Chapter 7
Elysia lunged for the coin. That’s my lifeline, you harlot. But Beatriz flung an elbow into Elysia’s gut, attempting to manhandle her like a sack of potatoes back onto the couch. She held the coin far out of reach, and Elysia’s anger soared to where she could barely think.
Through sheer mental grit, she willed herself to remain in control. I must not react. I must not react.
“So easy to”—Beatriz flicked her on the forehead with her free hand—“ rile . Doing you a favor, trust me.”
Elysia’s temper snapped the moment her sister’s fingers reverberated off her forehead. Years of training aided her. Her leg swept out, collapsing Beatriz from the knees. One more breath and her sister was flat on her back. She dug her knee into Beatriz’s chest and wrapped her fingers around her throat.
Her sister’s pulse was warm and erratic under her fingers. She plucked the coin from Beatriz’s now rigid grasp.
It was then she saw her sister’s wide, fearful eyes. How they tracked her like she was a rabid animal.
Her rage drained in an instant. She sprung back with her palms facing her sister.
“I’m sorry,” she breathed. “I’m so sorry, did I hurt you?”
What was I thinking—I should have just let her. Elysia’s thoughts became a torrent.
Beatriz just blinked and gingerly propped herself up to a seated position. “How in the name of the undead gods did you learn to do that? Why did you learn to do that?”
It was Elysia’s turn to feel her face turn fiery and warm. She ignored the pointed questions. “What does that coin mean to you?”
Beatriz held her stare in a way that clearly noted Elysia’s evasion, but answered her anyway. Her voice was low, serious. “Stay away from them, Lys. This isn’t some silly castle intrigue or case for you to break open.”
“I can’t.”
“What do you mean, you can’t? Just mind your own damn business for once, Elysia, and stay away from them.”
Elysia shook her head and tears pricked her eyes as she slumped down to the floor. “There is no story.” She looked up to meet Beatriz’s eyes. The last week had broken her. She’d like to blame it on her bellyful of wine, but the truth was her life was crashing down around her ears and she desperately wanted to shove all the fear and anxiety into someone else’s hands. She hadn’t expected those hands to be her sister’s, but here she was, saying what she shouldn’t. “I want to meet with them because I need their help.”
Elysia ground her palms into her eyes, not wanting to see her sister’s face after how Beatriz had reacted to the coin in the first place. Fear clenched her throat. How terrible it would be to be turned in by her own damn sister. No one would be surprised—a Parker eliminating another Parker. They would call it poetic. The Crown’s children had turned out to be the beastliest of them all.
Her sister did not snarl or shout now. Her face lost its color entirely. If Elysia didn’t know any better, she would have said she just broke her sister’s nonexistent heart.
But Beatriz did not have a heart, unpolished angry child that she had been, and Elysia did know better, which was why it could not possibly be a tear, silent and gleaming, in her eye.
Beatriz shook her head, her normal sharp light dimming, and grabbed the wine jug one more time. The arrogance in her posture fell away as she held the bottle back with just the sound of the wine glugging down her throat. She paused and held the bottle out to Elysia wordlessly.
Elysia grabbed it only to find the dregs. She stood to dig out another bottle from the cupboards, glad that she’d been hoarding a few for times like these. She plunked back down on the floor, bottle in tow.
Beatriz sat with her legs bent and forearms resting loosely on her knees. “Tell me where this story starts. Because I can promise there is no happy ending involving that coin and those fools.”
Elysia pulled out the dagger that had been tucked into the pocket of her pajamas. Gage’s lessons to always be prepared were hard to forget. She began mindlessly spinning it between her fingers, letting the rhythm soothe her jagged thoughts. Biting her lip, she weighed how deeply she could trust the woman sitting in her living room who shared her last name.
Maybe it made her naive, but she wanted to, she really did. Desperation will get you killed. She ignored the thought. Even if it was the truth. She had told Rollie the facts, but tonight, she wanted to tell the story and pretend her big sister would actually show up for her for once. Against her better judgment, her mouth opened.
“It started months ago,” she began. “But today, I was at the library and something happened.”
She lost track of herself for a moment as she flashed back to how Topp had pushed her flush to the shelves, not caring that books had rattled and fallen like gilded, crashing bricks to the floor. Her back pinching against the wooden edges of the shelves. His fingertips pressing into the hot skin beneath the edge of her shirt.
Elysia blinked and found her sister grinning like a cat with a bird. She tried to fix her face, but it was too late. Beatriz might not live and breathe secrets, but she had their father’s gift for being an uncanny reader of most situations. If she could use those skills to torture her little sister, then all the better.
Beatriz pounced, knowing exactly what she was doing. “By yourself in the library, were you? Didn’t think so. But do go on. I love a steamy bedtime story.”
“Oh, shut up.” Clearing her throat, she kept her face perfectly even. “As I was saying, I was in the library when a book fell and caught my eye.”
Beatriz’s grin widened as she let out a lustful sigh. “I bet it did. I could use a little book shaking, if you know what I mean.”
Elysia’s fingers flexed on the hilt of her dagger in exasperation. So annoying.
Mostly because she wasn’t wrong.
Elysia recalled what had happened next. How she had dragged one particular old volume closer across the cold stone floor. Trailed a finger down its golden edges, feeling the slip of the gilded pages. She’d whispered the title aloud and shivered. Travels of the Undead. It was a book on the many gods that had been revered before the Fall. It was a book that should have been burned with the rest of the religious and magical works. Cracking it open, she had found a purple flower pressed between the pages.
It wasn’t one of her own flowers, though. It had been left between the pages like some dark beacon pulling in stray maidens who made the mistake of kissing amongst dusty tomes.
