, can't see the terror written there. When she sees me, her entire body stiffens in fear, but she doesn't make a sound. Her eyes dart quickly back to Father and remain there. She knows ignoring the real threat in the room would be a great mistake.
I don't scream, though I desperately want to. I don't even utter a gasp. I don't do any of the things you're supposed to do. In the movies, people always scream or shout, they struggle and fight to be free, to get to their loved ones. Instead, I just stand there, frozen, silent and, observing.
"Bring that little cunt here. Let her see what her whore of a mother has done!" Father roars.
It's at this moment I understand we have no hope. If Father feels betrayed, whether true or otherwise, there is nothing that can be done. Father is a proud Pakhan, a man whose entire life revolves, depends, on keeping his men in line with fear and control. Like the world we live in, we are in his hands . Fatheris the maestro of this hell. Everything that happens or doesn't happen today will be because he ordered it.
Volk drags me further into the room, maintaining his grip on me. I feel his hand tighten on my arm as his other hand grabs my other bicep. I don't realize I'm resisting until he uses his full strength to jerk me forward, sending me jolting forward. With his hands on my biceps, I'm unable to raise my arms to save myself, and I fall to my knees a few feet from my mother.
That's when I really get a look at the body.
I force myself to view it from top to bottom, trying to identify who it was. I see the shoes and I know. The custom "T" burned into the leather of the loafers is a dead giveaway. Thomas. One of the few non-Russians Father’s trusts and a frequent bodyguard ofMomochka. A terrible feeling takes hold in my heart.
My eyes return to Father, expectantly. Father is nothing if not theatrical. He stands there, sleeves rolled up, knuckles bruised and bloody. His normally pristine, bespoke clothing is splattered with red. I expect to see some of his men standing, watching. But Volk remains the only other man in the room, his eyes not missing a single detail. He radiates confidence . Mother and I are not a threat to him, much less to him and Father at the same time.
"That dead motherfucker is your real father," Father hisses in Russian, slipping into his native language. English becomes too difficult to remember when he's beyond rage. "Your bitch whore of aMomochkawas fucking him. In my fucking house ," he spits out in the direction of Mother . She makes no effort to move out of the way, though she does flinch.
