Chapter 17
Seventeen
- MARCELLA -
Cyrus leads me away from everyone else. The quartet’s music rolls over us in soft, lovely swells. And yet, I can’t ignore the fear bubbling inside of me as my hand rests in his.
As soon as we are in the center of the dance floor, he turns me to him. As is customary, he bows, and I follow. Gently he guides me to him, his hand bracing mine, with his other tenderly cupping my waist.
“For a moment, I thought maybe you decided to leave,” he whispers, and takes the next beat to lead us into a gentle dance.
“Why? Because you have secrets you aren’t telling me?”
“You know all my secrets.”
Rolling my eyes, I glance off to where Lyra is.
I watch her join Aelia at a side table, and I can’t help my jealousy for how easily the other women accept her.
Because to everyone else, I am rough. Unpolished.
Unrefined. And yet, they don’t know the actual reason I am here.
To spy on them. To make sure they don’t kill the man leading me into a slow, swirling dance.
“You couldn’t allow me to at least settle first? To grab a drink or something to eat?” I ask, not yet looking at him.
“I was worried about you. I didn’t want to waste another second pondering where your head is at. And then when I realized you were missing with Lyra…”
I swing my attention back to him. “What? Afraid the two of us decided to leave?” But that’s not it. No. The way he’s looking at me speaks of another concern.
His voice is gentle. Honest. “No…I was anxious because I knew the two of you don’t get along. And I wasn’t sure—”
“If I had taken a chance to maul her?” I scoff, shaking my head. “Why is it that not a single person here seems to believe that I am a woman of strategy above all else? That I do not hastily lash out, nor let my emotions determine my plans—even if I’m furious?”
“That’s not what I meant. What I meant is that perhaps you found out something about her. Something that established she’s the assassin, and you decided to save time and—”
“She saved me today,” I finally say it aloud.
He blinks. “Saved you…?”
I tear my gaze off him, finding Lyra smiling near Aelia, who chatters on about something. “She risked her own life to save me. Charred her hands to almost ash. All for someone like me, who hasn’t shown her any kindness, and yet she still decided I was worth saving.”
“If it’s not her, then what kept you two so late?”
I swing my attention back to him, thinning my lips.
He searches my eyes. “There is still a part of you that doesn’t trust me, isn’t there?”
“Do you blame me?” I ask with a bite.
“No, of course not,” he says with a pinched brow. “But I am doing everything I can—”
“Then stop these trials. They aren’t necessary.” I flick my head over to the women watching us from afar. “You’ll kill many of them by putting them through it. You might not even have any candidates left if the rest of the trials follow the nature of this one.”
There’s a war in his eyes, in his voice. “I can't stop them.”
“Then tell me why!” I tighten my grip on his hand.
“Tell me everything! What good reason is there for you, or Devin, or Lady Bethany to think the trials are necessary? Do you understand that several women are in the infirmary tonight? That several more died today? These women are hungry for your hand, Cyrus. Hungry enough that they will do some desperate things to win your attention, at the expense of their bodies and possibly their lives.”
“You don’t think this hurts me, too?” His voice breaks. “It is agony for me knowing you all are out there and I can’t stop it.”
The tension in my shoulders and jaw snaps away at the raw flicker of pain in his expression.
He pulls me tighter into him until we are chest to chest. His mouth hovering over my ear as he bends down to whisper, “It’s not that I do not want to tell you. I want to tell you everything. But I risk everything if I do. You don’t truly understand that I can’t. I can’t, Marcella.”
“Because your council or Devin advises it?” I shoot back.
“No. Because speaking freely of anything jeopardizes your memory—same as everyone else’s.
What you all were given to clear your memories was a mixture a chemist from the Dragon Academy had been experimenting with.
He created it to clear out his own painful memories, but when he tried it, it cleared all of his memories.
Most of them came back, but not all. He never remembered what he did to create the concoction in the first place.
