Chapter Thirty-Three
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
‘Elara?’ a voice whispered urgently. ‘Elara?’ it urged again, louder.
Dreamscapes swirled around Elara as she staggered, half intoxicated with Ariete’s blood, half poisoned with his venom. The two fought each other, struggled to control her magick. But she dreamwalked on.
‘Elara,’ the voice beckoned.
She recognized the dreamcloud up ahead, had wandered to it so many times growing up. And with a sob, she fell into it.
Sofia sat on the shore of Lake Astra, the still water a deep indigo, the mist rolling in and around her as she watched Elara approach, attempting to walk. But the pain had followed her into the dream, and she fell to her knees and crawled.
‘Sof,’ she rasped.
She tried to grip on to Sofia, but Sofia’s touch was nothing but smoke.
‘What have they done to you, Lara?’
‘Gem has been sweeping my mind. She keeps asking the same incessant fucking question. How am I supposed to know why I survived Ariete? Why Fate wrote what she did?’
Sofia stared out to the water. ‘The threads tie in mysterious ways,’ she replied. ‘As our lady Piscea once said.’
Elara refrained from sighing.
‘What about you, Sof,’ she replied gently, scared to break her friend who seemed so far from the spirited girl she grew up with. ‘Are they hurting you?’
‘Not more than usual,’ Sofia replied. ‘It doesn’t matter how they hurt me, even if I knew why you survived him, I’d never tell.’
Guilt plunged through Elara’s chest. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she whispered.
Sofia shrugged. ‘Where are they keeping you?’
‘In my old room,’ Elara replied. ‘You?’
Sofia gave an empty laugh. ‘In the dungeons.’
‘I promise I will get you out,’ Elara swore. ‘I don’t know how, but we will not die here.’
‘You won’t,’ Sofia said.
‘And neither will you,’ Elara said, trying to stroke Sofia’s cheek.
Sofia’s smile was sad. ‘I hope so, Lara. You just need to fight Gem. To wait her out. She’ll get bored. Just like she did with me.’
‘How long will it take?’
‘I don’t know. But I promise it won’t last forever. Ariete will want you out of here soon. For some new game to play.’
‘Lucky me.’
Sofia snorted.
A flash of starlight lit up the dreamscape, and Elara flinched.
‘That’s them,’ Sofia murmured. ‘Get back to your body.’
‘I love you, Sof. And I’m coming for you. I promise.’ Elara reached for her friend’s hand, forgetting for a moment, but Sofia stood up, out of reach.
‘I hope so.’ Sofia looked to the skies. ‘Please don’t fall for him, Lara.’
Elara stumbled back. ‘I’d never fall for Ariete,’ she declared in disgust.
Sofia only blinked, as Elara was pulled back into the waking realm.
The next day, and countless others that Elara could not keep track of, Gem visited her, aiming to break her mind.
She entered it with glee, distorting her memories and picking away every bit of information she could. She particularly enjoyed focusing on Elara’s parents, turning her happy childhood memories into things of nightmares, twisting the echoes of her parents’ dying screams into ‘ It’s your fault .’ Still, Elara kept Enzo and the secret of her refuge in Helios locked tightly away, buried so deeply that Gem could never discover it. The darkness beckoned and consoled her each night, weightless and welcoming, like being held in the arms of the night sky, and it was only then, alone, that Elara allowed herself to think of Enzo. It was her only avenue of defiance. A way to make at least one memory—one thought—her own. She pictured his golden hoop glowing in the Light. The freckle below his left eye. The furrow of his brow when he was frustrated with her. Over and over she rendered the images—her proof that she hadn’t lost her mind to Gem. Her one anchor to reality.
She was riding a fever from Ariete’s venom, the god not deigning to visit her again with his blood since that first night. The door to her bedroom opened, and she was staring at her father. ‘No, no, no, no,’ she whimpered, trying to move, though the venom rendered her useless. ‘This is not real, this is not real, this is not real.’
‘Darling, it’s me,’ the figure said, and her father’s voice was so warm that she began to cry, looking into his face. ‘It’s me, and I just wanted you to know,’ the warmth in his eyes was replaced with malice, ‘that it is your fault that we died.’
Elara let out a shuddering sob. ‘This isn’t real. You’re Gem. You’re not my father.’
In the blink of an eye, the form changed, and her mother crouched before her. Sadness tinged her grey eyes.
‘He’s right, darling,’ she lamented, ‘you did this to us. If I hadn’t given birth to you, the Star would not have appeared.’
Elara shook her head against the coldness of her mother’s hand as it touched her face. Over and over, like a mantra, she told herself that this was not real, that it was the Star of trickery doing what she did best. But as the screams of her parents told her that she was worthless, better off dead, her mind started to crumble.
Who is Alec? came the question, relentlessly, the same as every other day. ‘No one,’ she replied.
Cold laughter followed, before she blacked out, as she always did, clinging on to an image of golden eyes.
When she next woke, her back was wet with sweat, her neck stiff with pain, where Ariete’s bite wound throbbed. Her head lolled forwards as she prayed for respite. Hoop. Freckle. Frown. Hoop. Freckle. Frown. She repeated it again and again, until Enzo’s face came to her in her mind. She was still here. She was still alive.
