I turned to see her cottage in flames. The roof already caved in, and the walls blazed with fire.
“Malia…” Her home. Destroyed.
I pushed on my hands to stand up but froze when the grass felt unnaturally sticky.
Blood.And it wasn’t my blood.
My stomach tightened, like a net being hauled in too fast, cutting into itself. This was worse than a shipwreck,worse than watching a man go under and knowing you couldn’t save him.
Did they kill Malia?
A scrap of fabric from her black dress sat on the ground. Soaked in blood.
I saw them drag her away…Then why was there so much blood?
They killed her…
No.
No.
No!
I stood and rushed to the house, wondering if they threw her into the flames, as they did before. But the place was ransacked, everything destroyed. And there was no sign of Malia.
Not a body.
Just that scrap of her dress and the sticky blood on the grass.
If they didn’t kill her on the spot she was, no doubt, dead by now. They had dragged her away and I’d been out forhours.Malia was arrested with the intent of being killed as soon as she reached Sereth.
And the worst part? Maliahadcommitted a crime. Aterriblecrime.
It was one thing for a member of the royal family to be threatened by a commoner. But by another royal?
That’s why Sereth killed her stepmother…
And now she’d kill Malia. If she hadn’t already.
The twins were right.
Anger boiled inside of me: anger at myself, anger at Malia for not telling me the truth sooner, but anger especially that now… we wouldneverbe together.
She was gone.
Gone!
I kicked a metal bucket, falling to my knees as I let out a scream. My head was spinning, a million emotions kicking in all at once. But the strongest emotion–stronger than the anger and sadness–was grief. Grief because I’d lost her.
I lost her.The one person that had ever become important to me, more important than anything else… and I lost her. I didn’t protect her. I didn’t open myself enough so that she felt safe telling me the truth.
The whole truth. We could’ve avoided all of this if we had both been honest–completely honest–about our pasts.
I was an idiot. I had to get out of here. I hurried towards the ocean, knowing it would not solve my problems. But I had to get away from her cottage, away from this situation that was sowildlyout of my control.
I paced along the shore,knowing I had to do something. Anything. But what? Malia was a criminal, and even I, as powerful as I had become, could not save her. The most powerful, wealthiest, untouchable whaler in all the seas could not save her.
I kicked the sand and ran my fingers through my hair, frustrated. Furious at myself. Furious that I hadn’t discovered her past sooner, or at least confronted her about it sooner.
