Chapter 29
When I finally leave Finn and go to Eldrion, I find him stalking back and forth like a caged animal. His usually perfect hair is tousled, his muscles tight, and there is an almost-empty bottle of whisky on the mantlepiece above the fire.
He looks at me and daggers nestle between my ribs and my stomach. He might have trusted me once, but not anymore. Now, all I see when I look at him is pure, molten, hatred.
Hatred and the sting of Finn’s lashings on my back.
I take my eyes away from him, staring down at my bare feet. In my mind, I hear those sounds again. The tearing of Kayan’s wings, the scream, the thud. I see Finn, and the way he looked when Eldrion humiliated him.
“You are late.” He flexes his fingers.
He pours himself another drink and sighs as if he is in physical pain. When I look up, he is rubbing his temples.
“I will not be discussing anything else with you.” I sit down in his armchair, cross one leg over the other, and fold my arms in front of my stomach. It is taking every ounce of strength in my body not to crumble, sob, run. But I will not let him see I am scared of him. “You can keep making me come here, but from now on I have nothing to say to you.”
I am trying to breathe slowly, trying to trick my nervous system into believing everything is okay, when he strides across the room to stand in front of me. His enormous frame casts a dark shadow over my face. I keep my gaze trained on my intertwined fingers.
But then his hand is on my chin and he is jerking my face up towards his.
I jolt back in the chair. I see him grabbing Kayan, lifting him into the air with one hand. Nausea surges at the back of my throat. I stand, pushing past him, and vomit onto the floor beneath the window.
Eldrion simply watches me.
I brace my hand on the window, letting the cool glass soothe my palm, and breathe heavily. Then I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand, and straighten myself.
Eldrion assesses me for a moment, then hands me the whisky.
I take it and drink it down in one, wincing as it burns on its way down my throat.
“You took away their pain,” he says slowly. He’s talking about the cells.
I open my mouth to talk, then stop myself. I vowed not to speak, and I won’t.
“It was magnificent.” His eyes change. Something in them softens, but then he seems to notice it and quickly corrects himself. Looking down at the remnants of my breakfast, which now stain his floor, he takes my wrist and jerks me away from them.
He is so strong, his grip so powerful, I could not refuse him even if I tried. He drags me over to the fireplace, then pours me another drink. The last of his whisky.
“You are very powerful,” he says.
I shudder because it feels more like an insult than a compliment.
“But you have no idea how dangerous your powers are.”
My grip tightens on my glass, nails scratching the smooth surface. “Dangerous to you?” Damn it, if he wants to talk, then we’ll talk. But I am not going to be the one giving answers today; he is.
“Not to me,” he says. “To everything.”
“You are speaking in riddles. Either tell me what you want from me or let me go.”
Eldrion’s lips curl into a vicious smile. “Let you go?” he laughs, tipping back his head. “You think I would let you go now?”
I stare at him defiantly, struck by the sudden knowledge that I no longer have anything to lose. Except my life. And if Kayan lost his, why should mine be any more precious? “Tell me what you want from me,” I spit.
“I will not tell you that.” Eldrion steeples his fingers. “But I will tell you that you were right. I found you long before I paid for you.”
My eyes flash and I swallow forcefully. “Why?”
“I heard rumours of an empath living amongst the Leafborne. I wanted to find out if it was true.”
“You came to my village?” I take in his vast wings and shake my head. “I think we would have noticed you.”
“Not me.” Eldrion meets my eyes. Something flickers in his icy gaze. “Finn.”
A laugh stutters on my lips. I shake my head.
“Finn tracked you down for me. He was supposed to capture you on the night of the centennial, but the Gloomweavers put pay to our plan.”
My legs feel as if they have turned to liquid. I grip onto the mantlepiece to steady myself, and memories of all the ways I have given myself to the jester swim behind my eyes.
My back burns.
I trusted him. I let him . . .
Shaking my head, I screw my eyes closed and try to make sense of what Eldrion is saying to me. “Finn?” I mutter.
When I look at Eldrion again, he is smirking. A vicious smirk that tells me he knows what Finn means to me and he waited until this very second to reveal the truth about him.
“Search my emotions,” he says, leaning back, pushing back his shoulders, opening his chest as though he expects me to slam my hands onto him and scour his body for traces of a lie.
“I do not want to be anywhere near your emotions.” I flex my fingers, put down the whisky, pick it back up again and drink it in one.
“Then ask him yourself.” Eldrion leans back and gestures to the door. “I’m sure you won’t mind getting close to his emotions.”