Page 48 of Possession

“But you can’t tell me that you enjoyed the life you had down in that box.”

I’m not sure how to respond, and Aris isn’t either. It almost sounds like he’s speaking against the mages’ protocol.

Is this some kind of test?

“I didn’t,” I admit after hesitating, nervously, not wanting to say the wrong thing.

Henry sighs and leans back in the chair, thoughtful. “What will you do now?” he asks, tone still light.

I blink. “You mean, you aren’t going to take me back?”

Henry takes a moment to respond.

Rehearsing his answer, says Aris.

Or he’s just thinking.

“It wasn’t right what they were doing to you, but I don’t know how safe you’d be on your own,” Henry says. “Aris is renowned for his crimes. There’s nowhere you could go where you wouldn’t be apprehended—no borders to cross, no ship to take. You couldn’t have a life.”

I knew this already, but Aris can get around it. Granted, he would have to come out, and we would need to find a way to secure that I don’t disappear, but he could help.

“You didn’t cover your tracks well either. Even if I don’t notify the mages, they’ll be here soon enough. I expect whoever,” he points at my wound, and even under gauze and a blanket, I feel stripped bare, “did that to you, will find you as well.”

His words surround me and press my shoulders down. His tone has never once turned snide, and he’s only being honest, but the truth is a beat down. I feel like a child again. Little, and alone.

You are not alone, Aris says quietly.

I consider that, looking away from him. He’s right—I’ll have him, but that brings a whole other set of problems.

It’s funny. I’ve got an all-powerful god on my side, and I still feel powerless.

Not all-powerful, murmurs Aris.

And not exactly on my side, either.

Aris pauses for a moment, then says, You’ve become solemn quite abruptly. You might want to consider that he is using magic to influence your emotions.

Henry wouldn’t do that.

The same Henry whose last name you don’t know? He scoffs when I stay quiet. Don’t take it so personally. Why wouldn’t he lie? Why wouldn’t he use magic? We’re a threat.

He has a point. I’m still reeling from the betrayal at the gala and have no interest in falling into another trap.

“Why are you saying all of this?”

My voice, sharper than it’s ever been with him, makes Henry sit up straighter. “I want to help you,” he says.

His face, while sweet, doesn’t make me that stupid. “Why now, after watching me in a cage for three years?”

“What could I have done?” he demands with sudden intensity, eyes narrowed from the force of his own words. “Do you think that I have any power with the mages, that I could have changed anything? In some ways, I was as trapped as you were.”

Oh, please, says Aris.

As if he can hear him, or at the very least sense Aris’ doubt, Henry’s tone turns even more vehement and insistent. “I signed up for as many shifts as I could, because I knew what the others were doing!” he exclaims. “I knew that they liked messing with you, and I tried my best to keep them away. I’m no apprentice—why do you think I watched you so much? Instead of studying with the colleagues of my rank, I was with you, taking care of you!

“I was never allowed to talk to you. If I had, I would’ve been pulled, and you would’ve been surrounded by people much worse than me. But do you think I didn’t see you? Did you think I wasn’t watching?”

My eyes are wide. I had no idea he ever cared about me, let alone that he cared this much.

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