Chapter 11
Evie
Massacre Manor was at peace when they saw it from a distance, the magic appearing stable for the moment.
And Evie was so twisted about, her stomach was making its debut as a pretzel.
How long would her home remain so?
And yet, even as Fluffy descended toward the sleepy manor, all Evie could think of was Trystan’s bare hands clutching her, the intensity of their connection…the ruined forest.
She was apparently incredibly self-centered, with her body as the proof, because even in the middle of a crisis it was aching for Trystan.
As they landed and she slid from Fluffy’s back, allowing Trystan to hold her hips the entire way down, their eyes never left each other’s until her feet met the ground.
Her heels clicked on the stone as she moved inside, and the echo of his steps falling behind her was like a guardian, a protector, shielding her from every threat she wouldn’t see.
The mirror in the hallway tended to show her the greatest of them all.
Today, it reflected back at her exactly how she looked after being ravished on the forest floor.
Her dress was splayed open at the back, the corset strings loose and haphazardly tied; her lips were devoid of her usual color; and her heart was two tons heavier than it had been when she left.
The day was ready to end, the sun beginning its descent with slow spills of golden light through the windows.
The space was warm. And so was her face.
From mortification.
“What happened to your dress, Evie?” Blade asked worriedly, clearly noting the missing buttons.
Her cheeks burned, and her eyes turned to saucers. “Oh, you know. Forest things,” she squeaked.
Flee this hallway, Evie. Before you must flee the kingdom!
Trystan was rigid and tense, actively avoiding looking at her. He knew as well as she did that it would give them away. And as they followed her and Trystan up the staircase, it was clear she hadn’t convinced Blade or Becky, either.
“Forest things?” Becky asked airily, pulling the candelabra. As the hidden door to the offices slid open, the scrape of stone against the ground was the only noise breaking the quiet.
Evie swallowed, noting how empty the normally bustling space was. “It, um—it caught on something.”
Becky snorted. “On what? The boss’s teeth?”
“Rebecka!” Evie’s voice reached a pitch not usually accessible to human ears.
Blade tsked, looking troubled, before grabbing Trystan’s arm. “A barn? The ground? Where do you plan to romance her next? A tool shed?”
Evie gasped when the words truly registered. “You told Blade?”
“Gushiken,” Trystan gritted out, shoving him aside like a pesky gnat. “I would advise you to keep your opinions to yourself, lest you lose the ability to have them at all.”
Blade narrowed his eyes. “How would you manage that?”
“By stabbing you in the face,” Trystan growled, then addressed Evie with the expression of a man about to lie down on the torture rack. “I shouldn’t have said a damn word to him—”
Her fingers touched his lips, and the tension began seeping from his shoulders when he spotted her smile. “No, I— It’s okay. I’m—I’m glad you had someone to talk to about, um—it. It’s good to confide in people about big life events. Not that it was a big, um…event.”
Trystan stared flatly. “I spent a month imprisoned with no light. And I promise you this impacted my life in a far greater fashion.”
“I saw him draw a heart around it on his calendar.” Blade offered this information gleefully, ignoring Trystan grabbing for him before Evie put a stop to it.
“All right, boys, play nice,” Evie urged with false confidence in her voice, then felt sudden and sharp relief course through her blood when Lyssa appeared, running to wrap her arms around Evie’s waist. “Hello, sweet.” She brushed a gentle hand over Lyssa’s unbound curls, trying to infuse calm into the gesture.
“I’m sorry I haven’t checked on you yet today. Are you well?”
Lyssa squeezed tighter, whispering into Evie’s sternum, “I don’t want to talk to her.”
Evie frowned, concern striking hard at her nerves. “Who?”
“I imagine she means me.” Nura Sage’s voice came from the far side of the room as she entered, her face gaunt and shadowed. “How are you, hasibsi?”
It made sense for her to ask. Evie hadn’t seen her mother since the truth of her parents’ misdeeds was revealed. There hadn’t been time, and Evie hadn’t wanted to. But there were some unpleasant conversations that couldn’t be avoided. And there was no more avoiding this one.
“You told Lyssa…about what your father and I did.” Nura appeared betrayed, and Evie almost laughed.
The two people meant to love her most had conspired to change her identity because they couldn’t accept her. And so many had suffered in the wake of their selfishness.
