Page 19 of Exquisite Monster
On top of that, I doubted I would be able to touch her. I had some skills, but I was still human. Close range when someone wasn’t expecting it—like Andaros in that hallway outside the throne room, or Endre pressed up against me in my cell—was one thing. Attacking a fully grown dragon who was expecting it was another.
“Not ideal clothes for fighting,” I said, trying to keep the anger and frustration out of my voice.
Gleym closed in on me. “When are you going to realize that nothing ever happens when the circumstances are ideal? No one will wait for you to be ready, Princess.”
The sound of my title made something in me break. They were the last ones to call me that, and it was all I wanted to hear. From them, not from her.
I lunged, swiping too fast and leaning too far. She smacked my shoulder with her staff, easily moving out of reach. “You’ll have to do better than that. And don’t bother telling me that it’s unfair that I have a longer weapon. Things that are fair go hand in hand with things that are ideal. They’re never going to happen.”
Pushing aside everything else, I focused on her and what I knew how to do. Maybe it wouldn’t be today that I managed to strike her, but I would do it.
She moved, and I ducked under her sweeping blow, just missing catching her leg. “You act like I don’t know there are hardships in life. I do.”
“You mean your life as royalty? Learning a trade you desired, even though it was in secret? Being protected at all costs because of your value? Yes, those are great hardships.”
I whirled, moving faster in response to her words. Yes, I’d been protected, but I’d also been sacrificed. If the marriage to Andaros had been successful, I might have been brutalized. I’d been on the edge of death so many times it didn’t even seem real anymore.
My struggles had been different, but they were still struggles.
There were no more words. Simply me attacking and her defending with an ease that made rage build in my chest. Bruises formed where she struck me—and I knew it was not even close to how hard shecouldstrike. Every touch spoke of holding back.
Anger built like a living thing under my skin until it was all I could see or breathe. I finally screamed and hurled the knife directly at her face. She didn’t even move, the knife simply changing directions and clattering to the rocky floor.
Her power in controlling the relationship between things and how they moved made the defense simple, and it made me ache. I was not strong enough.
“That’s enough. For now.”
I didn’t even look at her as she moved to exit the room, but Gleym stopped near me. “Anger, like everything else I am teaching you, is a tool. It is useless if you do not know how to use it. Consider it a resource, and one that you have more than enough of. Hate me if you must, as long as you learn.”
Shaking my head, I didn’t turn until I thought she was long gone. But she still lingered in the doorway.
“I do not speak to you as I do because you’ve known no hardship, Katalena. But because you think you understand more than you know. Because I am down here and because I used to be an Elder, you have created a story about me that makes sense to what you’ve experienced. You know how twisted, mercurial, and vile the other Elders can be. So, to you, I must be better than them to have had them turn on me, just as they turned on your mates.”
She looked at me and tilted her head. “But did it ever occur to you that I might be worse than them? That they put me down here to save themselves fromme?”
My mouth opened, and one look from her made me close it. She hadn’t told me the truth one way or the other, and no matter what, I was still trapped with her. I found my voice in spite of her. “Are you going to tell me which story is real?”
“I will. But remember this lesson. The stories we create for others are just that. Stories. You do not know the truth unless you see it with your eyes. Even for the people you know the best.”
She glided out of view, and I retrieved the knife, keeping it close. My own knife hadn’t been replaced after it melted in the storm of dragonfire.
But with what she just told me? I was glad to have a weapon. I just prayed to the Fallen I wouldn’t have to use it to get out of here.
CHAPTER TEN
________
KATALENA
Time at the center of the earth fell into a rhythm.
I studied the books that Gleym gave me until it felt like my eyes would bleed, committing not only the formulas to memory, but drawings and maps of where things might be found.
She tested me as I created things in the workshop. If I got it wrong, I started over. If I got it right, we moved on to the next thing. My head felt tight and stuffed from the amount of new knowledge I was taking in.
And after I finished whatever task she had for me, she would take me to the empty room and allow me to try to attack her. It didn’t work, and my arms and legs were black and blue from being struck with her staff. But it was also an outlet. It kept me from sobbing into the pillows after I ate and retreated to the little roomVaríand I shared.
In the moments when I could bear it, I thought about them. I sent love through the space our bond occupied, even though there was no proof they could feel me. Part of me hoped that because dragons were stronger, perhaps they could sense the mating bond at a greater distance than I. The other part of me hoped that they couldn’t, because feeling my grief and rage while Fallen knew what was happening to them made me sick with worry.
