Chapter Five
I look into my brother’s eyes, which never leave mine as he perches on a desk near the pillar where I’m chained. As usual, I can’t read what he expects of me. I’ve misread Seth’s moods countless times over the years, often to disastrous results.
But I am not the little girl chasing her brother and sister around the castle anymore, begging them to play with her only to regret it the moment they actually did. Seth may hold power over me right now, but he doesn’t know what I’m capable of.
And that gives me an advantage.
“No,” I tell him. And it’s the truth, just as he asked for. “I did not miss you. I hardly thought of you at all.”
Seth sighs and makes a clucking sound with his teeth as if to say it’s a real shame. “We never were close, were we? Why do you suppose that was?”
Because I was terrified of you. Because the few times I tried for your attention, you made me regret it. “I couldn’t say.”
“Oh, I think you could,” he says with some amusement.
“I’ve heard you have much more to say these days.
” He picks up a letter from the desk. The candlelight shines through it, rendering the ink visible through the paper.
I recognize it even backwards as Adria’s hand.
“‘We have a problem with the lark over-performing.’ That’s you.
Please, for the love of all the gods, tell me she does not mean what I think she means. ”
“I have no idea what she means.”
“That’s a lie,” he says cooly without putting down the letter. “As I said, I can tell. Do you want to know how I know?”
“I suspect you’re going to tell me either way.”
He smiles. “You tilt your head down a bit when you lie.” He demonstrates, looking at me from beneath his eyebrows.
“You always have. Mother pointed it out to me when you were barely five years old. She thought that as bad as you were at lying, you’d be fire-born, and I’d be the shadow-born like her.
I think she would have been right, if it wasn’t for Adria. ”
“What did Adria do?”
Seth laughs as if my question is absurd. “What didn’t she do?” He pulls the chair from under the desk and sits in it facing backwards, his arms draped over it as if we’re about to engage in hot court gossip. “But enough about old times. Tell me what’s happened lately, and do not lie to me again.”
“I did what was asked of me,” I say carefully. No lies there. “I got close enough to Ronan to earn his trust.”
“How close?”
“You already know.” I’m sure Adria shared her suspicions with him, and I don’t intend to share any details with my brother.
“I suppose I do, but I didn’t want to believe it. Ronan, Sylvie? Really, Ronan?” To my surprise, he says the name with disgust rather than anger.
I’m the one who’s angry. “He’s ten times the man you are.
One hundred. Ronan treats me with respect, with kindness and trust and all the love no one in this family could ever be bothered to show.
He sees me for who I am, and he’ll come for me.
And when he does, you better hope he’s willing to show you mercy. Because I won’t ask him for it.”
“Oh boohoo, poor little Sylvie never got any love from her family.” He rubs at his eyes mockingly, smirking at me all the while. “So you fall into bed with our enemy just because he’s nice to you? Do you know how pathetic you sound? How ridiculous?”
“Less pathetic than the man who’s holding his own sister hostage. Less ridiculous than the man who has the audacity to act shocked that she’s no longer on the same side.”
“How rude of you,” he says, as if I’m the one being unfair here. “And after I went to the trouble of making sure you made it out of Faros alive—a wasted effort, I can see now.”
“That’s what you thought you were doing? Helping me?” Bullshit. He’s never helped me before. Why would he do so now?
“Is that really so hard to believe?”
“Yes.”
“You wound me.” He clutches at his chest. “I did at the time I planned your retrieval, yes. Of course, I had no way of knowing what was really going on. All I knew was that things were not going according to plan, and I thought Larus was responsible, based on what Adria said in her letters. When one of my spies found out he was planning to take you out of the city, I had them pay the crew to bring you to me instead. And this is the thanks I get?”
I’d had it wrong about what Seth had done. He hadn’t known what Larus was truly planning—he still doesn’t know.
I can’t let on what Larus’s real plans are, not while Seth can still try to stop them. “What do you think he was planning to do with me?” I ask instead. It’s a question, a question that implies I don’t know what the plans are when I do, of course, but it’s not a direct lie.
“Use you against Ronan, just as Adria would have done. Just as I will do. As you said, he’ll come for you.
I didn’t need spies to find that out. Every watering hole in the damn world is talking about your little romance.
Of course, I thought it was all a farce.
Thought you were in on the joke too. Now, I don’t blame you for having a little fun.
I’d rather gouge my own eyes out than picture you in bed with someone, but I’m hardly a prude.
A little tumble now and then never hurt anybody, and I understand that, as much as I’d rather pretend you’ve joined a temple and taken a vow of celibacy.
” His face turns from mild disgust to the greenish look of someone preparing to vomit.
“But of all people, him. And, according to Adria,” he says, shaking the letter, “you care for him.”
“I understand why you hate him. Truly, I hated him too, but he isn’t like what we thought. I know you want revenge—”
He holds his hand up to interrupt me. “Revenge? Me? Do I seem the type?”
“Yes, absolutely,” I say without hesitation.
“Well, you’re generally right about that. I am a petty bastard. But in this case, you’re wrong.”
I don’t understand. “Don’t you want revenge? For Father? For Mother? For what Selara did to us?”
“More of Adria’s thing,” he says with a shrug. “It was a war. We lost. I don’t know what she expected.”
I open my mouth to speak then close it again, shocked. “Then why are you doing all this? The war? The grain?”
Seth pulls on the skin of his cheeks, rolling his eyes back so they appear dramatically larger and more annoyed than ever. It’s exactly the same face he pulled when we were children. “Not the fucking grain again. Gods, I’m sick of hearing about the grain.”
“You’re sick of hearing about it?” I know I shouldn’t lose my temper with him—he’s dangerous, and I really can’t afford to set him off. But I can’t help myself. “People are dying, Seth. Your people.”
