Page 34 of Bright Blinding Ruin

More flames erupt in the air behind her, more than enough light to illuminate the dark expanse around us. I’m slow in approaching her, feeling some kind of way about it. She looks just as she did in that vision I had of her, when she told me to bring Fred back to Laconia: some of her blond hair braided in a tight crown around her head while the rest of it falls down her back. Her bluish-green eyes match the color of her regal robes. White, porcelain skin, with a sharp jaw that doesn’t detract an ounce from her beauty.

She appears no older than thirty, but I now know that’s a lie, and I can’t help but wonder how old this woman is. How many years did she see before Invictis was unleashed and everything changed? I bet she never saw it coming.

“Hello, Rey,” Morimento speaks with a calmness I feel in my bones. “I’ve been waiting for you to return.”

“Morimento,” I say her name, an odd sense of tranquility sweeping over me as I near her. The woman must radiate peace; it really is a shame what happened. “I got Fred to Laconia, like you wanted.”

The smile she gives me is slight but warm. “And now you are here, just as I knew you would be. You’ve come and gathered the aether, and with three combined you will be able to enter the great chasm beneath Laconia and see the truth.”

She must be talking about that stone door in the library beneath the council chambers. I have a thousand questions I want to ask her, but before I do, there is something I should say. That small skeleton sitting on the throne, the one Invictis pretended to be, grown.

Morimento was a mom. She had a son. She lost not only her people but also her family.

“I’m sorry about your son,” I whisper. “I’m sorry I didn’t know… I didn’t know Invictis could affect reality like that. If I would’ve known—”

Morimento shakes her head. “Don’t. I appreciate your sympathy, but our fate was written in the stars long before you stepped foot in Laconia with Invictis guiding your actions. I do not begrudge you for falling for its tricks. I…” Her blue eyes fall to the space between us. “Perhaps it will be easier to show you.”

A bright white ball of energy materializes between us, a memory she’s sharing with me. I know what I have to do, so I don’t waste any time; I reach for it and immediately I’m thrown back in time.

I stand in the throne room. Sunlight shines through the stained-glass windows behind the throne, illuminating the golden band around Morimento’s head. She sits on her throne, looking bored, as a nervous man approaches.

Fred, I realize once I see the man’s face. He’s younger, and he’s a dead ringer for his son.

“What is an agent of Krotas doing in my castle?” Morimento hisses, sounding not like herself at all. The opposite of calm and collected. Here, she sounds vicious.

“My lady sent me on a mission—”

One of her guards hurries to her and whispers something in her ear. With a wicked glint in her eyes, she listens to whatever he says, and only when the guard leaves does she stand and approach Fred. Step by step, it is not the welcoming guise of an empress to one of her loyal subjects. No, the walk she walks right then is one of a predator about to strike.

“You are here to steal from me,” she whispers with a frown. With a sudden jerk of her hands, a vine grows out of the ceiling and snakes down, coiling around Fred’s ankles and pulling him off his feet. In seconds, the poor man is dangling helplessly mid-air.

“No! No, I would never. My lady hoped you were… strong enough to fight the madness.” Fred fumbles for words, “Please. I have a son—”

“As do I, agent. As do I.” The vine wrapped around Fred’s ankles releases him, and he falls to the ground with an audibleoof. “Guards, dispose of his things and throw him in the dungeon, where he belongs. If my sister wishes to steal from me, let her come herself.” Morimento chuckles. “Provided she’s able to get her anger under control, for once.”

With a flick of Morimento’s wrist, the guards lining the throne room converge on Fred and drag him away. No amountof pleading on his part would get the empress to change her mind.

She sighs as she returns to her throne, sitting with the opposite of grace—another reason I’m able to see just how lost she already was when this happened. Someone else enters the throne room after that: a boy wearing the same regal clothing as Morimento, a boy who can’t be older than ten.

“Mother.” The boy approaches the throne. “Who was that?”

“That, my son, was a traitor to Acadia, a thief sent by my sister. Do not concern yourself with his fate. He is of no importance to you.” Morimento’s tone shifts as she notes something is off about her son. “What is on your mind, my love? Tell me what’s bothering you, and I will do everything in my power to fix it.”

She doesn’t sound so insane when she’s talking to her son. I suppose, in her own way, her son became the only thing that mattered to her, why she ceased caring about the lives of the people in her city.

The boy is a mirror image of his mom, with bright blue eyes and ashen blond hair. He looks down, then over his shoulder. He and Morimento are alone in the throne room, and yet he still whispers it: “I can hear it in the vault, mother. It wants out.”

Morimento slides off the throne and takes her sons hands into her own. “My son, my sweet, loving boy… you must promise me you will never go into the vault, no matter what it tells you.”

“You can hear it, too?”

“I can, but we must ignore it.” The look on her face says it all, and maybe it’s because this is her memory, but I can hear her thoughts and I know exactly what she’s thinking. She hears it too, all right, and Invictis has already driven her to the brink. She worries whether her son can withstand the pressure.

The memory fades around me, and I’m back with Morimento on the platform in the undercroft.

“I did not realize it then, but that day is the day I lost what was left of me,” Morimento whispers, forlorn. “It was not my magic that kept Frederick LaRoe alive all this time; my sister must’ve placed a spell on him, so that he would remain safe until his mission was complete. My only focus was my son.” Her eyes close. “I tried… I tried. I should’ve sent him away, but I could not bear the thought. It was my undoing.”

Another memory sphere appears between us, and before I reach for it, I know this one’s going to hurt.

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