“No?” I ask low, narrowing my eyes on him.
“This isn’t over. You still have seven more gods to go. I’ll be seeing this through, and I want an explanation of what the fuck is really going on.”
My teeth and fist clench.
“You’ve been told everything you need to know.”
Mara startles as a barking laugh belts out of him. I’ve never heard that sound leave his ass either, but I don’t flinch. Icontinue to stare at him as he falls the fuck apart in a fit of laughter.
“No. I’m done being in the dark. I’m not fucking blind, Thayla. Since the second my Valtrue was ordered to go with you all on that journey to find what the hell ever you all had to find, I knew something more was going on. Then not to mention being accused of stealing whatever it was and having my house torn apart.
“I’ve got a Valtrue member with weird abilities, your powerfeelsdifferent, your Valtrue has been acting different, the attacks at the barrier have lessened, which may sound like a good thing, but it’s not. It’s a shift in the pattern, and it’s never a good thing when the God of Obliteration does that. So, no. Fuck no. I haven’t been told everything I need to know.”
He ends his tirade by throwing his hands up in the air.
My skin fucking tingles with the control it’s taking me not to stab him. I can see it so clearly.
Creed’s sword would glide out of my halter smoothly, then it’d pierce through his heart like a tender piece of meat.
Breathe.
“Your Valtrue member is lying or possibly doesn’t know he doesn’t have a Domain under Pain. I don’t know what the fuck he has going on. Other than that, I’ve told you everything I plan on telling you. That’s the end of this.”
“It’s not the end. Why do you have to be so stubborn? Why can’t you just give me an explanation?”
So stubborn…
My calm, numb restraint cracks.
“Why the fuck do you think you deserve one?”
I throw my hands out as my bellow echoes through the trees.
“Gladian, you had me strapped to a fucking post, then you whipped me. You left scars on my damn back. What realm are you living in to believe you deserve anything from me? Everytime I look at your face, that’s all I see. Your smug-ass smirk and that damn whip. Every time I catch a glimpse of the four permanent streaks down my back in the mirror, I get a reminder.
“I have had totolerateyou every time I turn around because you just keep popping up. Every-freaking-where. You and them. Your shitty Valtrue members who spent a year beating and whipping the shit out of me. I owe you, them, nothing. If anything, you all owe me far more than you could ever fucking afford to pay up.”
Silence descends around us as my chest heaves. No matter the number of breaths I take, it doesn’t slow my heartbeat down.
“I didn’t ask for your help today and I don’t need it. At this point, I don’t want it. I don’t even give a shit about your signature. I’ll find another god.”
I turn and stomp a few paces away from him. Whatever shit Sevryn says to him, I can’t hear. The ringing in my ears doesn’t allow it.
“I lost my power.”
My feet fall still and my head jerks. Slowly, I turn back around.
“You lost your power? When?”
“After I did what I did to you.”
I sneer at him. “Say it. Say what you did.”
He closes his eyes, taking a deep breath.
“After I whipped you, I lost my power. It gradually came back over the course of a few days, but weeks passed and they’d randomly just…stop working. It took me that long to realize they’d quit working every time I spoke of or thought of you.”
“Well, I can assure you, I don’t have the power to do that to you, so…”
