Chapter 36 Sorin
CHAPTER 36
SORIN
S orin felt his flames gutter in his veins. If his blood could freeze, he was sure it would have as Scarlett told him of that night. Even the fire in the fireplace went out. Scarlett kept talking in the dark, as though if she were to stop, she would not be able to finish the story. Mikale had done atrocious things to her. Threats and promises still hung between them. No wonder she was terrified of being seen with Callan. If his fire had gone out while she spoke, it now roiled in his veins as he worked to control his rage.
“I did not leave the manor for nearly three months. I don’t really remember them to be honest. I didn’t get out of bed for the first one. They concocted some story to tell Lord Tyndell about me that he accepted and allowed me to stay.
“After the first month, Cassius would make me get up, and he would set me up in the sunroom or my room or somewhere else before he’d report for his duties. Tava would try to talk to me. Most days, she would just sit with me until Cassius returned. Nuri came one night. Said the Assassin Lord demanded I be brought to him. Cassius couldn’t refuse, but I did. I refused to set foot in the Black Syndicate. I couldn’t face going there knowing she was gone. He eventually came and collected me himself.”
“The Assassin Lord came to the Tyndell manor?” Sorin asked. His first question in the entire time she had been speaking.
“Yes,” she whispered. “He came in the night and… Let’s just say he knew what wounds I had received to my stomach and ribs. He knew where to strike. He took me before the Council himself. Nuri and Cassius were also summoned.”
“What happened?”
“Cassius was punished. For leaving me.”
“But he saved Nuri.”
“Yes, but—” She chewed on her lower lip. “Cassius was not only assigned as my private tutor. He was assigned as my personal guard. His job is to put my safety above all else.”
When it comes to her, I outrank everyone .
“Why?”
“Because of who I am, whose daughter I am. Who I am supposed to become to the Syndicate,” she whispered.
“You are to eventually take her place on the Council?”
“Yes.
“But you are not a Healer.”
“No. That was to be Juliette’s place. She was Sybil’s daughter.” She was still, hardly daring to breathe. “I outrank Nuri because she is not the Assassin Lord’s blood daughter. I am to take his place when he dies. Nuri shall only inherit his riches. Cassius outranks her because he is my personal guard, and my safety is his highest priority.”
“Did Juliette not have a personal guard then?”
“Yes. Rylan. He was killed for his failure to protect her. It was not quick nor painless.”
“Were you…” He almost couldn’t bring himself to say it. After everything she’d gone through they couldn’t have still… “Were you punished?”
For the first time since she’d started speaking, she turned to face him. Her eyes were dark and hollow. Shadows seemed to swirl in them. “Yes. Nuri and I had to clean out her room. I would have rather they had beaten me within an inch of my life.”
“They did not demand retribution for Juliette’s life?” Sorin asked.
“No.” Scarlett’s tone turned bitter. “I fought for it. I argued with the Council and then with the Assassin Lord himself. I refused to give in. I became obstinate and refused to take assignments or jobs. When it became clear, I would not let it go, he devised a new punishment for me. I was to remain with Lord Tyndell. How it was worked out, I do not know, but he knew that shoving me into a life of propriety and rules would be worse than locking me in a dungeon. He knew that shoving me into a pretty cage would break me more than any amount of physical pain would. So here I sit in a cage that keeps Mikale at bay but still forces me into his presence, designed to eat away at me until the Assassin Lord can keep me under control to use as his own once more.”
“And your current assignment? The one you have not yet completed? He will punish you for such tomorrow night?” Sorin inquired.
Scarlett did not speak for several minutes until she said softly, “Months later, in the early days of summer, Callan and the king had come to dine at the manor with Lord Tyndell. Lord Lairwood accompanied them, along with Mikale. I was, of course, required to attend now being a member of the household. Cassius made sure I was seated at the opposite end of the table. Between Callan and Mikale, I was watched constantly.”
“I was at that dinner,” Sorin said, his eyes widening at the recollection. He hadn’t wanted to attend, but his hand had been forced by Lord Tyndell. That was the night he’d first seen her, first caught her scent. He remembered the wraith of a woman at the other end of the table. Cassius had sat next to her, often hiding her from view. She had slipped from the room as soon as dinner was over, and he had thought nothing of it. He had simply thought she was a shy, docile Lady.
“You likely were,” she replied. “I wouldn’t have noticed. I said little and left as soon as it would no longer be considered rude to do so. I was nearly to the steps to go upstairs to my room when Mikale’s voice came from behind me down the hall. ‘Off so quickly, my pet?’ he had crooned.
“I froze at the base of the stairs, forcing myself to breathe in and out. He continued down the hall to me until he was a foot away. ‘You do know we are not done yet, don’t you?’ He brought his hand to my cheek, and I flinched away. He only chuckled under his breath. At the sound, something in me snapped. I grabbed his tunic and threw him against the wall. The dagger I always carry was at his throat. ‘You are right,’ I told him. ‘We are not finished. You and I. I shall kill you for taking her from me. Mark my words.’
