Chapter 2
Chapter Two
Malakai
Every lie I’d been fed over the past two years hung over my heart, poised to pierce, when I saw my mother and the fucking wrecked look in her eyes.
For so long I’d been the only one to feel the effects of Lucidius’s decisions. His lies and betrayals—fucking Spirits, the beatings, even—it had all only affected me.
Or that was what I’d thought. I hadn’t considered how far his wrath would stretch when I’d disappeared.
The marks were upon my skin—I’d ensured that—but it was becoming clearer every day how far the impacts reached. While I was the only one physically under his thumb, my mother, my friends, Ophelia…they were the ones who felt it.
Looking at my mother now, those fragmented lies threatened to dig into me until my sorrow was an ugly crimson mess upon the floor.
“Mali.” My nickname was a sob up her throat. Then, she was across the room, hugging me, tears staining my shirt.
Something thick lodged itself in my throat, but I couldn’t cry. I wouldn’t cry when she was already so distraught.
She pulled back to look at me and ran soothing hands over my hair and down my face, carefully tracing the scar across my jawbone. The new one, left by my father’s ring in some of our last days together.
I flinched when she touched it, hating that thick white line every time I looked in the mirror.
It was a blatant reminder of everything I’d faced—of every way he’d hurt me.
One I couldn’t avoid. One everyone’s eyes went to the second they looked at me and the world became a crushing weight on my chest.
“Did he…” Her voice trailed off.
My heart sped like it was going to leap out of my throat. My voice was rough when I spoke. “I don’t—I can’t—”
“Shh, shh. We don’t have to talk about it.” She stretched up to kiss my forehead like I was a child again. “You’re safe,” she whispered against my skin, reassuring us both: You’re alive.
I wasn’t sure what she already knew, but I was certain from the tears lining her cheeks that a piece of her had assumed I was dead—there was a dim light of relief in her eyes.
“Let’s sit,” she said. “Let’s talk.”
I followed her across the stone floor; my footsteps softened as we stepped onto the thick carpet in front of the hearth.
We settled on one of the three settees in the sitting area.
Why were these even here? This room was meant for sequestering prisoners.
But the gray velvet couches matched the linens on the bed and the curtains hanging from its posts.
A dining table was laid with gold-etched dishware, a pitcher of wine in the center.
“Mali?” my mother asked, blue eyes hollow.
The flames warmed my back, siphoning out the chill I hadn’t noticed. Bracing my forearms on my knees, I sagged forward, indulging the heat, head hanging limply between my shoulders.
“I stayed a night in Turren on my journey here, and the rumors—they’re horrific.” She rubbed a hand in circles between my shoulder blades. I prayed she couldn’t feel the raised edges of my scars through the fabric.
But she could—I knew she could. Yet, she soothed me anyway.
Why was she the one comforting me? I was the one who had caused the hurt in her eyes; my disappearance had done that. As my father had told me again and again, this was all my fault.
And it was only about to get worse when I shattered my mother’s world. Lately, it seemed like breaking others was the sole purpose of my existence.
“He—” I couldn’t bear to say his name. “Father and Kakias—they were working together.” Forcing the words out was difficult. Each tasted burnt against my tongue, but I kept going. Partly because my mother deserved the truth, partly because I needed to admit it.
When I finished explaining everything, I met her gaze. Silent tears streaked down her cheeks, giving life to her pain in thin rivers that wanted to drown me.
“I’m sorry, Mother. I’m so sorry.” Why in the fucking Angels did I have to be the one to do this? Hadn’t I suffered enough? Perhaps Damien enjoyed my pain.
“No, Mali, it’s all right.” She looked at the ceiling until her tears slowed. “I already knew some of it, but hearing you say it. Hearing what he did to you…It’s all so much more real than before.”
My heart skipped a beat at her confession. “What did you know?”
“I knew of your father’s…loyalties.” She leaned against the cushions, one hand toying with the tassels on the nearest pillow.
I pushed up from the couch, a fire roaring to life in my chest. “You knew about Kakias? And their son? Did you know what they were planning, as well?” Had she been aware I signed that Spirit-damned treaty? Was she unsurprised when I didn’t return from the Undertaking?
