I twist to face her, my mind a tangle, the world I thought I knew so far from this chamber of scintillating steam and terrible truth.
She smiles at me—the saddest thing I’ve ever seen, I think—the curl of her fingers brushing the underside of my chin. “There is much I do not know, either,” Nyatrix tells me, her gaze boring into mine. “Much no one in Liminalia remembers or understands, even if they claim otherwise. But I do believe that your God destroyed this city to punish His own people.” She pauses, her lips impossibly close to mine. “And even afterward, even in a new city, I’m . . . I’m not sure if He everstoppedpunishing you.”
My breath is a skittering thing in damp, newborn lungs, like I’ve only now entered the true world to find it dark and full of terror. And just like the infants I’ve delivered time and time again, I want to scream.
“I command you,” comes a voice, thin and uneasy, lacking its usual mask of authority, “to stop poisoning my betrothed with these foul lies, you Sepulchyre beast.”
Chapter 29
Renault stands at the mouth of the baths. His wrists are still tied behind his back, his ankles hobbled tightly, but he’s managed to get his blindfold down around his neck. Which means he sees me, unclothed in this bed of sin and steam.
“You’re awake,” Nyatrix replies flatly, like it’s barely of interest. She gives him no more attention than that, immediately returning to rinsing my wounds.
I refuse to meet Renault’s gaze, keeping my eyes trained on the mosaic floor. Its colors twist and I feel unmoored.
“What is the meaning of this?” Renault demands. I can hear the anger vibrating in his voice. “Release her from this madness at once.”
At that, Nyatrix whirls. She’s halfway to the foot of the stairs by the time I blink. Sinking back against the ledge, the words rise and then die in my mouth. I watch as Renault stumbles away a few steps, just barely keeping his balance.
“Thismadness?” the Lupa Nox demands, her voice louder than I’ve ever heard it, the chambers giving the words a rich timbre. “I am cleansing the woundsyouinflicted on someone you are meant to love and care for.”
Renault gapes like a fish at the nearly naked woman shouting at him. “You stole her,” he insists, though his gaze never strays to mine. Not like Nyatrix’s does, glancing at me over her shoulder with a furrowed brow, something I cannot identify simmering in her eyes.
I wish I had the courage to say I went with her. That I agreed to go with her. But the thunderous look of rage on Renault’s face steals the words from my mouth. Shame burns my cheeks as I stand there, speechless.
“She is not a jewel or an heirloom,” Nyatrix snaps, charging up the stairs.
Renault wrenches himself back, but between his tied hands and hobbled ankles, he loses his balance and tumbles to the stone floor.
Nyatrix is on him in seconds, a vengeful phantom dipped in black waters, the moisture on her skin turning her body to gold in the hearth-light. “She is not a thing to be stolen nor returned,” the knight snarls, looming over Renault like Death Herself. “And if you speak of her in that way again, I will cut you into so many pieces you will never be whole again.”
I wait for him to reply with his usual confidence—always the right words, always something that leaves no room for further argument. Instead, over the gentle lap of water in the knight’s wake, I hear only a whimper of agreement. In awe, I watch as Nyatrix straightens, making no offer to help Renault to his feet.
“Ophelia’s the only reason you’re not rotting in the antechamber with your knights,” she sneers at him, her profile half-lit by the fire at her back as she points toward the corridor. “Show some goddamn gratitude, you worm.”
With that, Nyatrix grabs Renault by the scruff of his tunic and drags him back to the corner where she’d propped him up when we first entered the chamber. My mouth is dry, my heart a runaway carriage on the avenue of my ribs, as she shoves himagainst the wall. From here, I can see every curve of her muscles, every powerful tendon and sharp slice of bone, lovingly gilded in the hearth-light like a painter crowning the First Son. Something flutters low in my belly.
She yanks his blindfold back into place. “Stay here and be quiet. If you do not, I fear I might lose my temper.” With those last words, Nyatrix turns on her heel and pads back over to the bath stairs. She pauses at the top, dusting sand off her bare feet, then plunges into the pool. “I do not like him,” she observes with an air of detachment as she wades back to me. “You could do better.”
At that, my spell of silence finally breaks and I let out a laugh. “I’m a crippled foundling with no House,” I sputter, looking up at her in astonishment. “He’s of the House Amadeus, foremost of the Twelve. His father is a storied commander, his mother a revered Host member of the highest standing.”
Nyatrix watches me carefully as I speak, her gaze slipping to my mouth, which makes me flush even harder. “In the place you come from, all of that is incredibly important,” she concedes after a long pause. “But the place you come from is not the entire world, Ophelia. And the world is much wilder than you think.”
I look up at her, haloed and hallowed by the firelight. I am on a precipice, I know, about to trip from its height into the darkness below. I am so close to giving myself over to everything I’ve been taught to fear, to rebuke.
“Maybe it is,” I offer, noncommittal, glancing away from her. The idea that Renault can hear us terrifies me. I do not know how to investigate this new world Nyatrix offers with him in earshot, with the knowledge that he braved the terrors of the Sundered Lands to find me.
I close my eyes, taking a deep breath of the hot steam wafting from the waters. If he came formeat all. Perhaps the Host Knights were only pursuing the Sepulchyre warriorwho escaped. Perhaps all they wanted was her. I can, I admit, understand that.
“All done,” Nyatrix murmurs at my back.
I nod and turn, crossing my arms over the sheer material clinging to my bust. My fingers brush the chain of my Saintess medallion, and all at once, my anni of devotion to the First Son come washing over me. Am I truly willing to forsake everything because of a woman who makes me blush? I remember when my feelings for Carina first bloomed, how enormous they felt, like the world began and ended with her nebula-brown eyes and chestnut locks and pale rose skin and soft lips.
It will pass, it will pass, it will pass.
“Thank you,” I manage, not daring to look at her. “I need to speak with my betrothed.”
Because he did come for me, despite everything that’s happened. He could’ve sent a regiment in his name. No son of the House Amadeus ever needs to don armor and go out into these Cursed lands personally. Am I truly so weak that I would mistake Nyatrix’s momentary kindness for anything greater?
