Chapter Seven
Alexandria put up a good enough show that when she left Cara’s room, she had placated her sister enough to get some sleep. They had a big day ahead of them.
Her sister.
That was never going to change. Never. Cara would always be her sister, but Alexandria’s inside felt like tar. She didn’t know what to do, and mental paralysis was not something she needed now.
Back in her room, she had paced the rest of the night away and was now fully dressed while she waited for the sun to rise. The moment it peaked from the sky, she went in search of Melle, knowing she would find the older woman getting her first cup of tea from the kitchen.
The silence in the house suddenly became eerie as Alexandria entered the kitchen at the same moment Melle stepped in from the servants’ side. She struggled to walk, her shoulders more stooped than normal, a sadness in her eyes that had never been there before.
Alexandria hated what she was going to do. She didn’t want to harass Melle for information but she couldn’t speak to anyone else. It was time that Melle told her everything.
“Alexandria,” Melle said, surprised, but then her face whitened as if she knew, by the expression on Alexandria’s face, what was to come.
“You know everything, don’t you?” Alexandria whispered, knowing even the kitchen was bugged, but at this point, did she even care?
“I’m thrilled to see you, my dear. Will you come to the pantry with me and get the Earl Grey off the top shelf? You know how much I like the lavender-flavored one. And while we’re there, maybe we can bring all the tea down onto a bottom shelf so I can reach them myself.
Alexandria was about to protest, but Melle put a hand on her arm, her grip tight, her eyes masked with a warning. She steered her toward the pantry, which was as big as a kitchen, fully stocked with everything anyone could need.
“They seemed to have forgotten to bug the pantry,” Melle said softly.
How had Alexandria not known this before? Although, if she, Rhea, and Cara started bundling into the pantry to plan their escape, they would come off as suspicious anyway.
“Who is Cara, Melle? Tell me the truth, please,” Alexandria begged, a piece of her still hoping she had misunderstood everything and jumped to the wrong conclusions.
“How do you know?” Melle asked instead.
“Oh, god. It’s true. She’s their sister.” Alexandria felt as if she were going to throw up. She reached out and balanced herself on a shelf. “But she grew up with me; with Rhea, I don’t understand.”
“She was brought here when she was eight years old.”
“Who brought her here?”
“A senior council member. He died a year later. But his words to your parents were simple. They were to raise Cara as their adopted daughter until you turned twenty-two—”
“Me?” Alexandria asked softly.
“Yes—the year you turned twenty-two would also be the Swan House centenary. They were given no further instructions… except to wait.”
Her knees threatened to buckle under her.
“Cara was… she was stolen from her brothers?”
“They were led to believe she had died, Alexandria.”
“Oh god.” She slammed her hand against her mouth. There was nothing insidious about their level of cruelty; it was blatant, brazen, and heartless.
They had thought Cara had died…
“So the council and my parents... They’re using Cara to control them. Is that why they’re complying with everything?”
“Yes.”
“Are they threatening to—” She couldn’t finish her sentence.
“Her room is lined with canisters of poisonous gas. If the Dragons try to escape, if they get as far as one step out of the ante in which they are imprisoned, a hidden camera will scan their faces and automatically release the gas in Cara’s room.”
A thick sludge blurred Alexandria’s vision. She wanted to wake up from this nightmare. How had her parents so happily agreed to put Cara's life at risk in such a way? And yet, how perfect it had worked out for them, with Cara never leaving her room. Alexandria was truly going to be sick.
But she stopped short. Did her parents even love her, or even Rhea? She couldn’t say yes with a straight face. Her parents had always been together, side by side, like business partners, while their children were merely accessories for the perfect family picture. She couldn’t even remember if her parents had ever said the words ‘I love you’ to their daughters.
No. Because the Swan family didn’t need love or feel a need to show love. It was meant for poor people with no ambition. The demonstration of love was too vulgar for them.
