“It’s a long story. They’ve been working on the continent together for centuries. Preparing for Tristan’s return. Ensuring he would have enough support throughout the continent to take his throne back from Eamon.”
“So, she’s been…” Cassandra could barely finish the sentence.
“Waiting for him for centuries,” Ronin said, his voice softening. “She is the Delphine the Goddess’s prophecy speaks of.Born of phantom wings and mortal bones. Turned by the very Prince whose cause she’s dedicated herself to.”
Cassandra squeezed her eyes shut, a tear stealing down her cheek, and Ronin sat down on the end of the bed.
“Why didn’t she come to the colonies in all that time to find him? Why now?” Cassandra asked.
He placed a hand on her ankle. “She felt it was safer for him down there, to be out of sight and reach of Eamon and Leonin while she and Trophonios worked to grow the movement. Once they’d amassed a sizeable enough force, she sent me to recruit him. You saw how that plan ended. She must have had some final trick up her sleeve after Eamon arrested him.”
“So, they’re what?” Cassandra asked, her throat closing. “Fated to one another?”
Ronin shrugged. “She certainly seems to think so. But no one knows how the prophecy ends.” He gestured to Cassandra’s wings. “And his Turningyouas well has certainly called the entire thing into question. Too bad no one outside these wards knows you’ve been Turned.”
“Why didn’t you tell him that Ione was alive?” Cassandra snapped. “When you met with him at the Serpent’s Den?”
Ronin dipped his head. “She asked me not to. Wanted him to come to the decision on his own.”
Cassandra ran a hand through her damp, tangled hair. HighGods, she needed a shower. Needed to shut the entire world away.
All those fears she’d had back in Thalenn, before she’d given herself to Tristan, had been confirmed.
Tristan wasn’thers.
And even though she believed that the feelings he’d expressed at the time had been genuine, what did they matter in the face of the all-powerful Goddess who controlled their fates?
Perhapsthathad been the purpose of the vision; Adelphinae showing her Tristan’s true destiny.
And encouraging Cassandra to let him go.
Her heart began to pound, and she felt like she was suffocating. How was she supposed to continue training, continue working toward her appeal, if Tristan wasn’t waiting for her on the other side?
Mireille said gently, “The only way to know the truth is to survive. Win that hammer. And hope we canget out of here.”
Cassandra scoffed. “I’d actually have to defeat the Koenig to have any chance of that. And we only have twenty?—”
“Nineteen,” Ronin chimed in.
She shot him a glare. “Nineteen days left to train. It seems…”
She couldn’t get the word out.
Impossible, that’s what it seemed.
She pushed up out of bed, her head swimming. “I need to shower. Then I’d like to be left alone, please.”
Mireille grimaced. “We should really continue training?—”
“It’spointless!” Cassandra shouted. “I didn’t ask for any of this. Not to be Turned, not to be sent here, not to be given this death sentence that’s only giving you all false hope. I can’t do it. And the sooner you both accept that, the better off we’ll all be.”
Ronin and Mireille exchanged a weighted glance as Cassandra stormed past them and out of the room.
“If Tristan is meant to be with Ione,” her voice nearly broke and she didn’t dare look at them as she reached the door, “if that is what’s going to save this world, then the best thing I can do for him, foreveryone, is to just accept my fate. Let the Koenig end me. One less complication for everyone to deal with.”
“Cassandra,” Mireille whispered, reaching for Cassandra’s hand, “you can’t?—”
As soon as their fingers touched, Cassandra’s eyes slammed shut and a memory ripped through her mind.