Elysia released the memory, crawling over to her flower house where she had stuck the bloom earlier. She gently brushed her fingers over its still soft edges. Velvety and pliant, she had a sinking feeling the petals were not going to dry out. “This flower was in the book. I think it's in some kind of magical stasis.”
Beatriz dropped her head to her knees. “Of course it is.”
“It held the book open to a story. A story of a girl who went to a dark, dark land and retrieved the light for all her people.” Saying the words aloud gave her chills.
It was just a story. Just a silly book that had been knocked from its home. That drawing, though… Elysia shut down the thought. The drawing was a coincidence. Nothing more.
But beneath the chills and her fright, it was as though the smallest tendril of warmth sprawled within her chest, telling her this was just the beginning, and for some reason, that scared her more than anything else.
“Is that all?”
“No, no it’s not.”
She stood and began pacing the room, feeling the need to check all the doors and windows. She of all people knew that someone could always be listening. There was no silent listener at her door or window though—just the irregular rhythm of her heart and breath reminding her of the thin line she now walked.
Beatriz slapped a hand to the floor, impatient as ever. “Just tell me already!”
Elysia halted. “I’ve been having dreams. But they’re not dreams.”
She leaned against the windowsill, staring out at nothing. Her body warred between frustration and an all-encompassing numbness. The cool glass touched her forehead and she closed her eyes. Beatriz still waited behind her. She could hear her shifting on the floor. Impatient, but waiting.
Her eyes grew distant. “It’s like I leave my body, and at first, I can see my body still lying there. But then I go somewhere else, and wherever I am, my body is just as real as the one that’s back on my bed. I tested it once, took all my strength to stay there long enough, but I brought my knife to slice my hand... When I came back, it bled.” She looked down at her palm. The scar stared back, taunting her.
Her sister, who had seen every vulgar and delicious happening in all of Kava, had eyes the size of saucers.
“No one knows?”
Elysia glanced back. “No, no one knows. Well, Rollie somewhat knows. He gave me the coin. I haven’t stayed a full night with Topp since it started, but he caught me leaving in the middle of the night this week. I think I’ve thrown Remy and Daphne off for now.” She trailed off, her anxiety reaching new heights as she worried over what people may have noticed and what they would do if they realized she was cursed.
Beatriz nodded darkly. “Good, you’ll keep your distance if you’re smart. Tell me what happens in these dreams.”
This was the part Elysia really did not wish to remember. Because remembering made it real. And she still desperately wished to pretend it wasn’t. She had searched and studied to no avail, and yet, there was still a tiny voice that begged her to ignore it all, as if it would go away. It wasn’t going away.
She grabbed her house robe from where she’d last thrown it and tugged it on, pulling the edges close. The thick fabric warmed her but did nothing to soothe the turmoil within.
“I don’t know where I go. But it is not here or of this land, I can tell you that.”
Some of the fear in Beatriz’s eyes lightened into curiosity. “What do you mean?”
Elysia shook her head. “Honestly, I believe it’s a place of death.”
The curiosity vanished and Beatriz blanched. “Death?”
“Yes, it’s dark, desolate.” It was also beautiful, but she kept that hidden thought to herself. Instead, she told her sister of the deep, rich soil that was foamy and cool between her bare toes. How the river sang her the most haunting and eerie song, raising a tear to her eye every single night.
“Does anything happen?”
“I’m barely there for more than a moment. But I swear... there’s someone else. And they’ve called to me. Before I can do anything, I’m gone. Slamming back into my body.”
They were both quiet a moment.
Beatriz came close and clasped Elysia’s hands. “Don’t go to that meeting. Please, I swear I will find a way to help you with this. Just don’t go.”
“You fear them this much?”
She snorted and dropped her hands. “I don’t fear them. I fear what those idiots may do and who may find out. The fact that their little ragtag group has lasted this long without the Crown discovering them is nothing short of a miracle.”
Elysia hesitated. “Rollie thinks they could help.”
“They will get you killed. Is that what you want? To join the others at the gallows?” Beatriz breathed heavily. “No, you keep this to your damn self, and we—we will find a way to stop this.”
Elysia wanted to believe her sister. Her sister, who never showed up when she was supposed to and only called for blackmail. She believed that Beatriz did not want her to die. That some shred of protective sisterly instinct remained beneath the clothes and reckless behavior. But what could Beatriz, who couldn’t stay out of trouble herself, possibly offer?
She deflected. “Mother says Topp is proposing.”
Beatriz’s mouth dropped. Whatever she saw on Elysia’s face must not have been reassuring. “You know you can’t, right? You’re supposed to be the sensible one!” Disbelief softened the cut of her words.
“You want me to turn down the Crown Prince in front of the entire court at the Raven Ball? I’m not sure if Mother or Father would kill me first. Mother is oddly light on her feet,” Elysia noted dryly.
Beatriz glared in response. “Then stop the proposal altogether. Break his heart. Smash it all to smithereens and come up with some story. Get pregnant by some commoner for all I care. You’ve grown up in this jungle, now fucking act like it, or you’ll be the king’s most favorite example. His own son’s true love beheaded for the sake of the Crown.” Her words were mocking, but the bite of her fear was true.
Elysia said nothing, made no false promises that she had no idea how to keep.
Beatriz looked at her with pity. “What has woken will not die. But maybe we can stop it.” Her gray eyes doubted even as she spoke. They both knew magic was not so easily killed or hidden. The headless and broken bodies decorating the main square proved it.
“I’m going to that meeting,” Elysia said softly.
Beatriz nodded shortly and stood up to leave. Tight anger cut into her words. “Fine. It’ll be your own fault when they take your head for treason. Imagine that, the crown prince’s betrothed left for the birds in the square.”
And with that, she stalked out the door, slamming it behind her.
Elysia thought she heard her loose a fist into the wall as she stomped down the stairs.