And the men in the dungeon? They had allowed themselves to be imprisoned, to be stripped of their pride and ego, and made puppets with sperm by the Swan House family. They had done it for the love of their sister and for her life.
“What is going to happen to them now that the ritual is done?”
“They will be kept alive, until you are pregnant, in exchange for Cara remaining unharmed for the rest of her life. And then they will no longer be needed.”
She’d been right. Her family was going to kill them.
“Please don’t hate me, my sweet Alexandria. I gave my life to Swan House. For two hundred years, we were a proud family that created our own wealth and power, and we lived by rules that were fair to everyone. We left our barbaric ways in the past. But this… I will die with this in my heart.”
It took Alexandria a long moment to set aside her shock, fury, pain, and everything else that went with finding out her parents were monsters. The councilmen were monsters before she realized what this had done to Melle. She was so frail, aging right before her eyes.
“One. Six. Nine. Two. Eight. Five. Five. Five,” Melle said.
“What?”
“That is the code to disarm the motion sensor that would trigger the release of the gas in Cara’s room.”
Adrenalin pumped through Alexandria’s vein, making her whole body vibrate. She was going to save them if it killed her.
“There’s no chance of me being pregnant, Melle. I’m on the pill, and my parents know nothing about it. I’m leaving Swan House forever with Rhea and Cara. Tomorrow night. I’m also going to release them.”
Melle threw her arms around her, her strength again surprising Alexandria.
“I knew you would find a way, my clever girl. I knew you would. That gives me hope to remember Swan House the way it used to be.” She paused. “If you go left from the tunnel you will find three stone doors. If you push the third door, you’ll enter the ante. There’s only one guard there. Look around for the keypad, you’ll find it easily.”
Alexandria nodded. Would Melle have helped them escape before they were killed? She believed with her whole heart that the First Priestess would have saved their lives and faced the consequences.
Alexandria knew Melle would not come with her. She would die here, where she had lived all her life, devoting her last breath to Swan House.
Melle quickly reminded her to rearrange some of the teas, at least to cover their tracks before they left.
Alexandria couldn’t eat, couldn’t sit quietly; her mind thrummed incessantly. She had to do the right thing. She had to give Cara the choice of being with her brothers again. The thought of losing her sister killed her, but she had to make that right. She stopped herself from sobbing uncontrollably. It would slow her down and weaken her defenses.
She planned to let Rhea know first, and grabbing a pencil, she opened her copy of Wuthering Heights and started looking for words or letters to convey her message.
She shut the book nervously when her mother strode into her bedroom, remarked about the dark circles under Alexandria’s eyes, and informed her that she had booked them a day at the spa and shopping for baby clothes afterward.
She knew her mother, and unless she were dead, Crystal Swan would make her daughter do exactly what she wanted because nothing she did was not for the duty to the family name collectively.
Throughout the day, Alexandria really looked at her mother and found not an ounce of love inside her. It should have made her sadder, but she cheered herself up by being extra excited about picking out baby clothes for a baby that was never going to be theirs.
“It’s Swan House’s time again, Alexandria. The drought of our financial problems will be over with the birth of this child. Riches will fall from the sky for us again. You’ve done your family proud.”
“Thanks, Mom,” Alexandria said cheekily, relishing the shocked look on her mother’s face at being addressed as Mom. It was always Mother. In fact, if it had not been frowned upon, she would have preferred her daughters call her Crystal. She never forgave Rhea for the obscene stretch marks she had felt on her body.
If ever Alexandria had a child, that child would be so loved and cherished, and they would know it every single moment of the day. But somehow, she knew that happy ending was not in her future. The evils of her family would follow her everywhere.
Whatever guilt she had nurtured about leaving her parents disappeared.
All that remained heavy in her heart now was Cara. She had to give her back to her brothers. It was the right thing to do. The only thing to do. And once she and Rhea got immunity from The Console, maybe they could visit Cara. But would her brothers let her anywhere near a Swan again?