Chapter 2 #2
"You didn’t find that strange?" Kallie asked, her hands falling from the iron bars.
The captain shrugged. "At the time, I was too busy making sure none of us died. I was injured. I—it was hard enough to keep going as it was. While the thought crossed my mind, I didn’t dare question it since I was barely hanging on myself. We needed a blessing, and we got one."
"So you mean to tell me that Domitius didn’t send anyone after you?" Kallie asked, the question painted in doubt.
Laurince’s lips parted and shut, unable to find an answer.
"Why would he bother if he was planning on declaring war?" Rian asked.
Even if that was the reason, something still wasn’t sitting right.
"He could have declared war at any point. I was here," Kallie stated. "He didn’t need to involve you. So while I’m not surprised he’s declared war, I am surprised he waited this long and let us all go.
According to Graeson and the others, he let them take me the day of our wedding.
But if there’s one thing I know about Domitius, it’s that he doesn’t do things without reason.
So what’s changed? Why didn’t he declare war earlier?
Why did he wait? Why did he let you go unscathed? "
The sound of chains scraping against the cement floor called Kallie’s attention to the last occupied cell, the true reason she had come here.
Myra leaned against the bars, listening to the conversation.
Her blonde hair hung down her back in thick, limp strands, its normal sheen dull.
The hem of her wrinkled skirt was torn, the fabric stained with dirt and grime from traveling.
Kallie forced her feet forward because, as long as Kallie could remember, Myra was always there, listening, watching, observing. "Earlier, you said Domitius' plans were twofold. What else is he doing?"
Myra’s face paled. She wiped the palms of her hands down the sides of her skirt. "He’s been performing tests on people with abilities. I think he…I think he seeks to acquire them for himself."
Sweat coated Kallie’s palms as Myra’s words settled in her stomach.
That can’t be true, Kallie thought.
Had that been his goal the entire time? Was that why he wanted her? To steal Kallie’s ability? If Domitius acquired it, he would be unstoppable.
"Was he successful?" she asked, fear coating every syllable.
Myra’s gaze fell to the ground. When she spoke, a slight tremble rang through her voice. "I can only assume he was. I never…I never saw what happened to the victims."
"What victims?" Kallie asked, needing to know the truth yet fearing it all the same.
"Pontians," Myra answered quietly. "He—he’s been collecting them."
"Collecting them?" Outrage filled Kallie’s voice, her previous intention to stay calm long forgotten.
Myra nodded, expression haunted.
"That—" Kallie shook her head, taking a step back. Her back hit the bars of Laurince’s cell, and she jumped, startled. "There’s no way that’s true," she whispered.
There was very little that Domitius could do that would surprise her. So it wasn’t his cruelty that shocked Kallie, rather that he had most likely done it under the same roof as her. How had Kallie never noticed? How had—
Her lungs dropped to the bottom of her stomach.
How many times had Domitius left the castle for some mysterious excursion? How many times had he returned with some stranger and requested Kallie’s assistance in forcing them to speak the truth when the king interrogated them?
Kallie had never stayed around to witness the interrogations.
Domitius had never allowed her to, only asked Kallie to use her gift before sending her away.
Was it possible the individuals had been Pontians?
That they were the ones he had been collecting?
Had she been helping Domitius even more than she initially thought?
Her legs trembled, on the verge of buckling. She was going to be sick. How many times was she going to discover the hidden truths behind her actions? How many times would she be forced to face the fact that she was a monster? The very reason for Vaneria’s ultimate demise?
"What did he do to them?" Kallie asked, her heart pounding in her eardrums.
Myra’s gaze grew distant, as if she was somewhere else, as if a ghost of her past was haunting her. She shook her head as if to rid herself of the resurfacing memories. "Like I told Queen Cetia, he has been turning some of them into the creatures Rian called drakonises."
"But Nyrri isn’t human," Kallie said, certain of at least this.
"If Nyrri was one of the earlier experiments, Sebastian probably wasn’t testing his experiments on humans yet. Things have…developed," Myra said, rubbing the back of her neck with her palm.
"Are they all Pontians?" Kallie asked. She wondered how many people were undergoing the transformation. What horrors were they facing right now? How many people were there who were still suffering?
"No," Myra said with a shake of her head. She glanced at Rian and Laurince, her brows drawing tight and something unidentifiable passing between the three of them. "He tried to transform His Majesty as well."