“I told her of the choices you made and how they affected us. I will not apologize for giving her honesty.” When she took a step forward to place herself in front of Lyssa, Evie saw her mother flinch away, and she felt the slash of pain.
“I am not protecting you any longer, Mama. I’m afraid you cannot mend a burned bridge. ”
“I know you’re angry,” Nura said shakily. “I know you feel betrayed again. Of course you do. I just want a chance to explain—”
“I’m not angry,” she corrected. Her threshold for pain at the hands of her loved ones had been reached long before now.
She had nothing left to give her mother.
Not even her anger. “I’m unsurprised—disillusioned, perhaps—but no, Mother.
I think I’ve finally learned the lesson you’ve tried to instill in me since birth. ”
Nura took a hopeful step forward, reaching for Evie’s hands, and Evie let her, looking her mother square in the eye with the dullest ache in her chest. But it was one she could stand to live with.
Ripping her hands away from the woman she’d been waiting for since she was thirteen, possibly longer, she realized the version of her she’d wanted was never coming.
“I won’t count on you anymore. I won’t hope you become what I always needed you to be.
I will give up the idea of you, Mother. Forgive me for holding on to it for so long.
” Her voice had never been more level, her body numb.
“I did it to save you, hasibsi. It wasn’t the right thing—I realize that now—but I was young and frightened. I trusted your father to know what was best for you, and I apologize with all my being for that.”
The few workers in the open office space were watching, whispering to each other. A burning prickle began behind her neck most unpleasantly.
“Everyone go to lunch,” Trystan boomed.
“It’s five o’clock, sir,” one of the men by the accounting desks objected.
“Now!” he boomed again, and she found his eyes on her face, not bothered in the slightest by how the workers scattered under his command, how quickly the room cleared completely. Becky urged Lyssa toward the kitchens, with Blade following loyally behind.
Suddenly, she could breathe again, without everyone’s eyes on her. “How did you know?” she murmured to him.
“I’ve spent an obscene amount of time staring at your face since your employment began. I always know.”
The words were too level for the way her stomach jumped, doing flip-flops around her heart. It was a common fear, being whispered about. But the common fears she’d been born with were no match for the new ones.
For everything she had to lose.
I could lose him.
By my own hand. She shuddered.
“Is there nothing I can say that might make you understand what I did?” Nura pleaded. “Does it move you not at all how regretful I am?” Her voice was strained, her gaze desperate as it searched Evie’s face for some kind of penance. An opening back into her heart.
She would not find it.
“You should go rest,” Evie urged, passing her mother. “Your starlight magic is gone, and there isn’t anything you’re needed for up here.”
Nura’s footsteps were all Evie heard as her mother ran for the stairs. When she finally dared to look, Nura was gone—but someone had taken her place.
Gideon had walked in, his mouth a grim line.
“Something to say?” Evie asked icily, feeling her hackles rise at the look on his face.
“You have a right to your anger, little sister,” Gideon responded, holding his palms up.
“I’ve been looking for you all day to tell you that.
But perhaps— You can tell me to go to the deadlands, but I worry for our mother’s mental state after the starlight was taken from her.
Might you remember to be a touch gentler? ”
She did laugh now. It was so unbelievably ironic, she couldn’t stop the cynical sound, or the welling of tears burning her eyes—tears she refused to allow to fall.
“Gideon.” Her laughter faded into a pained smile, the strain pulling at her chest until it physically hurt.
“I seem to be having some difficulty with that. Since no one cares to remember to be gentle with me.”
Gideon flinched, opening his mouth, but was immediately cut off by Trystan, who stood between them, looking much the soldier ready to die fighting for his cause.
“Gideon, why don’t you go and ensure everyone has arrived.
We’ll be along in a moment.” His tone brooked no argument.
It was leave or have his head bashed in.
Gideon chose wisely.
As Trystan’s words sank in, Evie grabbed his arm, her still-damp curls brushing against the fabric. “Arrived? Everyone?” she asked, the heaviness of the interaction with her mother leaving to make room for her dismay.
His mouth curled, and even in the midst of everything, she needed a will of steel to withstand not kissing the dimple peeking through on his cheek. “What’s the worst thing you could imagine doing right now?”
With a dramatic groan, her forehead fell against his arm.
They were having a meeting.