Page 16 of His Eternal Claim

One brow rises. “You’d be declaring war.”

I tilt my head. “No.”

“Then what the fuck would you call it?”

A slow smile pulls at my mouth. “Retirement.”

Judas stares at me as I lean back in my chair.

“No throne. No successor. No Cosa Nostra. No crown for anyone to fight over.” I continue.

Realization flashes across his face. Followed by a smirk. “That’s a terrible fucking idea. But I like it.”

Chapter 8

Claim

THE REQUIEM | Present

Everything tastes like a lie nowadays. Days bleed into nights, and nights often bring memories I have no recollection of. Sometimes I am on the beach, sometimes the blue fades into white sheets. The only constant in that haze of thoughts is stormy greys and clashing waves.

I don’t recall much.

I don’t want to recall much.

Every time I try to, it brings a headache and terror, because what I find down there is not something my mind wants to remember.

I stare at the ceiling, watching as shadows stretch into fingers across the white paint. It feels like they’ll extend and grow to wrap around my throat.

I turn to my right, watching the curtains sway. I feel like I am somewhere where I was never meant to be. I should be sleeping, letting the pills Mama gave me take over and sweep me away, to be lost in a haze and never wake up.

But I faked the sleep. I let my breathing go shallow until Mama was satisfied the medicine had drowned my consciousness.

She left ten minutes ago.

Now, I am alone with the storm inside me. It’s a tempest of half-remembered touches and whispered vows that don’t fit the story I’ve been told. She told me Zagreus is a monster and had taken too much, but as much as I want to believe her, my heart doesn’t let me. The hatred I thought I had for him is not there anymore.

When I escaped him, I thought it’d bring me freedom, peace, and a life. Now, I don’t even recall what I was thinking.

My Mother’s version of the world is soft, lavender-scented, and safe, while Zagreus’s version is cold, iron-wrought, and terrifying.

So why does her safety feel like an interment, while his terror felt like being alive? His touch evoked something in me long forgotten, but the Mother I remembered is someone I’d never known. There’s no longer that spark in her. She no longer feels like home.

Jumped from one cage into the next. At least with Zagreus, everything was a lie.

Fake.

Less true.

Consuming.

But with her, the bars are carefully honest. She lets me pretend I’m free, even though I haven’t been allowed to set foot outside this room. A maid comes three times a day, always at the same hours, bringing me meals, changing my clothes, feeding me medicine. It all looks rehearsed.

I haven’t seen Corvin since I woke up. He betrayed his own brother. He spat on his bloodline to bring me to a woman I thought was ash and bone.

Why?

I roll onto my other side.