Page 95 of A Reign of Storm and Madness

“If you don’t think there’s a target, then what’s the point of staying in the Academy anymore?”

Regis’ question isn’t unfounded, but at the end of the day, I don’t get to choose. “Who’s to say?” I shrug. “At the end of the day, I’m just a servant to Ophelia’s whims.”

“You don’t really believe that,” Regis’ reply is instantaneous and it bubbles up a laugh out of me.

“Don’t I?” I counter. “I’m under a blood contract, Regis, or have you forgotten that fact?”

“She’s never treated you like a real servant,” Regis snaps. “She’s raised you like her own daughter.”

“No.” My denial is bitter and full of venom. Maybe, once, there’d been a time when I, too, believed that. When I wanted to believe it with every fiber of my being. The sad thing about reality and fantasy, though, is that some things can’t become true with just a wish. “I am not her daughter. I can never be her daughter.” I say the words as much for myself as I do for him.

No mother would ever turn her daughter into the monster that Ophelia has expected me to become from the beginning of our relationship.

I meet Regis’ gaze, letting it all drop away. The pain. The hurt. Even the anger. None of it will help me now. It’s meaningless. Just like our relationship. It always has been. He warned me in the beginning and I simply didn’t listen.

“What did you say when we were kids?” I bite down on my tongue hard enough to taste blood. “Back when we were still in training and you hated me and the fact that I carry the blood of the Gods in my veins?” He flinches, knowing exactly what encounter I’m referring to.

He’d been standing over me with a sword in his hand dripping with my blood. It’d taken months in the training trials for him to see me as more than another pompous child of the Gods. Nearly two years to drop the sly insults and saving each other’s asses on more than one occasion for me to feel like we’d bridged the gap between hate and friendship.

Now, I stand here, watching that bridge burn, smoke rising from the vestiges as it fills my lungs and chokes me. And there he stands, holding the match that lit it all.

I repeat his warning word for word. “‘You’ll never truly be able to hide who you really are.’” I laugh and shrug as they come free. “You were right. I wasn’t able to hide it anymore. I’m not mortal. I’m not a God. I’m one of them.” Those wicked, evil things that he hates.

“Kiera—”

I don’t let Regis finish whatever he’d been about to say. I see no reason to. Instead, I turn away from him, and feeling the burn of emotion in the back of my eyes, I sink myself deep into the pit of the darkness that Ophelia had ingrained within me. I take five steps towards the door waiting for me, not stopping even when he calls my name again.

It’s time to face the results of my choices.

Choosing lies. Choosing them. Choosing myself.

The knob is cold against my skin as I grip it and twist. I step into the room, smaller than I anticipated. It’s only the size of an office with no windows and wallpaper that matches that of the sitting room.

It’s not the wallpaper that draws me to an immediate halt though as I spy the three individuals inside. It’s not Carcel, sneering at me as he always does, with a fresh smattering of cuts across his knuckles, or even Ophelia, of course, with her cool, detached gaze that stuns me the most.

The world tilts as the man between them rises to his full height, straightening away from the table the three of them stand in front of. Gone are the robes of deep jewel colors. Gone is the facade of kindness. I hadn’t seen him at the arena, I remember dimly as dark earthen eyes meet mine. I’d wondered where he’d been. I don’t have to wonder anymore.

The books. The words of secrecy. None of it had made sense. I’d just assumed he knew because he was … he is…

“Caedmon,” I say his name. The God of Prophecy.

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