‘Elara,’ a voice urged, and she jolted up, looking around wildly. She nearly fainted from the pain in her head, so much pain that she could barely open her eyes. ‘Elara,’ the voice said again.
Standing in front of her was the pale, dark-haired figure of Eli. Gem’s twin. The Silvertongue. She swore, rolling off the bed away from him, thudding hard on the ground as she buried all thoughts of Enzo as deep as she could. She tried to crawl, but her body wouldn’t obey.
‘Stop, stop .’ He took a cautious step closer. ‘I’m not going to hurt you.’
Elara’s chest heaved as she eyed Eli, bracing herself for the same cruelty his sister had shown. His piercing eyes were unreadable. His charcoal shirtsleeves were rolled up to show a black snake tattooed on his forearm, winding around it. His hair was slicked back, not a strand out of place.
‘Have you come to finish what your sister started?’ she spat, still trying to inch away from him.
‘I came to give you this,’ he said, producing a small knife.
‘To put me out of my misery? Why do they call you the god of knowledge if you don’t even know that I can’t be killed by a Star?’
An amused sound escaped him as Eli drew the blade across his hand. ‘He warned me you had a smart mouth.’
Elara’s mouth dried, her body singing out for the divine elixir now dripping from Eli’s palm.
‘Wait,’ she said, backtracking. ‘Who said that?’
Eli crouched forwards, gingerly picking Elara up and placing her back in bed. He sat upon the edge, tentatively skimming a hand over the wound at her neck. She took a deep breath at the Star’s contact again. That scent of rain reached her, along with his cunning, quicksilver power that never stilled, that couldn’t be read.
‘Ariete and my sister are fucking sadists,’ he muttered, forming his palm into a fist above her mouth. ‘Now drink.’
Elara held his gaze as she tentatively opened her mouth, allowing the blood to slip down her throat.
She jerked as her magick leapt towards him. Something within it sang to her, and her shadows followed it, right into the wound in his palm.
The contact caused an image to flare in her mind—Eli, sitting with a woman with white, long hair, a sky heavy with stars around them—before the Star whipped his hand away. ‘What was that?’ he hissed.
‘I—I don’t know,’ she said. ‘You tell me.’
He stared at her, something like fear in his gaze.
‘What?’ she asked.
‘Nothing.’ Whatever the look was, now it was gone. ‘That’s just…that’s all your body can take right now. It will keep Ariete’s venom at bay, at least for a few hours.’
‘Why are you helping me?’
‘Because I owe it. A certain prince bought my favour.’
Elara stilled. No, no, no, no. Every royal knew, warned as children, that one did not make a deal with the Stars. She thought to the bloodied Stella card that had wrought Ariete’s wrath upon her. A Star could be called by a blood sacrifice upon their card. But if someone’s wish was granted, it was rarely worth what the Star asked for in return.
‘What did he do?’ she whispered.
Eli looked faintly amused. ‘That’s his story to tell.’
‘Is he okay?’ she demanded.
Eli laughed softly then.
‘Okay? He’s feral.’ Elara gnawed at her lip. Relief swept over her at Eli’s assurance that Enzo had escaped with his life. But being indebted to this god…what had he given up?
Before she could ask more, Eli pressed his fingers to her temples.
She flinched, trying to pull away, but he held her firmly. ‘What are you doing?’ she implored.
‘I promised I wouldn’t hurt you,’ he replied impatiently. ‘Now stay still.’
Once the bargain was made, even a Star could not break it. It was that, and only that, which allowed Elara to trust the slippery god in front of her.
Eli closed his eyes, and Elara felt cool water over her mind, a balm against her ravaged thoughts. She almost sighed as it flowed over her, massaging her until she relaxed enough. She heard Eli’s voice from far away.
‘I’m placing a shield around your mind,’ he said.
She felt it. Cool walls of metal, the same colour as her eyes.
‘Surely your sister will realize what you’ve done?’
She heard an arrogant scoff.
‘Not when it’s crafted well enough. I’m not a Star of cunning for nothing.’ She felt him tinker in her mind, adding embellishments and adjustments. When he was done, she breathed out a long sigh. Her mind was clear, sharp.
‘When Gem looks in, all she will see is your mind and a few false memories pulled to the forefront. Enough for her to give up and not look past them to the wall.’
He straightened, adjusting his pinstriped waistcoat.
‘I’d best be going. My favour has now been fulfilled. I’ve kept you as safe as I can.’ Elara nodded, watching him go towards the door.
‘Eli?’
The Star’s eyes rested on her.
‘What did he do? How did he buy your favour?’
The Star cocked his head. ‘He had to tell me a truth. One that he cannot bear to utter aloud. One that could be wielded against him if I chose.’
Fear bloomed in her chest. To give up something so intimate, to a Star, no less.
‘Thank you,’ she whispered.
The Star said nothing more, simply nodding to her and heading for the door.
But then he halted on the threshold, turning back as though he had remembered something he wanted to say.
‘I have only once before met a person with such purpose and vengeance as Lorenzo when he summoned me.’
‘And who was that?’
Eli’s answer was a faint smile as he disappeared from sight, the door closing behind him.