Chapter Seventeen
MILA
Rainwater puddled on the floor beneath Mila. Cold tile reverberated into her finger bones where she pressed her hands for stability. She bit back a sob, prostrated on the ground before Mother. The only thing she could think was, Pedr. Not Pedr.
Pedr’s shocked expression when she revealed the truth haunted her. His fury and determination as the sea swallowed him and Stinna bore her away.
Oh, the quiet horror of goodbye.
Stinna prowled in furious circles around Mila.
“Ingrate!” she shouted, fists clenched. “Selfish bastid child. Daughter of a fiend. You deserve to die for all we suffered on your behalf!”
“Silence.”
At Mother’s command, Stinna’s rantings ended. Mila curled her fingers into fists, dragging them across the ground.
“I will handle this, Stinna,” Mother stated calmly. “You may go.”
“I will not! I found her, I deserve to observe her punishment. You will be too soft on her!”
The air trembled when a wave of fury opened in the room.
Stinna’s lips snapped shut and she winced, angling away, but there was no escape.
Hot and sticky, Mother’s displeasure ballooned until her arcane force hit Stinna with terrific impact.
The superheated air caused boils to spring to Stinna’s skin.
She screamed, acquiescing with a brutalized, “Cease! I will obey!”
With a mere glimpse of her arcane power, Mother subjected Stinna to obedience, a feat no other siren would dare. Stinna retreated in a fuming silence, the boils healing before she left the room.
Alone with Mother, Mila choked on her sobs.
Tentative quiet filled the room as Stinna’s stomps and screeching ire died away.
Mila refused to open her eyes. She knew where she knelt.
Stone floors. High walls. Drifting banners.
She smelled the lingering scents of the Seat of the Mother Queen where her aunts had often gathered in pursuit of Mila.
Notes of fear and panic remained in the air.
Her chest fractured at the thought.
“What,” Mother hissed, “were you thinking? How dare you, Mila? How dare you risk everything?”
Mila couldn’t bear to face Mother. She’d see stress lines around her lips and eyes and understand their torment. She had risked their lives as well as her own. As well as Pedr’s. Guilt returned, heady and powerful. Weakness followed, and Mila’s head bowed under its pressure, as it always had.
She stopped her self flagellation. What was she doing? She didn’t regret a moment of her freedom and time with Pedr.
No.
No bowing this time.
She wasn’t the only one with decisions to answer for. She wasn’t the only one who did something wrong. They bound her to their castle and lied. The past month had proven their whispered threats about a horrible, bloodthirsty, terrible world wrong. They hid her from wonders and splendors.
They hid her from Pedr.
If she hadn’t left, she would never have met him. Whatever punishment Mother meted out, it would be worth it. Mila would endure years of isolation or physical agony because she had something they couldn’t remove.
Her memories.
Pedr’s warmth brightened her mind and quickened her courage. Mila pushed off the floor, lifted her chin, and met Mother eye-to-eye. Mother had more pallor than usual. Her cheeks were hollow, strained. It surprised Mila.
Did Mother care?
Mila’s whisper shattered the silence.
“How dare you?”
Mother blinked. A shocked calm overtook her body.
“You caged me!” Mila cried. “You held me prisoner in this castle and forced me to bow to your whims. I had to learn about the arcane, knife fighting, and strategy. War and battle and ruthlessness and I wanted none of it! But you didn’t care. How dare you call me selfish?”
Her voice echoed past the empty throne pedestals, twined beyond the sparkling windows overlooking the mountains, and magnified the empty air.
The clear, rocky Westland vista brought Mila’s despair rushing in.
Despite all she’d discovered and endured, the rocks and sky remained. She hoped they crumbled.
Mother lifted her chin.
“What did he do to you, Mila?”
“He loves me! He protected me. He showed me the wonders of the world. He proved to me that all you said was lies.”
Flecks of brutal disapproval filled Mother’s glacial stare. “You have no idea what sort of danger you put yourself and us in these past several weeks. As?—”
“I know.”
“Excuse me?”
“I knew the danger. I lived it. I experienced it for the first time, and now I can appreciate?—”
“You appreciate nothing!” she snapped.
The terrible tempest arose, and Mila braced herself for a wave of agony.
She’d felt it before when she failed to produce the level of an arcane shield that Mother desired.
In desperation, Mother had turned to pain as punishment, hoping it would goad the arcane abilities from Mila.
Instead, she endured hours of torture to no avail.
Stulla had finally begged Mother to cease, and Mother acquiesced with unusual exhaustion. They hadn’t spoken for months after.