It was confiscated by the council and has been under lock and key for a long time. ”
“You risked us with it?” I nearly drop my hand out of his. “Are you out of your mind?”
“You agreed to it. As did everyone else. No one here was forced to.”
“That doesn’t make it any better,” I spit. “What happens if none of us ever recall our memories?”
“That’s why I can’t freely tell you everything.
If anyone were to warp your perspective of reality, you could be lost. You may never get your own memories back.
Someone else’s perception may twist your own—you might even become someone else entirely if we aren’t careful.
I’m doing what I can to guide you to remembering, but as much as I might try to lead you there, you have to find it yourself. ”
I pull back to look up at him. “Did I know about the trials prior to agreeing to this assignment?”
When he nods lightly, I ask more, “And I knew what each trial would entail?”
Again, he nods. “I kept nothing from you. I don’t know what the trials are myself to keep my bias out of it, but Devin and Lady Bethany were commanded to share it all with you before your memories were wiped.”
I blow out a breath, tearing my eyes out of his. There had to be some good reason the past me would agree to it. Would agree to all of this. Yet, chasing down my memories is like pinning down a shadow with a needle.
Perhaps I just have to work at recalling the trials. Recalling anything, so I don’t feel like a woman stumbling along in the dark.
When he spins me and pulls me back in, I misstep. Right onto his foot. I blush as I remove my foot from the tip of his boot. “Sorry, I—”
A burst of a memory flashes behind my eyes, but it’s gone long before I can decipher it. The feeling remains, like dust after the wind. The familiar swing of his steps. His hand gentle on my waist.
I glance up at the man towering above me. “This isn’t our first dance, is it?”
He grins with a hint of sadness. “No, Marcella. It isn’t.”
“And I’m assuming you won’t tell me whatever it is I saw back in the gardens?”
“You already know the truth.”
Groaning, I lightly toss my head back to avoid his eye contact. We’re talking in circles at this point. “Should I be afraid of you?”
“I...”
I glance back at him, demanding an answer through narrowed eyes. The song slips into a new one. One slower.
He shakes his head. “I can’t determine that answer for you. Your fears are for your own.”
I attempt to take a step back to conclude our dance, but he shakes his head. “Wait, please. I need one more—I need one more with you.”
“I’m not really allowed to refuse anyway, right?”
“You can always refuse me,” he mutters. “Do not confuse the authority of my role with someone I am not.”
“Fine,” I say simply, following his lead into something slower. Swaying back and forth, somehow finding ourselves a touch closer.
Changing the subject, he asks, “Have you truly no idea if any of the women have ulterior motives? Because Marcella, I must know. Tonight I have to send women home.”
I blink, pulling back my head. “Tonight? Right after our first trial? Why?”
“Because Devin demands it of me. He says it’s important to cull the selection so that I might develop deeper bonds and discover who truly deserves the title of Queen.”
“Have you ever thought Devin just has a stick up his ass—” I pause and then slam my lips closed. What is wrong with me? Why is it I cannot keep a simple boundary of formality with this man?
But rather than reprimanding me, Cyrus chuckles and looks over my head to the room behind me. “Careful. I might start thinking you don’t like him.”
“I don’t.”
He looks down at me. “I know. But he’s a good man. An honorable one. I’ve known him long enough that I’d almost consider him a brother.”
The term brother strikes me like lightning, and when my face falls he murmurs, “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have even used the term—”
I clear my throat, looking at his gloved hand cupping mine instead of his face. Now isn’t the time to be thinking of my brother. Not when it might trigger emotions I’m not quite ready to unpack in a crowded room full of people I don’t know.
“Marcella, I’m trying. If I free him on my own, I’ll risk rebellion for pardoning a woman’s brother convicted of murder—”
“You don’t even know him,” I interrupt. “Nobody does. They all think he is some evil person—rotten to the core. But he is kind, he is…loving…” Memories begin to trickle in, spiking the pressure in my skull.
“He loved so much. He loved a man, and the priest of the Millton chapel didn’t agree with it.
