Page 228 of A Queen's Game
“You look like you could use a drink after that.” He glanced at her, his mouth tilting with a smile.
Marietta nodded her head, leaning further into Tilan. She really could use a drink. Part of her thought she was going crazy, seeing things that weren’t there. Perhaps after years of undergoing Keyain’s controlling patterns, her brain manifested the thing she feared most.
Now a year out from her relationship with Keyain, she could see the unhealthy toll Keyain had caused, the emotional turmoil that he put her through, especially with his anger. Keyain would have never hit her, but not all injuries were physical. Marietta couldn’t see it until she left him. Such things were always clearer in hindsight.
Chapter Eighty-Eight
Marietta
Keyain paced before Marietta in the living room of their suite with his jaw ground shut. She sat on the couch, her hands clasped in her lap on her filthy dress, torn from where she fell. Red plumed from her bruises, her knees ached and were caked with blood. Despite looking worse for wear, she held her chin high.
“How dare you,” he whispered again, his gaze finding her.
“Are you that surprised?”
Keyain laughed mirthlessly. “I said you would be the death of me.”
“And I once said I never wanted to see your face again, so you decided to steal me away and attack my city as a cover for your actions. Did you think I would ignore all of that?”
“I suppose I’m a fool for thinking you would.” Keyain looked away.
“And you lied to me,” she hissed, hot tears running down her face, “I saw him; Tilan’s in the dungeons. He’s alive.”
The muscles in his neck tightened. “What did that bitch do?”
Marietta laughed. “Valeriya gave me the truth—that you are a liar. Why keep him here? To torture him while you fucked me, claiming me as your wife?”
Rage flashed in his eyes as Keyain turned, punching the wall next to him, splintering the wood paneling. Blood ran down his fist, his voice a growl. “Tilan is a monster. How many times do I need to say this?”
“You’re just petty and controlling. Does it excite you, having complete control over me? To make me tremble at your anger?”
Keyain glared at Marietta, his fists flexing. He turned, disappearing into his office, digging through his desk drawer. When Keyain returned, he pulled a few pages out from a file in his hand.
“What’s this?” She looked at Keyain with knitted brows.
“Look for yourself.”
The papers shook in her hands as she lifted them, her eyes taking in the notes. Tilan’s handwriting—she would recognize it anywhere. And gods, those were his drawings, the streaky, sketchy style of his designs, but the machines were... nausea rolled in her stomach. No, Tilan hadn’t made these. Not him. Not Tilan.
The first sketch was of a device stretching out a body. The person on the rack had pointed ears, their face sketched in pain. Tilan’s handwriting made notes in the margins around the drawing.
“See those machines, Mar? Your sweet Tilan designed those himself, intended to use them against Satiros.” He laughed darkly. “I told you he was no better than me; I was just faster than him this time.”
Marietta turned the page, letting the first fall to the floor, holding the breath in her chest. Unbelievable—they weren’t Tilan’s.
The second page had sketches of large wooden blocks loaded with spears. Tilan’s notes detailed how black powder launched the spears into groups of people, impaling them. Black powder.Gods, Tilan had talked of black powder with her not that long ago.
“Keep flipping, Marietta,” Keyain hissed. “See what your husband created.”
The next was a small hand-held apparatus made from metal that, at first, appeared to be harmless. The diagram showed round compartments attached to an elongated frame with notes in the margins that denote the use of black powder to launch a metal casing that exploded on impact.
She flipped through the pages, each machine crueler than the previous. Bile climbed her throat with each sketch. Marietta leaned over the couch, her stomach spilling out to the floor. How could he have designed such evil things? How could anyone have done so?
Keyain approached her with heavy footfalls, his hand on her back. “I hope you understand that this is what your treachery aided.” His voice choked as Marietta spit the remaining vomit in her mouth to the floor. “I don’t know what Wyltam will do to you, but I might spare you and the baby from death if you give us the identity of your Exisotis informant because I am sure it was you leaking information.”
The baby. Keyain still thought she was pregnant. She closed her eyes, resting her hands on her head. It was all too much. She reached to find the warmth of Therypon in her chest, calming her. “I don’t know who the informant is,” she whispered.
“How do you not know?” He lifted her chin to stare into her face, confused.