Kallie looked at Rian, whose face was masked in shadows as he sat at the back of his cell.
"If we hadn’t—" Myra choked on her words.
Kallie could only guess what Myra was about to say. If they hadn’t escaped when they had, Rian might not have been sitting in that cell.
Myra cleared her throat. "Domitius told me that his true goal was to give the giftless the same abilities."
"He can’t do that. That goes against the ways of the gods." But the moment Kallie spoke the words aloud, she knew better than to doubt Domitius. If this was his goal the entire time, then nothing would stop him from achieving it, not even the gods.
Swallowing the rising fear threatening to drown her, Kallie forced herself to voice the question she feared the most: "How? How is he doing it?"
"It was supposed to be you," Myra whispered, her fingers curling into the cotton fabric of her wrinkled skirts. Her back hit the wall, and her voice trembled when she spoke. "You were supposed to be the one to force them into obeying. But when you hadn’t come back, he had to find another way. The healer said the victims needed to be willing to receive the serum or else they wouldn’t take to the transformations. I—" Myra’s bottom lip wobbled, and she bit it as tears slipped free. Instead of swatting them away, Myra let them fall down the contours of her pale face. Slowly, as if the weight of the tears hanging on her lashes was too heavy to bear, she lifted her glossy gaze to meet Kallie’s.
The gold flecks within her hazel eyes glistened with water.
"You were supposed to be the one, but you weren’t there. I had no choice. I had to—"
"You always have a choice," Kallie snapped. She pulled the dagger out, unsheathing it.
Myra choked on a gasp, the whites of her eyes widening. Laurince shouted at Kallie, his arms popping through the spaces between the bars, but Kallie dodged them.
She held the dagger up to Myra’s face. "You are the holder of your own fate," Kallie spat, flashing the words etched into the metal blade so Myra could see them. "You had these very words etched on here, not me."
Myra would not blame Kallie for this. People could blame Kallie for anything else, but not this. Not these experiments. What Myra had done to aid Domitius in his pursuits was not Kallie’s doing.
"You don’t understand. He—he had my brother."
Kallie flinched. "Your brother? You don’t have a brother."
"I do," Myra said. But then quieter, she corrected herself, "I did."
Kallie didn’t understand. She had known Myra for over nine years. She had spent nearly every day with her until a few months ago. If Myra had a brother, Kallie would have known. Right?
But as she stared at the woman, whom Kallie had once believed to be her best friend, Kallie no longer knew who she was looking at.
"You never…you never told me," Kallie whispered.
"I didn’t know if he was alive. I didn’t—" Myra rubbed the heel of her palm across her chest. "I didn’t want to jeopardize his life if he was still alive.
Domitius…he used him as a bargaining chip.
He kept him hidden away, always promising I would get to see Mynhos if I just did this one thing. But his list never ended."
Myra’s voice was thick and haunted, and then Kallie realized what Myra had said: she had a brother.
A pang of loss struck Kallie in her chest. Once, she would have reached out and offered Myra comfort, but now…
Now, Kallie didn’t know what to do.
"Frenzia was supposed to be the end. I was supposed to be released once…" Myra’s voice trailed off, but Kallie heard the unspoken words: once Kallie married Rian.
"There’s a lot you didn’t know back then," Myra said, pushing through the heavy silence that had formed. "But it doesn’t excuse what I did. I know I have betrayed you, and I know I may never regain your trust. But…"
Kallie’s sea-storm eyes locked onto Myra’s and remained there as the two women stared at each other in silence.
They had both made irreparable mistakes, but Kallie was realizing it wasn’t that simple.
They were both at fault for so many wrongs that had come to pass over the years.
But more than that, they were both victims. They had both been led to believe many lies.
Both of their actions were at the root of the coming war that neither of them wished to take part in.
Yet they would each have to play a part in it if they wished to take down the king.
While forgiveness was not something Kallie was prepared to offer, there was a sort of understanding that passed between the two women.
Myra gripped the iron bars that separated them, her fingers flexing over the metal. "He needs to be stopped."
"He will be," Kallie promised.
"You know, that’s all fine and dandy, but how do you expect to stop him?" Laurince demanded from his cell, annoyance hanging on every syllable. "You have no military."
Kallie’s gaze flitted across the floor as though the answer was written there. She had come here for an answer, for a solution. Instead, she found only more questions. Then Myra spoke up.
"There’s something else I have to tell you."