35. Ava
AVA
T y’s face was stone, a mask of defiance even as a gun pressed into his back, forcing him forward as two more guards piled in after him.
My chest clenched at the sight of him— Ty, who was supposed to be our backup, our failsafe if anything went wrong.
And it had gone so, so wrong.
A wave of terror surged up my spine, freezing my limbs and threatening to drown me. The obvious truth became unavoidable with every passing second.
There was no cavalry storming in to save the day. We were alone—Ciaran, Ty, and me. Caught in the Sochai’s claws.
We had been outplayed.
The dean wasn’t the High Lord. Of course, he wasn’t. If Ciaran had truly been groomed by his father, he would have known that. We had tipped them off when Ciaran had made his request to join the Sochai to the dean .
This had been a trap from the start, and we had walked straight into it, blind.
“You bitch,” Ciaran snarled, his voice sharp with rage and betrayal, his glare locked on Ebony. “She’s your daughter.”
A guard stepped forward and slammed the butt of his rifle into Ciaran’s cheek.
The crack of bone echoed through the chamber like a gunshot, and my scream tore from my throat, raw and desperate.
“Don’t!” I cried, my voice breaking as Ciaran staggered but didn’t fall.
Blood streamed down his face, painting his skin with crimson streaks, but he still stared at Ebony, defiant and furious.
His chest heaved, and his eyes burned with a hatred that frightened me. Ciaran was going to get himself killed.
They were both going to get killed. And me? They’d make sure I wished I was dead before the end.
The sight of Ciaran’s blood snapped me out of my spiraling thoughts. I needed to act.
There was no fighting our way out of this, not with these guards, these guns. My only weapon was the part of Ebony I had once believed in—the part that had raised me, even if it was a lie.
“Please, Ebony… Ma .” The word tasted bitter, almost choking me as it left my mouth. “I know you don’t want to do this.”
Her gaze flickered, the faintest shadow of doubt crossing her face .
I latched on to it like a lifeline, even though my own words felt hollow.
The truth was, I didn’t know this woman. The mother I’d called just hours ago, the one I had told I loved for the first time, wasn’t here. She was gone—if she had ever existed at all.
“Just let us go,” I said breathlessly, my words spilling out faster than I could think them. My lungs burned as I forced myself to hold her gaze, to find the humanity I prayed was still there. “We’ll leave. We’ll go far away. The three of us. We’ll never set foot in Ireland again.”
I paused, gasping for air, my chest tight with fear. If I stopped, if I gave her a moment to consider, she might give the order.
Ty and Ciaran might be executed right here, right now. Or worse, one of them might do something reckless, something that would get them killed.
“The Sochai will be safe,” I promised, my voice cracking. “Your secrets will stay buried. You can keep your plans, build your new society. Just let us go.”
It felt like dying. The words left my mouth, but they left a part of my soul behind with them.
This was a retreat, a surrender of everything I had fought for. Justice for Liath, for those missing girls, for myself.
I was choosing Ciaran and Ty over those girls. Over justice. I was letting the world burn—for them.
And while it felt like dying, I knew there was no other choice I would ever make.
Quietly, I said, “I know you never wanted to kill me. ”
Ebony’s gaze softened, just barely, and for a moment she looked more human than the monster I had come to fear. Her voice, when it came, was quiet, carrying a weight of regret that almost broke me. “Let’s not talk about what I wanted.”
We stared at each other across the dim tomb, the air between us thick with unspoken words and shattered dreams.
The silence was oppressive, broken only by the faint drip of water from the stone walls in one damp corner. Each drop echoed, an ominous reminder that time was running out.
I hated her. I hated what she’d become, what she’d done.
But as I looked into those pale eyes, I couldn’t deny the trace of sympathy clawing at my heart. She was twisted, corrupted by her own pain, but for a time, she had been something else to me. I had loved her.
I couldn’t reconcile that love with the revulsion churning in my gut, and it tore me apart.
