Chapter 45
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
A mouthwatering aroma coaxed her eyelids to life.
Helaina sat up to find yet another delivered meal.
As unsettling as it was to know someone had come in here while she slept, she couldn’t resist the tempting arrangement.
She devoured the poached eggs and sausages, enjoying the pleasant feeling of fullness until she gathered her courage to exit her door.
She cautiously peered out into the hall, turning her head in the direction of Theo’s door. It was closed. She hurriedly shuffled in the opposite direction.
Elkron was a maze, but she surprised herself with how well she had memorized the intricate twists and turns so far.
Although washed and clean, she could still feel the essence of dried blood on her skin as she rubbed her fingertips together. It wasn’t the first time she had worn someone else’s blood, and if she chose this path and became a Divine, she knew it would not be the last.
What’s your purpose, Helaina?
She couldn’t stop thinking about Callum’s question and how to answer it.
Theo’s words muddled her head too, words of sweet promises and sinful desires. Before she had forced that beast to the surface again. Those words were a trick, his hands an illusion. That’s what any romance had ever been to her. A vile trick, a deception.
But Theo had held such truth in his eyes as he spoke.
She restlessly ran her fingers through her hair, completely at war with her own mind.
Had she overreacted? He hadn’t tried to hurt her . . . He had lavished her body with many types of affection.
It doesn’t matter now.
What mattered was that she was done living in her own shadow, the one she created from her grief. She was done torturing herself to satiate the guilt in her chest. She was done watching those around her suffer.
That’s why, despite the embarrassment of the night before, she made her way to the valley above.
Helaina would train. She would use the bone dagger when she was ready and seek out Ures.
No more hiding, nor running or making up childish excuses.
She would fight for Keles, not for the family that abandoned her, but for her people.
For the kingdom her brother loved so much and wanted to build a better world for.
She would fight for the good in this world. The Agathas and the Adriels and the Krystas.