20. A devastating mirror image
A DEVASTATING MIRROR IMAGE
Maksym
Three-quarters of the way to Enora’s room, I realized just how in over my head I was. Comfort was not my area of expertise. It was Jasper’s. Sort of. Or Kieran’s, I guess. Fuck, that alone was going to be a mess.
I’d known his true name for years—Kieran Morana, teen deserter of Odessa—but I didn’t think I’d uttered it once. He never wanted to hear it, and I had no reason to say it. I understood more than most about wanting to leave a part of your past buried somewhere miserably deep.
Clearly, I’d been a fool for believing every bit of his past without question.
It had come in pieces over the years—little bits when he’d get these sporadic urges to unload something on me.
So, of course, I’d learned of his original home in a small village of the Wastes and how he left it as a young child.
How he was a ward of Odessa’s king, studying under the tutelage of revered high mages to hone his unusually potent magic.
How he left Odessa—both versions of his sudden departure from everything he’d known.
I’d heard stories of his closest friends interspersed with all of that too, of their ragtag group that didn’t fit in anywhere.
Often mentioned was the king’s bastard daughter, who Jasper had the fortune of growing up alongside and forming an inseparable friendship with. Glued at the hip whenever they were together, planning their next activity when they couldn’t be.
But there was no way Enora had been just his closest friend.
In hindsight, it had been so damn obvious—the state of utter panic my usually unflappable mage was in when he dumped Enora on our war room table. I’d written it off as the unexpected emotion of seeing such an old friend in such a dire way.
But then, I saw the way she looked at him, beneath her own devastating shock. That was how you looked at someone you used to love but had learned to hate.
She’d given him a sliver of her big, foolish heart, as she’d put it to me just last night, only to have it annihilated and left festering for fifteen years.
And now, I’d found myself speared right in between it all.
Fucking wonderful.
The bargain mark on my palm started itching the moment I set foot back inside the damned Keep, settling into a burning sensation that could only be interpreted as an omen for how things were about to go.
Eilir wasn’t faring much better.
When I’d finally turned to the wing I wasn’t confident Enora knew we shared, it was impossible to miss the sprite as they darted up and down the princess’ end of the hall.
They were squabbling to themselves in high-pitched sprite-speak, which I’d never recognized a word of in my entire life, and, at some point, they’d shed a damned head leaf.
“Fuck,” I muttered as I gave it a nudge with my foot. “She did a number on you, I take it?”
“Oh, Max,” came Eilir’s drawn-out whine as they zipped over, hands clutched to their chest. “It’s bad. Really, really bad. I-I came back, t-to apologize and take her those nice things you asked me to get before, but-but…she-she—”
“Breathe, Eilir.”
The sprite sucked in a gulp of air.
“She was so mad, Max! So mad. And Gallan showed up, and she was mad at him too! Yelling at him. Yelling at me! Yelling about you and Jasper! She threw a lot of things at poor Gallan, and then she kicked me out! Me, Maksym. What have I done to her?”
Narrowing my eyes at the sprite, I asked, “Gallan? Why was he here?”
Eilir threw their hands up. “I don’t know, Max! I didn’t get a chance to ask, between the flying objects and the door being slammed in my face!”
I sank back against the wall and sighed, “We fucked up, okay?”
“WE?” Eilir squealed. “You, Max! You made this mess all on your own! Always with your lies and your secrets! It’s too much!” The sprite had barely finished doling out those incredibly spiteful words when they reached into the plane threads between us and vanished.
If there’d ever been a day to not get out of bed, this would’ve been it.
A few strides cleared me the rest of the way to Enora’s door—her suspiciously quiet one, at that—and I gave its handle the lightest test I could. Of course, the bolt was locked.
“Miss Wynn?” Trying to keep my voice level and calm, I gave the door a light knock. “Are you in there?”
More silence. What a surprise. She always could have taken off through her balcony, but it was a hell of a drop to the ground, and I’d cross that bridge of thought only when necessary. Of the more likely options, she was ignoring me.
“Enora?” I shouted this time, rapping my knuckles firmly on the door. “Let me in so we can talk about this.”
The unnerving silence persisted, and I couldn’t figure out why the fuck it made me so uneasy. I’d have to mull that over later, or never, probably when I also considered my next choice of words too.
“Please, Enora,” I sighed.
I raised my hand to knock again, but the door cracked open before my knuckles met the wood.