We had both imagined a bright future with the other, one where she was my mother and I was her daughter. That dream, fragile as it had been, had shattered tonight.
It was gone, along with the last shred of hope I’d held for us.
And yet the ghost of it lingered, tugging at the edges of my resolve.
The glimmer of emotion in Ebony’s eyes was gone as quickly as it had appeared. She dragged her hands roughly over her face, wiping away the tears before they could fall. When she looked at me again, the cold, unyielding darkness had returned, a shield of ice encasing her heart.
“I’ll make you a deal,” she said, her voice sharp and detached, as if the moment of vulnerability had never existed. “I’ll let you leave…”
My heart stuttered with hope.
“You… and one of them.”
The ground beneath me felt like it was falling away. I barely registered the words, their weight too much to bear.
One of them.
It was a choice no human being could make. And yet she demanded it of me, her voice calm and indifferent, as if she were asking me to pick out a loaf of bread.
“What?” I whispered, the word barely audible, as though saying it louder would make it more real.
Ebony smiled, soft and venomous, like a snake coiling for a strike. She tilted her head, her pale eyes cold and calculating. “You heard me, darling.”
I turned my gaze to Ciaran, his cheek bloodied and his jaw tight with rage, then to Ty, whose calm facade cracked under the weight of realization.
Both of them looked at me, their expressions a heartbreaking mixture of defiance and desperation.
I couldn’t choose.
How could I choose?
For one to live, to carry my heart with them, while the other was left behind, condemned to the Sochai’s twisted clutches. To Ebony’s clutches. The thought tore through me, ripping me apart at the seams.
My chin quivered, and I shook my head, more to myself than anyone else.
“I can’t,” I whispered, my voice breaking. “I can’t do this.”
“You will,” she said, her voice smooth and unyielding. “While it would be nice to trust you when you say you’ll leave Ireland and never again interfere with the Sochai, I can’t take that risk. A good mother must always be wise, mustn’t she?”
The mockery in her tone was a dagger to the chest, twisting with every word.
I couldn’t breathe. My vision blurred, and my hands trembled as I fought the overwhelming panic threatening to consume me.
She continued, her voice so calm it was almost clinical. “To protect myself and my organization, you may take one brother and flee. The other will stay here with me, as assurance that you’ll keep your word.”
The room spun. Ebony’s words sounded distant, like they were coming from underwater. I couldn’t process them. Couldn’t comprehend the cruelty of what she was asking.
I must have looked horrified, but she didn’t care. I wasn’t her daughter anymore. I was just another adversary to be outmaneuvered.
Her tone hardened, final and unyielding. “It’s really quite simple. One… or the other. Choose .”
“I can’t,” I croaked, my voice breaking into pieces.
Ebony’s eyes narrowed, and she shrugged again, as though my refusal meant nothing to her. “Then I kill them both. And you.”
The guards moved in unison, raising their weapons with a cold precision that made my blood run ice-cold. Two barrels pointed at Ciaran’s head, two at Ty’s, and two more… at me.
My body froze, every muscle locking in place. My mind screamed at me to do something, anything , but I was paralyzed, my breaths coming in shallow gasps.
Ebony stepped forward, and I flinched, but I didn’t pull away when she took my hands in hers. She lifted them to her lips, kissing the backs with an obscene tenderness, her touch as cold as her heart.
“Well, my darling,” she said, her voice dripping with false affection. “What will it be? Or rather… who will it be?”
Disbelief, panic, and utter grief collided within me, a storm raging in my chest, tearing through every shred of composure I had left. It clawed at my insides, twisting and writhing, leaving me raw and exposed.
“You must decide now ,” she said softly, her voice carrying the finality of a guillotine.
The sound of weapons cocking echoed in the tomb, loud and brutal, like the snapping of bones.
The room spun. My knees threatened to give out.
“I can’t,” I whispered again, my voice barely audible over the pounding of my heart.
“You will.” Ebony’s lips twisted into a mockery of a smile. “Or I will decide for you.”