Mila refused to look away. She’d never spoken back before. Never questioned, pressed, dared. Never lifted an eye or refused a command.
“I will never be the same,” she whispered firmly.
“Do you love him?”
“Yes.”
“I can smell it on you,” Mother snapped with decreasing strength. “It’s foul and idiotic and I’ve never felt the arcane so small within you. What if loving him sacrifices all you hold within?”
Mila laughed. “All I hold? Mother, I’ve done nothing with the arcane all of my life!
I will never be the arcane force you desired.
I will never defeat Onskar. I can’t even use the abilities.
So take this as your freedom, Mother! All of you have sacrificed so many years out of the sea, and to what end?
Failure. So let me go. Return to the ocean again.
Pedr will take care of me. I will take care of myself. ”
With a voice like hardened slate, Mother whispered, “That will never happen.”
The gigantic wooden door swung open and slammed against the wall.
Stulla raced inside. Her short skirt rustled around her knees as she skidded to a stop, a messy braid of crimped black hair unraveling on her shoulders.
Her obvious panic ebbed as she sighted Mila.
A hand clutched her chest, and Stulla cried out.
“Mila!”
Stulla stalled in the middle of the room, her assessing eyes roving from Mother to Mila and back to Mother. Smells raced into the room behind Stulla, testaments to her other aunts. Sirae. Vaela. Henna. Issara. They must have just left, or waited in the corridors.
“Vassi,” Stulla breathed, advancing again, “let me take her while you cool off.”
“My daughter is old enough to break out of our castle and run away for weeks, so she is old enough to bear the burden of her punishment.” Mother sent Mila a terrorizing stare. “Such is the cost of love.”
Stulla whirled to Mila. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“Vassi, please. Mercy. I will take the?—”
“Silence, Stulla. She is my daughter, and I will deal with her. You cannot save her from punishment. Leave. Tell the others that everything is fine.”
“What about Onskar?”
“If you would obey my command,” Mother snapped with rising irritation, “then I could ascertain whether it’s possible that Onskar has discovered her or not!”
Stulla pleaded, “Allow me to bear your fury.”
“No.”
Mila’s fingers clenched tight. Sweet Stulla, willing to take the consequences for her.
Wasn’t that the problem? They didn’t let her own anything.
Nothing belonged to Mila. Not her future, her present, her consequences, her world.
Nothing to experience, own, endure. Without the pains and travails of her escape, what would she have ever known?
Only bondage.
Stulla reluctantly backed out of the center of the Seat of the Mother Queen and into the hallway. Once there, the door slammed shut.
A resounding silence followed.
A full three minutes passed before Mother allowed her typical transformation into a maternal figure to occur. The Mother Queen bled away. Her tight lips lowered. Her puckered brow smoothed. She released her shoulders from a tight hold. As Mother advanced, Mila retreated.
Stunned, Mother paused.
“Mila?”
“Don’t touch me.”
“One day, you will?—”
“Not one day,” Mila wrenched out. “Right now! I understand right now. You’ve lied to me all of my life.”
“That’s rich, coming from the girl who disappeared in the night without explanation. You have always known of Onskar and the danger he poses to you. You have known that you are in competition with him. We have not lied.”
“Then tell me about my father.”
Mother changed in a finger snap. She sucked in air, an oddly human trait. Her eyes expanded. Color drained from her cheeks. Her barren whisper was barely audible.
“What?”
“Where is he? Who is he?”
Swallowing, Mother said in a trembling voice, “I told you years ago that I would never discuss him.”
Mila cut her a nasty smile.
“That’s rich.”
Outrage replaced Mother’s wounded stare. “You cross your bounds, Mila!”
Gathering every painful, barbed insult she could find, Mila hurled them.
“Then punish me, Mother. Or am I your siren subservient? Do I bow to your authority as the Mother Queen, or are you my mother? You cannot be both. I presume you are my Mother Queen, for you have never acted as a mother. Stulla bore that position for you while you sent waves of blistering pain and disappointment my way.”
The agony in Mother’s face mirrored Mila’s, and Mila discovered a mighty sense of retribution in doling it out. Let Mother experience the ravages of supposed love. The horrors of loss. Let Mother know exactly what Mila felt all these years.
Mother’s cracking voice brought Mila out of the agonizing recollections.
“Mila, I . . .”
Her wordless lips moved, but no sound followed. Mila hid an exhausted sob. Pressing a hand to her face, she said, “I don’t want to be here anymore. I don’t want you, Stulla, Venna, none of you. I never want to see you again.”