“He only purred back to me, ‘Then let the games begin.’
“Cassius came down the hall then. He saw me with my knife at Mikale’s throat and his lips thinned. He sent Mikale back to the dining room and took my hand. He led me outside and summoned a carriage, and he took me to the waterway by the Pier where we walked along the waves. The sea has always been a place for me to sort myself out. My mother had often taken me there. That was the night we found the beach I took you to. When we emerged from the cavern, there were sea stars all along the beach under the moonlight. It was beautiful, but as we walked, we came across one that had gotten too far up the beach. The waves couldn’t reach it. It was already starting to dry out and gulls were circling. I scooped it up and carried it to the water. As I released it, I fell to my knees and sobbed. It was the first time I had cried since that night.
“The sobs wracked my body, and Cassius dropped down beside me and held me, saying nothing. My stomach hurt, and I had phantom pains from the rib injuries I incurred that night. I cried until there was nothing left in me, and when I stood, those memories were shoved so far down… I never allowed them to come to the surface again. I met you a few months later.”
He felt Scarlett shiver against him as she finished speaking, and he restarted the fire in the fireplace with a flick of his hand. “I am sorry. About the fire going out,” he said, interlacing his fingers with hers.
“It is a dark tale,” she said simply. “I suppose it makes sense to tell it in the dark.”
“How can you be in the same room as him?”
“Well, I’m not exactly pleasant to him,” Scarlett said bitterly. “The words I say to him are carefully chosen. It is indeed a game we play, he and I, but I manage to stay a step or two ahead of him.”
Sorin thought back to the various interactions he’d seen take place between her and Mikale. How she’d spouted off about finding men so unreliable that night he’d first met her. The time Drake had warned her that early morning that Mikale was there. Then there was a few nights ago when she’d panicked about possibly having to dance with him, to feel his hands on her again.
“Please do not pity me,” Scarlett said softly. She was looking down at her lap, at their hands linked together.
Sorin reached over with his other hand and lifted her face to look at him. Something in his chest tightened at the tears on her cheeks. “I do not pity you, Scarlett. Your past makes you who you are, even if you have lived through hell. It can either break you or forge you. Admiration of your courage? Yes. Utter fury at what you have been forced to endure? Yes. But never pity.”
“Most days, I feel like he did break me,” she whispered. “Some days I wish he would have just killed me instead.”
The fear and panic and utter desperation that flooded over him was like being shoved under icy water and held there.
“Don’t,” he whispered. “Do not ever say that again.”
Sorin held her chin for a few more seconds, staring into her icy blue eyes. When he let go, she let her forehead fall against his chest. He stroked her hair slowly, running everything he’d just learned through his mind. He needed to tell her about her mother and her heritage, but he couldn’t possibly bring it up now after such a heavy conversation.
The clock over the mantel said it was nearing midnight. Scarlett had shifted her head back to his shoulder and, after ten more minutes of silence, each left to their own thoughts, he realized she’d fallen asleep. He woke her just enough to have her take her tonic. She was instantly back asleep. With a wave of his hand, a pillow came from the bedroom carried on a phantom flame. He laid it on his lap and gently eased her onto it to avoid a stiff neck. She sighed in her sleep, stretching out her legs, wincing slightly at the strain on her abdomen.
Sorin wasn’t sure who he wanted to kill more— the Assassin Lord or Mikale Lairwood.
He arranged a blanket over her, sending a flood of heat through it. He watched her sleep, just as he’d done on his various watches the last few days. Her breathing was slow and even. He stroked her hair, his fingers grazing her cheek.
Exhaustion came over him swiftly, and he realized he had hardly slept these last few nights. He required little sleep when he didn’t have access to his magic, but when his magic was coursing through his veins, it used up his energy stores quickly. He settled back into the sofa, careful not to disturb her as she slept.
The conversation they’d had tonight was one he had not been prepared for. Never in all his years would he have guessed at what she had endured. He understood then why she had downplayed her abilities. He understood why she stayed sequestered in the Lord’s manor. He understood why she had said she wanted to go anywhere but here that night in the training barracks.
He understood her and Cassius and what they had become. He had kept her from breaking, had done whatever it took to keep her from going over an edge.
When it comes to her, I outrank everyone.
He finally let himself acknowledge the fact that he’d been jealous. He’d been jealous at the ease of her and Cassius. He’d been jealous of Callan and that he got to sleep next to her so many nights. He’d been jealous of Nuri for knowing details about her that she would not share with him.
Then there was the matter of Mikale. How he would be able to face him again after this knowledge, he did not know.
As sleep finally claimed him, he let himself acknowledge something else he’d been pushing away. Something he’d refused to even entertain these last few months, not thinking it was a possibility. He let an old prophecy come to his mind made by an Oracle a few years prior. It was one he had thought he had run from but had ended up running right into.