Page 93 of A Broken Promise

Priya turned around the room. I kept my eyes on her.

“How convenient,” she said, coming up to the shelf. We were in a bakery. Though the shelves lay empty, there were a few well packaged bags of rolls in the cupboards. Priya ripped into one. “I am starving. Are you? You would think the Royals would have better food, wouldn’t you?” she said, stuffing a roll into her mouth. Her tone was so careless and upbeat like we hadn’t just walked out of the Royal Castle murdering people left and right. Withherkilling them with just a thought.

“Priya. I need you to answer,” I stated. My tone stern, though quiet.

“Why? Why would it matter? I told you I’d save your skinny ass and I kept my promise. I think that’s plenty of answers for you. Maybe you should try and be grateful.”

I was.

I was grateful. I knew full well that if it wasn’t for Priya, my fatewould have been altered today, the same way it was altered when she found me exhausted on the riverbanks of the Dniar river.

“You are a Truth Teller.” My heart sank as I said those words out loud. Tuluma didn’t teach me much about the Magic Wielders, yet she warned me about Truth Tellers. They weren’t magic, no. It was a skill. A mind talent. Ability to read your thoughts, alter them. Human or mage, or even elven. Anyone could be a Truth Teller, yet they were so rare and dangerous.Very dangerous.

“And if I were, what is it to you?” she angrily spat.

My heart twisted as feelings of betrayal sunk in.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Why would I?” Priya glared at me.

“So, I wouldn’t have to question what was true and what wasn’t during these past months,” I blurted out.

“You give yourself too much credit, Freckles. I wouldn’t waste my energy altering your rather pathetic memories of life. You were already obedient and pitiful all on your own.” She had drawn on those words on purpose, aware of their sting. I clenched my jaw.

“How often?” I asked, unsure if I even wanted to know. “How often have you read my thoughts, mingled in my memories? My feelings?”

“Well…” she casually said, as if we were discussing a play playing in the theaters and not her invading and potentially altering my inner being, betraying any kind of trust I had for her. “There were a few times,” she said, taking another bite of the roll.

“I listened to you, I obeyed you, I heeded your every command. Itrustedyou. That day by the river, you promised me that I would have my freedom and yet all I’ve had was just a better master and a nicer cage?” Hurt poured like hail bruising my soul.

“Oh, don’t go all righteous on me now, Freckles, you have not been the perfect little pet you portray yourself to be.”

“Which ones, Priya?” I asked her while devastation and complete defeat settled deep within me. She frustratingly glared at me. Those eyes though, sharp as her blades, warning me; one wrong word and itwould be me who was bloodied up, grasping my head on the ground. “Gods, are you reading my mind now?”

“Relax. It requires a lot more to read someone else’s mind than glaring at them. It’s also rather exhausting, always leaves me so damn hungry and the headaches afterwards are really not worth it.” She rubbed her temples. “So, believe me when I say that when I have done it, I’ve only done it out of necessity,” she said, stuffing another roll.

Necessity.

Hernecessity.

Herchoice.

Nevermine.

She would never answer me, I realized. She would never tell me, and I would never know. I would have to spend the rest of my life questioning it all and just accept it as is.

Maybe that was the price I had to pay for the comfortable life I lived in the past few months.

I was ignorant and unaware.

Anger rose within me but not at Priya. At myself. I knew better. I had seen the red flags. I should’ve connected the dots, but instead I was so focused on everything else.

I was a starved little mouse for so long that I didn’t realize I set my foot in a trap while chasing cheese.

No, she would never tell me. Not now, not later, not ever.

But this ignorance?

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