Page 95 of Revenge of the Forgotten

“We can save him!” Vega cried, fighting against Bridger’s hold on her, and trying to free herself from the clutches of fate.

“Please don’t kill Meyer.” Bridger’s voice sounded so weak.

“You know what you need to do.” Her sister nodded towards her, forcing the tip of Bridger’s sword further into the underside of Meyer’s chin. Blood started to trickle down the blade.

“This will be easier for us next time,” Bridger promised as he closed his eyes and took a sharp inhale. He plunged the dagger through Vega’s heart, and even though it was a memory, Vega could feel the ache in her chest.

The memories kept coming, pouring back into her one by one—so painstakingly slowly Vega felt every ebb and flow of the curse releasing them to her.

Even though some of them were happy, they all reminded Vega of everything she’d lost.

Over and over and over and over—Marlena always won.

35

Vega’s eyes fluttered open, eyelashes tickling her cheeks. She was back in the cell, the pounding in her head intensifying as she slowly sat up. “Gods.” The curse left her mouth, and the pain in her head became an afterthought.

Vega jumped to her feet, her vision spotting. She bent down, her hands resting on her knees, to inhale a breath of stale air. At first, she thought it had all been a dream, the memories, but when she started to ignore the pounding in her head, she realized something…

She remembered.

Everything.

“Oh my gods.” Vega stood up straight, a hand over her heart, the other over her open mouth.

She remembered the first time Arlet skinned her knee outside of her house and how Marlena snuck into the infirmary to steal bandages so the girls wouldn’t get in trouble for being outside when they were supposed to be studying.

She remembered the sound of her mother’s voice and the smell of her home burning to the ground.

She remembered the stories Arlet and Khort told her. They were no longer fairy tales from someone else’s head—they were hers.

“I remember.” Vega choked out a sob. “I remember.”

Tears rushed down her face, and she no longer cared about anything going on around her. Nothing mattered except for one thing: the hollow feeling in her chest was gone.

Vega had her memories back, and if she died for good soon, at least she got to remember one more time. There was so much pain in her life, and the memories weren’t all happy—but they were hers.

I’m whole again.

Vega didn’t care she was locked underground in the Aeris chambers. Maybe she would find a way out, and maybe she wouldn’t. There was so much she could be angry about. The pain, the longing feeling she’d become so used to, the loneliness she’d been forced to feel, the curse. All of it would eventually make her blood boil, but for now, Vega just wanted to revel in the beauty of what it felt like to be whole—of what it felt like to be her.

She sat down with her back to the wall and smiled up at the ceiling. Vega was locked in a prison with a smile on her face. Her head no longer felt like a whoosh of radio static.

All of her lives on Earth were there too, spinning around with the lives she had here in Tolevarre. Over her last twenty years, Vega had learned a lot about herself. Fifteen of those years had been on Earth, where she was shaped more than she’d ever been. This last life on Earth wouldn’t leave her. None of them would—because they made her stronger, despite how weak she’d felt then.

Marlena meant for last night to be another moment that beat Vega down, but she’d been wrong.

It only made her stronger.

36

Carts rumbled over Fortis’s streets, their wheels bobbing over the cobblestone roads as merchants packed up their wares from today’s market. Fortis might have been Bridger’s birthplace, but it hadn’t felt like home in decades.

Vega has her memories back. He could feel it down the bond, just like he’d always been able to. It wasn’t the first time, and it might not be the last time she’d get them back, but for the first time in almost forty years, Bridger felt anxious knowing Vega would remember it all—worried how her remembering his betrayals would affect him.

This trip to Fortis was meant to be short—thank the gods. After he punished Grimes for his behavior, Bridger’s mind hadn’t felt like his own, like the one he’d conditioned to forget.

Before he could make it up the driveway and into the home, his mother filed down the front steps with two guards flanking her. “Darling.” Katrin reached for Bridger when she was close enough. “You’re home.” She kissed the side of his cheeks with an exaggerated pop.

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