The princess looked like fresh hell raked over the coals a few times.
She’d clearly done little other than cry since she’d torn out of the training arena, with how bloodshot and irritated her eyes were and the rubbed-raw state of her nose.
She had a scab on her lip too that lent itself well to her chewing right through it.
And that was just from the half-foot view I got.
“Oh, now it’s Enora, is it?” she barked through the barely open door. “It’s Miss Wynn when you think you’ve got leverage, but I get the luxury of being called by my fucking name when you come crawling back here like a wolf with its tail between its legs?”
Oh, Mina help me with this woman. I took a slow, grounding breath before I diverted and said, “We need to talk.”
“Like hell we do,” she seethed. “You and Kieran can take your talking and your catching up and shove it up your asses. Take that traitorous fucking sprite with you too.”
She moved to slam the door in my face, but I inserted myself in its path, letting out a grunt as I became trapped between the panel, the frame, and one incredibly pissed-off woman.
“Get out, Maksym.” She leaned all her weight into clearly trying to crush me with the door. Her next words came grunted with exertion. “I have no interest in talking. To. You.”
Endearing but futile attempt.
I was already halfway into the room and, as much as I was sure she didn’t want to admit it, I had an undeniable advantage in strength.
There was also the entire business of magic, but rubbing that in her face now seemed like it might do more harm than good.
Wrapping my fingers around the door panel, I gave it a solid shove and sent a blanket-wrapped Enora stumbling back into her room.
To her credit, she came charging right back at me, but not before I’d already shut the door and leaned back against it.
“Sorry, Miss Wynn,” I grunted as the heel of her palm made incredibly solid contact with my solar plexus, sending most of the air out of my lungs. I winced, grabbing her as she went to do it again. “Go sit, please, and let’s talk.”
“Oh, so I’m back to being Miss Wynn now?” she scoffed as she dropped her hand. “What kind of leverage could you possibly think you—”
Her jaw slackened. Enora glanced at her bargain-marked palm, and her hazel eyes flickered back up to me with an extra measure of anger blazing in them.
“Are you going to compel me to do whatever you want, just like you did to Kieran? Is that all this is?” She held up her palm and looked at it with disgust. “Some fucked-up way to control people? Get what you want out of them? Does it even hold you accountable for anything at all?”
With the rate Enora was spiraling, I not only needed to handle this conversation delicately, but quickly.
“Our bargain is not like that at all,” I said. “And it is impossible to create a bargain without dual responsibility. They are all made in Mina’s name, and she would never allow it otherwise.”
Her eyes narrowed, and I didn’t have a tangible way to prove my truth.
“So I’m supposed to believe it’s just Kieran who has the pleasure of being at your irrefutable beck and call, and that I, an alleged criminal, who was given no choice but to enter this bargain for my life, wasn’t screwed over like that? ” She scoffed. “Right.”
“I promise you that’s true. But it’s not just Jas—Kieran. It’s my entire Elixia.” Gesturing over to the small sitting area by the hearth, I forced on a pleading smile. “Can we sit, please?”
In complete contradiction to how she shook her head at me, Enora tightened the blanket around her shoulders and trudged over.
She dropped into the furthest armchair and cut into me with a gaze as sharp as fucking daggers as I walked over.
I put an entire sofa between us, taking the opposite chair. Just in case.
I braced my elbows on my knees, steepling my fingers under my chin and sighed. “I want you to know I didn’t expect you to find out under such…hostile circumstances.”
An indignant snort clawed out of her. “Really? I never would have guessed. And what about last night? Was that unexpected hostility too, or did you intend on being a complete asshole right out of the gate and ruining any intent I had on trying to make this somewhat hospitable?”
Mina. Help. Me. I closed my eyes and took a slow breath before turning my attention back on the absolutely stewing, blanketed bundle of a princess. “That was not planned, no. I had the same intention, I assure you—”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
“—and it was because of what happened last night that I thought you should know the truth. Eilir’s slip-up only expedited the inevitable.
You were so convinced the only thing to come out of this would be you having your heart broken and your soul crushed in some terrible place where no one cares about you.
And I couldn’t exactly blame you for that, given everything so far, but… ”
“But?” she hissed.
Goddess, if looks could kill, Enora would’ve had me quartered on the floor. “But I thought if maybe you knew you had a friend here, that—”