So he…he…” My voice wavers as I stare out at the whirl of color around us as he spins us.
“Go on,” he encourages gently.
I look into Cyrus’ soft eyes framed in dark lashes, “You already knew all of this, didn’t you?”
But he doesn’t answer, and it spikes anger within me. “Didn’t you!” I say louder, not caring if anyone else hears.
His eyes are soft with sympathy. The memories crest and crash into me with enough force that I rip my hand from his and take a step out of his arms.
“Marcella, wait,” he pleads as I turn away from him.
“Leave me be,” I toss over my shoulder and walk to the tables.
How can I not be angry, when he’s allowing my brother to sit in prison with a life sentence for merely protecting his love?
Connor fell for a man in the chapel’s choir.
And that man’s uncle was the priest. While beliefs have fluctuated between areas in the Dragon Lands, Millton was known for its harsh, reserved traditions.
When the priest stumbled upon an intimate moment with Connor and his choirboy, he threw Connor in the dungeons. Beat the choirboy in front of him to teach him a lesson, then turned his wrath onto Connor.
He was missing for eight days.
Eight days of beatings.
The memory turns my stomach sour. Crumples my heart, the flash of his face, swollen and bruised. How I held him in my arms when he came home, both of us sobbing.
The choirboy died from his wounds.
I go straight for the nearest table with wine glasses. Plopping down into a seat, I grab the fullest one and throw back the liquid into my throat to wash back the tears beginning to blur my vision.
Aelia and Lyra settle into chairs on either side of me.
“Are you…alright?” Aelia asks to my left.
“Did you get reprimanded for being late?” Lyra asks on my right. No doubt testing to see if she too will be in trouble.
I turn to Lyra. My hand shakes as I work to force down my anger and sorrow over the painful resurfaced memory. “The only one who gives a rat’s ass about that is Lady Bethany.”
Lyra scans around us before leaning forward. “You’re upset. What is it?”
I down the rest of the wine, and as I set the glass on the table I spot Devin. The sorrow in my veins turns into icy determination. “Would you ladies excuse me?”
Before they can answer, I rise and take a new full wine glass with me from another table, walking straight for the general speaking with several guards.
As soon as he hears my clicking of heels on the marble above the music, he turns.
Eyes widening before snapping some command at the guards that makes them disperse.
“Should I be reaching for my sword?” he asks.
I stop before him. “You might not agree to it. But you will allow me my own weapon.”
He bursts out into a mocking laugh. “You can once I trust you.”
A small smile settles on my lips and widens. And…I remember. It’s like I’ve broken through the wall of ice in my head and found a steady flow of flashing memories. “You don’t like me because I qualified for your position. Isn’t that right?”
His face falls into something like a warning.
I continue, leaning forward, “You’re jealous of me, aren’t you? I might not have my memory, but I could easily kick your ass. Cyrus had chosen me for your position and…and I turned it down. That’s the only reason you have it, isn’t it?”
“Watch. Your. Tongue.”
“And if I don’t? Please…” I laugh, “Indulge me with what you’ll do.”
He takes a step forward, craning his neck to look down at me. “Dare I mention why you refused it? Haven’t remembered that little part yet?”
His words strike home, danger ringing in my bones.
With a triumphant grin, he whispers, “You haven’t, have you?
You know…” Another step closer, placing us toe-to-toe.
He lifts a hand and traces the scar on my abdomen down to my knee from a few inches away.
While he doesn’t touch me, the movement sends a shiver down my spine.
“That little scar of yours? I imagine it hasn’t faded entirely. And I know exactly…” he leans even closer to me, his lips brushing my ear as he whispers, “…where that’s from.”
Everything turns black as I squeeze my eyes closed, my breath kicking up a pace in my chest. Fear floods my senses. Distant screaming and ripping flesh in darkness haunt my vision. When I open my eyes, Devin’s walking away from me. The candlelight flashing on his golden armor.
I need a weapon.
And I need it now.