A tear rolled onto my cheek. Voice catching, I replied, “But he said it was my failure that caused their deaths. He always said I was to blame. He used that event to convince the courts that I should be enslaved. It was after that day that he put his collar on me.”
A spike in Jax’s aura flooded the room, and his chest rose quickly. Malevolent energy suddenly swirled around him. “Do you think your guardian asked you to call the semelees that day in hopes it would result in deaths? Because if it did, he’d then have a reason to enslave you to him.”
My lips parted. “You think he wanted fae to die?”
“You and I both know he has no bounds to his treachery. That event may have been planned by your guardian all along.” Jax took several deep breaths, but his aura still swelled in steady, thickening waves. “You’ve seen more of his true character in the past few weeks than you’ve probably seen in your entire life. Do you still think he’s innocent of any wrongdoing that day?”
My forehead furrowed, and all of the memories flooded back of what my guardian had revealed in the Ustilly Mountains and the days since then. The lies. The betrayals. The murder he committed against my own mother.
Slowly, my heartbeat began to calm, and my chest didn’t feel quite so tight. “No, he’s not innocent. He’s far from innocent.”
“And do you feel that you genuinely warrant all of the self-loathing you’ve inflicted on yourself since that horrible event?”
I nibbled on my lip, my brow furrowing more. I’d been five summers old.Five.
I shook my head. “No, I never would have tried to venture to the Veiled Between that day if he hadn’t insisted on it. I only did so because he promised me chocolate syrup on my ice cream that night if I tried.”
Jax’s lips curved up in a sad smile, and he cupped my jaw again, caressing my face. “Do you see it now for what it truly was?”
A tear hit my cheek, but instead of guilt causing it, a bolt of relief did. “He took advantage of me again that day, and like you said, maybe it was all planned from the beginning.”
“Exactly. Yet he convinced you that it was your mistake, and I have no doubt he twisted the truth when he went to the courts. And since the fae near you that day all perished, my guess is the courts issued that decree out of an abundance of caution, especially when your guardian put that collar on you that guaranteed it would never happen again.”
A rushed breath escaped me, and for the first time since that horrible day, my chest didn’t feel so crushed. So constricted. “I never would have killed those fae that day if my guardian hadn’t been involved.”
A genuine smile lifted his lips. “No, you wouldn’t have.”
I sat there for another moment, processing all of what we just discussed, and for the first time in my entire life, an emotion entered me that I’d never felt before when I thought of that day...forgiveness. Forgiveness to myself and the child who had been abused.
Remorse still filled me and likely always would. But for the very first time, the self-loathing eased, and a ray of hope entered my soul that I wasn’t entirely at fault for what had transpired that awful day.
Once again, it was becoming apparent that, like so many other events in my life leading up to this moment, I had been a victim too. A child caught up in a treacherous adult’s plan.
And I wasn’t to blame for that.
CHAPTER 3
Since I assured Jax I was fine, he left to check on his brother.
I got up and stretched. The sleep had helped the fatigue I’d felt from commanding the semelee. Not to mention, the revelation I’d had while speaking with Jax had lightened my soul in a way I’d never felt before. Once again, he was right. My guardian was more to blame for what I’d done when I was five summers old than I ever should be.
But one thing still faded my spirit. The collar was slowly restricting my magic again. Twice now it had activated. The first being when I ventured to the Veiled Between right before we found Bastian, causing the semelees to pull back and put a restriction on the number of questions I could ask. And then this morning when I tried to command the semelee back to my side while it’d been wrapped around Bastian. It’d tried to resist and had almost turned its attention on Jax and his friends versus listening to me.
No matter all that I’d done, I was stillcaged.
I balled my hands into fists and padded across the room.
After changing into clean clothes, I slipped through the door into the bathing chamber. My reflection greeted me in the mirror. Tangled hair fell around my shoulders, and dark smudges lined the skin beneath my eyes.
In the ignited fairy lights, the gold collar on my throat gleamed like a blade.
If only I could rip it off.
I grabbed a brush and vigorously began working it through my hair.
The purple gem at my collar’s center flashed in the light with every swipe of the bristles against my scalp. That magical gem was behind my imprisonment. Each time the gem’s magic had surged slightly, it’d alerted the semelees to my magic’s full potential still being doused, and they’d paused. The collar’s suppressing effects had been minimal, but its controlling pulses had been just enough to jar my magic and cause me to lose my grip on the semelees while tiring me in the process.
Sighing, I finished brushing and pushed the hair from my face. The semelee’s response was a grim reminder that soon, even if it took months to fully activate again, eventually the collar would contain me completely.
