25. Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Four
Archer
My quarters were dim and empty, and Isoria’s door was firmly shut. But when I shuffled further down the hall, sounds came from my private kitchen.
I stifled a groan, wondering if Orchid was restocking my pantry.
Some of the servants would prepare me meals here, where I could enjoy fresh, hot food in solitude or with a few close guests.
But at this hour? All I wanted was to be left alone, to drown myself in more alcohol and pray for dreamless sleep after this accursed night.
But when I paused in the entryway, it wasn’t a servant hovering over the oven, but Isoria.
Her hair was tugged into a long braid that reached the middle of her back, and her cheeks were flushed as she kneaded dough beside the warm oven.
She hummed as she paused her work to open the oven and remove a baking sheet with her bare hands, unbothered by the heat.
To my annoyance, Onyx was perched in an armchair she must have brought in from the library, his eyes locked on her movements as his tail twitched. Cats were supposed to be intelligent, but mine seemed to lack discernment when it came to growing attached to a dangerous being.
Or maybe he just liked her warmth.
The tempting scent of berry pastries wafted over me, and my stomach growled.
Aside from the disgusting salted berries the death-lover had tried to murder me with at the feast, I had eaten little.
With the hollowness in my chest, I hadn’t sensed the emptiness in my stomach, hadn’t thought I’d want anything but wine for the foreseeable future.
Embarrassingly enough, maybe that was what drew Isoria’s eyes to me at last, the song she hummed dying on her lips. The coldness in her eyes made me want to retreat, reminding me of the cold-blooded way I’d killed one of her kind earlier.
Once, I would have comforted myself through the curse, assuaging my despair with the reassurance I’d protected my people. Now, I wasn’t sure. I could still hear the echoes of Cypress’s cries. Still see the brokenness and fear in Isoria’s expression.
“I thought you’d gone to your bedchamber to drink yourself into oblivion,” Isoria said, her tone not concealing her disdain.
There was a smudge of flour on her cheek, and it was disturbingly distracting. It made her seem—real. Vulnerable. Soft.
Rather than echo the fierceness and hatred in the eyes of other phoenix shifters I’d executed, her appearance reminded me of Cypress’s innocence and vulnerability. My stomach clenched, all hunger forgotten.
My throat was dry. “I thought you had gone to bed. Where were you?”
Isoria glanced away, returning to kneading her dough with more force than earlier. As if deciding I was worth the truth, she murmured, “Visiting the main library. Surely there must be a way to free ourselves from this bond.”
I barked out a bitter laugh. “Yes, when we both die.”
She shot me a look.
“You truly think the gods have mercy, Feathers? We’re their pawns, their playthings. Look at how the revenants go unchecked. How they sit by and let our own dead kill us off.”
“It’s probably because your father stole the throne, and both the land and the gods have distanced themselves from his rule.” Her proclamation came like a confession, heated and annoyed, full of the truth that none of Father’s subjects dared voice aloud.
The ones who’d not been able to keep the thought quiet in their heads had already vanished.
“You’re likely right, but from everything I read, they weren’t exactly cozy with the true Emberglade family either. They don’t care what happens to us; they probably bonded us out of spite, to watch us drive one another mad until we ask them for death.”
“If they just wanted us dead, there are faster ways,” she bit out. “And if they don’t care at all, they wouldn’t bless us with magic or prophecies or anything.”
I smirked indolently, hoping the expression annoyed her. “I think they savor our suffering.”
Isoria huffed. “Your emotions are so strong they’re clouding any possibility of reason.” She pushed away from the counter, stalking toward me.
For the first time in my life, I had the urge to retreat from a phoenix shifter.
But Isoria paused a mere arm’s length away from me. “That hollowness inside you…there’s an echo of grief to it,” she whispered.
I blinked, averting my gaze. Why I answered her, I wasn’t sure. Maybe I thought saying the words would unburden some of the weight on my chest. Who knew emptiness could have weight? “My mother. Some events reminded me of her…I lost her when I was a boy.”
When I dared to lift my eyes, Isoria swallowed.
Her golden eyes shone with unshed tears, and as her own feelings swelled, I managed to feel them through our bond, consuming my own numbness.
Worry. Sorrow. Homesickness. “Then don’t you understand why I can’t give up?
” she asked, voice quavering. “You know what it is to lose a parent. Well, I might lose mine if I can’t find a way back home. If I can’t regain my freedom.”
She released a shuddering breath. I gaped at her, not knowing what to think.
I hated the grief flooding me, her emotion reminding me of mine until I couldn’t tell where hers ended and mine began.
I wanted to retreat to my own numbness, to relish it as I never had before rather than drown again in this old, familiar ache.
“Now let me heal you so we don’t have to keep feeling this—”
I stepped back. “No,” I said firmly. “I don’t want you using your magic on me.”
Her eyes flashed with annoyance. There was the inner fire I’d been searching for, my reminder that she couldn’t be trusted.
“You want to continue to suffer?” She laughed, but there wasn’t humor to it. “Or you want me to continue to suffer with you.”
“I don’t want you influencing me with your dark magic,” I ground out, shoving off the doorway.
I pressed back to my bedroom, shutting myself into the illusion of safety with my own, newly familiar misery.
With a numbness that was my own and didn’t remind me of Isoria’s grief, which, thankfully, I couldn’t sense from this distance.
That didn’t force me to recognize that we shared something in common, or remind me that I’d sent a mother to the dungeons tonight.
Maybe that made me a coward.