Page 42 of Lux

“I waited and waited and waited,” she tells me. Over and over until her voice breaks. “I waited and you never came. I tried everything, Caspian. Everything! Where were you? Where?”

“I was… in the dark,” I say. In that dark, wretched hive mind. In that twisted collective brain.

It’s no excuse.

“No excuse!” she hisses, beating against my chest with two delicate fists. Slam. Slam. Slam. I barely feel the pain, but I let her hit me. If that is what it takes, I’ll let her break me into pieces like she was.

“We only had each other. Just us! It was JUST US! How could you endure him without me? That disgusting, fucking shithead! How could you survive him without me? Oh, Caspian, I’m so sorry. I told you to follow. I told you to come! WHY DIDN’T YOU LISTEN?”

“Darlings—” The voice cuts into our jaded reunion.

We aren’t alone, I remember. There are others about. Fragile, sensitive creatures huddling in rooms both above and below where we stand now. In Altaris’s strange domain of empty vamryer. He stands in the doorway of some narrow room piled high with a table draped in purple cloth, with even more material shielding the two large windows.

“I hate to interrupt, but the noise level… Can we just keep it to a minimum, please? The other darlings are already upset, and I frankly cannot afford moreincidents—” His tone is deliberately cutting, his gaze on my Cassiopeia. “In one day. Indoor voices, darling ones. Indoor voices.”

He slips from the room and gently closes the black door.

Slam. SLAM! Cassiopeia pummels me with her fists. It is starting to hurt. Starting to feel. Starting to remind me of another slender creature with grasping hands and a persistent voice.

Niamh. My Niamh. Lost. Alone. Needing to be found?—

“I’m so sorry.” Cassiopeia collapses into me. Her arms scratch around my waist—a physical embrace. In all the years we dwelled in Cassius’s demented playground, we rarely touched. A holding of hands there. A hug here. We didn’t need physical contact in the same way we needed our minds. Our thoughts. We’d let them mingle and merge until we couldn’t tell which belonged to the other. We were one. A hateful duality fixated on one purpose.

Kill Cassius.

Make him suffer.

Make him pay.

“He’s still there,” Cassiopeia says, her voice muffled by my coat, her face pressed to my chest. “Still thriving and living. That sick piece of shit! I hate what he’s done to you. I can see it on your face. Sick bastard. He tormented you. Why didn’t you come for me? You promised.”

I promised. That I did. We had a plan. An elaborate and carefully devised scheme, once we knew we’d gone too far and escape was our only option.

We ran together into the mortal realm.

Cassius followed. Personally, he followed. But why?

It hurts to remember.

“We should go now,” Cassiopeia laments, still striking me. Bang. Bang. “Go now when he least expects it. Stab him in the bloody eyes. Rip them out. Eat them in front of him. We should go now. Kill him now?—”

“We can’t,” I say. Then I grasp her wrist before she can hit me again. I step back and watch her fist flail in my grip, striking nothing. “I need to stay. I need to find…”

“You need. You need!” Her eyes blaze, a dull hue of red. Out here, they’ve lost that scarlet sheen. They’re more amber. Her hair…

I reach for a strand with my free hand and frown. It’s been desecrated. Someone painted over the silvery white with a garish pink. Until now, I didn’t even notice.

“What have they done to you?” I ask her. Demand an answer.

She shakes her head. “Not important. We are. We must leave. We must. We must. We must—ah!” She sinks into a crouch cradling her face in her hands. “It hurts. This stupid, fractured, lone mind hurts. I need you, Caspian. I need your thoughts. Your voice.”

“I am here,” I say, moving toward her, ready to touch. Provide comfort. A pat on her shoulder to mimic the way our minds would collide. I reach for her hand. She snatches it away.

“No! No! I can’t think! It hurts! Can’t think. Can’t think…” Her voice devolves into a moan as she rocks her body back and forth, her eyes squeezed shut.

“It’s okay.” A delicate voice. Falsely delicate.

I turn to see the wise one standing in the doorway, peeking inside. “It takes us all time to adjust. Poor Daisy. I’ve neverheard her speak before…” She trails off and sighs. Then she meets my gaze directly with her strange, probing eyes. “Altaris said you have business with Ginni in the basement. You can go. I’ll watch over her. It is alright.”

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