"I won't choose," he stated. "Not this time."
The woman laughed, like she'd expected that answer from him.
"In that case, dear boy." Her hand hovered over the hilt of the knife. "You will die and they will both be put into the trade. So, what's it going to be?"
Morana looked to the man on screen in desperation. "Don't do this," she bargained. "I will help you if you let us go." She wouldn't. She would hunt them down and murder themmn bloody. But she needed to get free, needed for Tristan to get free so he could break bones.
"I'm just giving a loyalist what they want," the man told her. How could people be so apathetic? So evil?
"Why?"
"Because some people just like to watch the world burn," it was a chilling statement because it was true. Some people didn't have motives, didn't have reasons, just chaos inside them they unleased on the innocent.
Silence descended for a few moments. Her heart drummed her in her ears.
Tristan looked at her, kept looking at her, until a tinny voice said from her right. "Make the same choice, brother."
Both his and Morana's eyes went to Luna, who was looking at him with the same fire in her eyes she'd had the night before.
"Lun—" Tristan started but she shook her head.
"No. Not Luna," she told him, and Morana blinked at her disuse of the name. "I'm both the lost innocent girl and the broken healed woman. I am a phoenix who rose from her own ashes, and I will claim my own name, not a name given to me by a bitch of a mother or a bastard of a man."
Her biological mother clapped. "Well done. Great speech."
Luna looked at the woman with disgust. "You're shameful. So what if you were raped? You brought an innocent child into the world and gave it to monsters. A mother loves. A mother protects. A mother sacrifices. I have seen good mothers, and for a moment in time, I have been a good mother."
Tristan gaped at his sister, the revelation of her words hitting him hard. Luna looked at him. "I gave birth to Xander."
Tristan started to struggle. Morana could see all the emotions overwhelming him as the epiphany, the connection that had shocked her a few hours ago, sank into him.
The older woman stared hard at her daughter before turning to Tristan. "Make your choice."
"Choose her," Luna urged him. "Get out of here. For Xander. He needs you both."
"We won't leave you alone," Morana struggled inside, not knowing how they would get out of this.
She turned to her. "I won't be alone. He'll come for me."
"Who?" Chiara asked, speaking for the first time in a while.
And then, a voice came from the screen, a voice she'd heard just hours ago, deadly and dangerous, and hope surged in her heart.
"Me."