Page 39 of Lux

“See?” Minchae appears by my side and slips her arm around my shoulders. “She’s fine. Together we will put on a show the audience will never forget. That I promise you.”

“Why does that sound less like you being a good girl, and more like a threat?” Smirking, Cyrus glances at the chains which encircle her ankles. “Don’t forget what happened the last time you tried to pull off one of your slick little schemes.” His voice is harsh, scorching hot against my cheek. “Did you tell her all about how you sold out the last little slut we had you perform with? Got her sold to save your own skin. A naughty girl, this one is. You’d do good to watch your back,” he says to me. “Before she slips a knife into it.”

Minchae does not even flinch. “I don’t know what you mean,” she murmurs, her voice the picture of innocence.

“Next time, I won’t leave your bruises in discrete places where you can hide them. I’ll beat you to a pulp, you fucking half-breed. With your new replacement, I no longer need you. So watch yourself.”

As Minchae stares blankly into the distance, her expression remains unchanged. Emotionless. “Of course,” she intones.

When Cyrus finally storms off, she scoffs and spits on the dirt at her feet. “That blasted, puffed-up son of a bitch! Ugh!” Her hands curl in and out of fists as she paces. There are goons still around, mucking out cages and carrying equipment around the arena—not that she seems to care if they witness her anger. Cyrus is the one she cares to maintain her calm around. It’s the only shred of power she has over him.

I know the feeling.

“God damned bastard!” A cloud of dust rises from her feet as she spins around and sighs. “Are you sure you’re ready tonight?” she asks, with her back to me. “You won’t chicken out? You’re okay on the trapeze?”

There is a hidden meaning to her words. At night, huddled in her tent, we barely slept on the pile of ratty blankets that seemed to be her makeshift bed. Instead, we plotted and schemed. Or, at least, she did. I listened. Rapt at attention, I listened. She made rebellion sound so beautiful in her husky voice. More than mindless rebellion. A carefully constructed plan with little left to chance.

The role I played was simple, but pivotal.

I nod. “Yes, I am ready.”

“Good—” She turns to face me and takes my hands in hers. “We’re in this together, for better or for worse. Got it?”

I nod again. “Yes.”

"Good." A sudden shadow appears over her beautiful features, dimming her expression. She seems lost. A ghost that forgot their tie to the corporeal realm. Fae, especially, were prone to lingering long after death. It’s why they as a whole devised fae stones to make use of those wayward souls yearning for a purpose.

Or so they tell us.

Now I am not so sure. If they were just a sacred end, then why did they litter the walls of the portal? Neglected. Haphazardly shoved into black stone.

It doesn’t make sense.

“I can’t last another second in this wretched place,” Minchae hisses, hugging herself tight. She appears so small in this yawning space. A speck of glistening green amid an ocean of red and yellow.

I stand out as well, wearing my borrowed robe, but I am not sure what picture I make. Not glistening and pretty. A hollow spot, perhaps. One too barren for anything but moss and neglect to take root. A dead tree in an endless forest, covered in overgrowth.

“Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean to bring you down too.” With a heavy sigh, Minchae collapses right there on the dusty floor and sits with her legs splayed out before her. “I get so wrapped up in myself sometimes. It’s how you had to be, growing up in the Desinan. They snuff out all weakness there. Brainwash thisstupid ‘obedient’ bullshit into our heads. Damn. Growing up, I couldn’t wait to get the hell out of that place. But sometimes…” She looks back at me, both colored eyes reflective. “Sometimes, I do miss it. Having a bunch of people tell you what to do can be a hell of a lot more comforting than trying to wing it alone. Here—” She pats the space beside her and draws the edge of her robe aside. “Come sit.”

A giddy feeling fills me as I do so. It isn’t the excitement or freedom I felt while ‘flying.’ It isn’t the desperate, anxious need I felt around Caspian. There was no thought then, in those moments. Just reacting to whatever my body wanted.

This requires thought. Tact. Skill. Navigating a conversation with someone when there is no clear end. No real aim. Their problems weigh heavily on their minds, and speaking them out into the open is the only way to find relief. Mortals do the same. They flutter and fret about certain subjects, never landing on them. Like butterflies avoiding a flower they desperately want.

“I think she is my mother,” I say, voicing my problem for all to hear. In my head, it sounded pathetic. Out loud, the longing is clear. The pain is clear. There is no denying it. “My mother…who abandoned me in the Citadel. I’ve never even seen her face. I don’t know what she smells like or looks like. I don’t even know who my father is. Or if my father is…”

Someone other than Night Aurelius, the only man it possibly could be.

“She left me without a second thought, and I know why,” I admit. “She had a purpose to attend to. Other children to produce. I was an abomination. I wasn’t meant to exist. Even so… It hurts to be abandoned.” I hug my arms to myself as she did, but I don’t find comfort in the meaningless embrace. I missCaspian. I miss his strength, and his voice hissed into my ear, telling me what I was, daring me to question and challenge. With him, there was always a challenge. That was the point.

He called me ‘It’.

I demanded he know me as Niamh.

So, he did. Mockingly, derisively, he did so without question.

I told him not to leave me.

He said he wouldn’t.

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