“Malakai, shh.” She held out a hand to me. “Take a seat, and I’ll explain.”
I remained standing, the crackling in the hearth accenting my panting breaths, but she clearly wasn’t going to elaborate until I listened. So I took a seat, staring at the flames instead of her, trying to process it all.
“To answer your questions—no. I didn’t know any of those things. But women are rather smart, if you have not learned that yet. I always felt your father didn’t love me as he claimed.”
“But you were his partner. You—you—” The tattoo on my chest throbbed, and my head whipped to her. “How did you promise your lives to each other with the Bind if he wasn’t loyal?”
“Darling,” she began in her most soothing tone. “It was a false tattoo.”
“What?”
“It’s why I always suspected he was lying.
” She lifted her hand for me to see the plain band of black ink looped twice around her wrist, oddly impersonal for a Bind.
“I never felt the connection one should feel within it.” Her eyes flickered to my chest, to the star beneath my linen shirt.
“I never wanted to admit it to anyone, but I always thought there was something wrong. I only recently realized your father must have had the imbued ink switched with regular dye so no lasting promises would be made between us.”
“Why wouldn’t you say anything?” I flopped back against the cushions.
“You forget I was no love-struck girl who fell for him. I felt affinity, and I grew to love the man I thought he was, but this entire partnership was an agreement between our parents.”
The Deneski family, my mother’s line, was a strong Mystique heritage, and that was how these political arrangements worked. A Revered needed a worthy partner at their side, demonstrating unity and commitment. Their proposal had been supported by every party, save for the man himself, apparently.
I used to think myself fortunate that my parents never sought the same control over my life.
Though, Ophelia and I made their task easy by choosing each other at such a young age.
Should our parents have selected, it would have been us anyway.
The son of the Revered and the eldest Alabath daughter—it always made sense.
“But why not demand he at least respect you? If you knew what he was doing…”
“I saw no point in us being unhappy together if we could be happy apart and still hold the image of power.” Her shoulders drooped, each confession paining her.
“I thought his dalliance was only that—a physical relationship with another. I didn’t know who it was or what they planned.
I only focused on fulfilling the role I’d stepped into, on being what the Mystiques needed.
And that was an example to emulate and an heir born of two powerful bloodlines. ”
“An heir that was never wanted.” Looking at my hands, I counted the scars left on my wrists from my cuffs.
“Don’t you dare think that, Malakai. Not for one fateful second.” She pulled both of my hands between hers. “I have always wanted you. You were the brightest point of this entire charade.” Tears rolled down her cheeks again. “You are the thing that made it worth it.”
Her words cushioned the hatred surrounding my heart, if only slightly.
“He had another son. Another family. He didn’t want us.” And there it was—the earth-shattering truth that hurt me as much as the physical torture I’d endured. The man who was responsible for my existence regretted it.
“If I had been a stronger woman, I would have left him when he was unfaithful, but politics are trickier than that. For years, I convinced myself I was happy, and once I had you, I truthfully was. There were so many times I wanted to leave with you, but I figured that with him in Damenal and us in Palerman, it was the best it could be. Then, when you were little, and I lost my brother, my future was cemented. I had to stay with the Revered until you inherited his rule because I needed to provide for my parents. Ensure their health and safety.”
I could barely remember what my uncle looked like, but I remembered the way my mother cried when he died. Until today, it was the only time I’d seen her so distraught.
“One thing is certain,” I said through a thick throat. “Lucidius may have given me his blood, but I don’t want to be his son.”
My mother tugged my head to her shoulder, running soothing hands down my back, and repeatedly muttered, “I’m sorry.”
“Why are you sorry?” I asked.
“Because I didn’t protect you.”
Tears stung the back of my eyes, but I forced them away again. “You’re not the one at fault.”
She smiled softly at me, the small slip of joy brightening the room’s fog of despair. “I’m so happy you’re okay.”
I might never be okay again, I didn’t say.
“I have something for you,” she continued, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.
“For me?” I asked, but she was already striding across the room. She cracked the door of the armoire, and dresses and leathers threatened to overflow—
“He gave you these rooms?”
Anger burned through me at the realization that those belongings had been here before she arrived today.