Page 20 of Kingdom of the Two Moons

“Don’t play games, Melody. You know it will only get worse.” When I say nothing, he adds, “And you should wash that paint off. You know how he hates that.”

He leaves the dress on my bed, though not without another indiscreet swipe over me that makes me clutch the brush in my hand tighter, wondering how it might possibly pierce his skull. Everything is a weapon. Wasn’t it Kayne who taught me exactly that?

One day… one day I will wipe the soil from Lyrian and his bloodhounds. It is that thought, that anger, that fuels me. That prevents me from falling to my knees and weeping for what Lyrian has just done to me again.

But the truth is, I’ve been feeling on the verge for a while now. Closer to breaking than I’ve ever felt. I’m just so tired.

When Kayne’s gone, I look at the dress. An expensive little thing. Nothing less when I have to appear next to Lyrian, who loves luxury over everything else.

A function. Along with my tracking activities, the functions Lyrian likes to attend are possibilities for me to escape for good. Not that I ever succeed. But I need to try. I need to get away. I can’t stay any longer. I need to seize every opportunity I can get, be it ever so tiny. I can’t just give up and accept my fate.

I swallow down my tears, along with my hopelessness.

When I’m sure Kayne has gone for good, I grab the dress and walk to the bathroom to undress. You never know with Kayne. But he was right in one regard: When I look in the mirror, there’s paint everywhere, in my dark hair and all over my skin. I step under the shower one more time and scrub it off, trying to get it out of my hair, but there’s still some left in the strands when I get out.

Oh hell, Lyrian will be furious.

I spend a long time getting ready. It takes a good deal of time to cover up the nasty violet-and-bluish spot Kayne’s hand left on my face. Not to mention the bruises from the handcuffs. But then I’ve had a lot of practice over the years. Eventually, I put on the black dress. It’s a skintight, half-translucent thing, showing off every inch of my tall, slim body, leaving no room for imagination. I clench my teeth. I hate it. I feel naked.

A dark part of me wonders why Lyrian sent such a thing for me to put on in the first place. Probably because he knows how uncomfortable it will make me feel. Another punishment.

Then again, he does love to brag, even about me, as if I, too, am a trophy. He delights when people want what he has. Apart from that, he is so vain everything around him has to look perfect. So I’ll play along, if only to buy myself another chance to run away.

6

Blair

Blair stands in her cell, the ripped fabric of the silver dress she’s still wearing stiff with dried blood. She no longer feels the ice biting her bare skin. A human would long since have died from the cold. A human like that girl…

Blair’s mind keeps wandering back to her.Melody.

She saved her. Not that Blair deserved that act of mercy.

Why? Why did she do it?

Witches know no mercy. Mercy is a coward’s trait. Compassion, another deficiency. It’s something that haunts Blair—why the very girl she has hunted for a year, chose to spare her. Because she’s a human with a soft, human heart?

Blair knows it was a sacrifice. Because a man like Lyrian won’t let a kindness like that go unpunished.

And now… Caryan has found her.

Last night, Aurora snuck down here. A stolen moment to tell Blair that Sofya was alright, to bring Blair some medicine and the rumors that Caryan had caught the girl. A seer told them so.

Melody. Ciellara’s daughter. The daughter of the woman who almost killed Caryan that fatal night at Gatilla’s tower.

Her daughter, born to continue her mother’s legacy and finish the task her mother didn’t accomplish. To kill Caryan.

Melody, the girl from Kalleandara’s prophecy.The girl who will end the blight.

Blair didn’t expect the task of finding the girl would bring the past rushing back in a deluge. The time in her aunt’s tower. A time of so much darkness, only lightened by the moments she and Caryan tangled in the sheets in some languid nightly hours.

And now this girl is in Caryan’s cruel hands…

A fact that could change this world all over.

Blair’s officially failed. The witches. Her people.

She leans her scarred back against the wall, her teeth chattering so hard her face aches. But a dark part of her heart aches even worse. A part she doesn’t want to examine too closely. A silly, useless stir of emotion. Definitely nothing she wants to acknowledge. But it bubbles up unasked, again and again like a burning itch until she can no longer ignore it.

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