“People are always dying, Sylvie. That’s what they do.
They’re born. They live. They die. Tale as old as time.
Don’t tell me you’ve developed some sort of affection for the plight of the poor, innocent little commoners on top of everything else.
Gods, it’s all so boring.” He leans back in the chair, looking to the ceiling as if to beg the gods to come down and rescue him from this place.
“You see, this is exactly what I was talking about when I said, ‘What didn’t Adria do?’ It’s always fucking something with her.
Flood the granaries, hire the thugs, write a letter to Lord Whoever-the-Fuck of Some Fucking Place and ask him for his support.
Raise the armies, feed the armies, stop the ash harvest. Start it again.
It’s all so dull. This whole fucking plan. ”
“Then why go along with it? Why help her if you don’t even think she’s doing the right thing for us? For our people?”
“I told you, I don’t care about any of that.
But have you tried defying her? Oh wait, you did.
That’s how you ended up here instead of in the arms of your beloved.
” He literally gags at the thought of Ronan.
If I could get out of these chains, I’d slap him.
“Adria gets what Adria wants, and the rest of us had better stay the fuck out of her way. I went along with it because once she has the throne, she’ll be half the queendom away from me, and I can finally have some fucking peace.
” He shakes the letter again in my direction. “And that’s where you come in.”
He gets up from the chair and folds the letter neatly back into its envelope, flicking through the other letters in his desk drawer until he tucks it into what must be the perfect place in his order.
I don’t understand him. I never have, but I understand him now even less than before. “If you just want Adria out of your way, why not side with Ronan? He’s more likely than anyone to stop her.”
“Is he?” Seth turns back to me, leaning against his desk. “I know you’ve been blinded by his whole—whatever it is that you find appealing.” He waves his hand dismissively. “But if you think he can stop Adria, well…”
I’m tired of hearing him insult Ronan. “If you don’t care about revenge, then what do you have against him?”
“Are you kidding? What don’t I have against him?
We’re the same age, you know. You’ve known him for a season.
I’ve known him my whole life. The Shining Prince of Selara.
Little Lord Perfect, the golden boy. Gods, as annoying as Adria is, he’s one thousand times worse.
It was never enough for him to be the best at everything.
He had to prove it to everyone over and over again.
Fucking show off. And then the worst of it was that after he’d beaten you, at horses or sword-fighting or climbing or whatever the fuck he made you do, he’d come over and try to act like he wanted to be friends.
Like he was doing you this big favor by being such a gracious winner.
But that was all part of his act. It made him feel like he was better than you.
Come to think of it, he and Adria have that in common. ”
I can see Ronan being a bit of a showoff when he was younger, but I can also imagine him being forced into it by his father, and I’m certain that his attempts to be friends with Seth were genuine. He was probably baffled by Seth’s response.
Seth is jealous of Ronan, I realize. That could be of some use.
“But golden boy or not, if you think he stands a chance against Adria, against the five years she has spent plotting this, you’re delusional.
She will win, and once she does, she’ll go after anyone who tried to stop her.
And that won’t be me. Good luck to you, sister, assuming you make it that long.
” He crouches down before me, a wry smile tugging at his mouth.
“The way I see it, you have two choices. You can sit here and wait for Ronan to come and get you like you said he would, hopefully quickly so this whole thing can be over. And when he does, you can watch him die. And then I’ll hand you over to Adria, and you can live out the rest of your life, likely your very short life, at her mercy.
“Or—and here’s where it gets more interesting—you could use that special power of yours to save yourself.
Yes, I know about it. I heard you’ve been using it quite a bit, and I’d like to see it for myself.
I’ve heard all sorts of stories about you, including some stories that I doubt you’d even believe.
But none of that matters right now. You were right about one thing: I don’t care what it takes to get away from Adria.
I just want to live my life without her breathing down my neck.
If you’re as powerful as they say you are, maybe you stand a chance.
Not Ronan. You. So what’s it going to be, dear sister? ”
I can’t show Seth my power—my corporeal shadows—because I don’t have access to it without Ronan around.
But I also don’t want him to know that. I won’t be able to conceal it from him long, but I need to buy myself as much time as I can.
“I can’t use it right now. My magic was drained in the fight,” I say.
It’s a lie, but I’m careful not to tilt my head down as I say it.
“Good thing for you that it’s dawn, and that means I have to drag myself out into battle. Don’t worry; I’ll be back this evening. I won’t be anywhere near the actual fighting.”
“Father always fought on the front lines—”
“And Father is dead. I’m many things, Sylvie, but I’m no fool. I know that was a lie about the magic. Do you know how I know?”
I shake my head, sick of Seth’s games. “Just tell me.”
“No, I won’t tell you because then you’d stop doing it.
That thing I said earlier about tilting your head?
Now that was a lie. Do you see how easy it is?
” He pushes himself up from the ground. “I’d say you have the day to think about your next move, but I am going to have to insist you get some sleep.
I can’t have you using whatever power you have to escape.
” He reaches into his desk and pulls out a bottle of amber liquid.
“Would you just take this willingly so I don’t have to knock you out?
It’s a basic sleeping draught, nothing harmful. I take it myself all the time.”
“Why should I believe you when you’ve just shown me how easily you can lie?”
He takes out a clean white handkerchief and dabs some of the liquid on it, smiling as he does it.
It smells strongly and pleasantly of ginger and bergamot, spicy with hints of fruit.
“Good. You’re not as hopeless as I thought.
This is just cologne.” He rubs it on his neck and temples.
“But I would suggest getting some rest, especially if you think Ronan is coming for you. And have a bath—I’ll send a servant in. You look terrible.”