I placed my hand on her knee and color bloomed in her cheeks.
“I’m going to miss this place,” she said softly.
“We can always come back,” I reassured her. Malia nodded and placed her hand over my own.
“Shall we go?” I asked.
Before she could answer, she went pale, her head turned so she could see the path in the setting sunlight.
I stood, instincts flaring.
I stepped in front of the witch.
Malia didn’t move.
She didn’t even breathe.
Lilo and Niko came up the path, followed by two armed guards bearing the blue wave coat-of-arms of Moanalei Kingdom.
“I’ll keep you safe,” I said, and her fingers curled around my arm.
“Malia, you’re under arrest by order of Queen Sereth of Moanalei Kingdom,” said Lilo, but the hatred didn’t quite reach her eyes.
If anything, she looked exhausted.
“What for?” My voice was rough, and I drew the golden dagger. Lilo and Niko visibly tensed, but Lilo lifted her chin and answered. “For treason.”
“What treason has she committed? You have no evidence.”
“The Queen's justice doesn't wait for lovesick sailors,” one of the guards teased, then both guards stepped forward.
I planted myself between them and Malia. “Not happening.”
The first came at me fast. I ducked under his swing and slammed my shoulder into his gut. He staggered, but the second guard was already on me. His fist clipped my jaw, snapping my head to the side. I tasted blood, but Icaught his arm, twisted it, and drove my elbow into his ribs.
He grunted, but didn’t go down. The first guard lunged again, tackling me from behind. We crashed to the ground, the breath jolting from my lungs. I heaved him off with a curse, my muscles burning. I managed to get both of them on the ground winded, but not out for long.
The teenager girl pulled out a cloth from her bag, and I frowned. What was it?
“Five years ago, Malia was found creating a poison… this one.” She held up the cloth. “And she put this poison on an apple, the same apple that poisoned Snow White.”
A lump formed in my throat.
I knew this.
“We’re going now–together–” I said, “To make things right.”
“It’s not just an act of treason, but of betrayal,” Lilo said. “Malia is Sereth’s stepsister.”
And then it hit me.
It hit me so hard I stood there, stunned, like a gust of wind had knocked the breath out of me.
It all made sense: Malia had a stepsister. Her mother had remarried and her stepfather had died, leaving her with a cruel, beautiful stepsister.
Sereth.
Why hadn’t I connected all of this sooner?
