Page 92 of The Second Death of Locke
That was it. They started to lead them away, and Grey fought with such ferocity that even Kier looked disappointed. She tried to do as much damage as possible until they finally drugged her, and as her eyes slid shut, she held his gaze and tried to convey with all of her might that she would never forgive him for this.
When Grey woke, she found herself slung across Ola’s lap, her head pillowed on the other woman’s thigh, Ola’s fingers stroking her hair.She felt a surge of panic, then an unbelievable rush of bitterness. Her whole body was heavy, weighted, like she’d never move again. She kept her eyes closed.
Kier.
Above her, Ola was saying, “… and the closest encampment is Grislar, but I don’t know where we are, and if we’re in Luthar, it doesn’t seem sensible to go asking.”
“Who would know the difference?” Brit asked from somewhere close by. “Who would care? Let’s head east, then follow the coast north.”
“We can’t leave him.”
There was a silence, then, and Grey couldn’t take it. She shifted, the others immediately focusing on her with a lot of soothing sounds that did absolutely nothing. She opened her eyes to find they were in a clearing surrounded by a dense wood of skinny, light-colored trees, in the middle of nowhere. Eron was pacing back and forth next to a magelight that Ola and Brit were maintaining. Grey felt the ache in every part of her body. She needed to speak, but the words were too heavy. They would not form. They would not come.
“Grey?” Brit was saying, looming over her. “Did you hear me?”
She didn’t. She couldn’t. She tuned them out because nothing mattered, not anymore, not when Kier was gone and good as dead. She sat up, nearly hitting her head on Ola’s chin, and hugged her knees to her chest. Ola’s fingers were there on her back immediately, scratching down her spine.
“He did what he thought was best,” Eron said, and Grey wanted tothrowsomething, because that sounded like Kier was already dead. Before she could stop it, a sob clawed its way out of her throat. She slapped a hand against her mouth, nails digging into her skin.
She wouldn’t cry for him. Not when he’d done this to her. Not when he’d abandoned her, taken her name and her title and her heart and disappeared.
She could cry for Mare, who deserved it. For Kier, she would just remain angry.
“Fuck Kier,” she said, too loud, her tongue still thick with sleep. She lurched up, pushing off Ola and Brit, nearly careening into a treewith the unsteadiness of a monumentally pissed-off newborn deer.
“Grey!” Ola called after her. “Where are you going?”
She didn’t answer. She couldn’t look at any of them, not with this anger brewing up within her. She pushed through the trees, wobbling unsteadily, breathing hard and grappling at the tether in her middle as if it would connect to Kier. She feltnothing.
An arm wound around her, right on her bruised stomach, pulling her against a chest—Eron, she realized. “No,” she gasped, grappling against his arm, but he said, “We need you.”
She turned on him. “What the fuckwasthat back there?” she demanded, the words clawing out of her. He gripped her wrists so she couldn’t swing, accidentally pressing on the bruises left behind by her restraints. “You just let him lie.”
“We can’t lose you, Grey,” Ola said over Eron’s shoulder.
Grey shook her head. “You should’ve let me go. You should’ve let them takeme.”
“Kier needs you alive and functioning,” Eron said firmly, “and you are only doing half of that.”
She looked at him, the rage clear in every line of her body, even though it wasn’t Eron she was mad at. She wished Kier was in front of her if only so she could shout at him, and the thought was so devastating and overwhelming that she did not know what to do with all the feelings she could not contain.
“I’mLocke,” she said, loud enough so the others could hear her as they moved toward her, unease on their faces.
“Weknowthat,” Eron said. “Now what are you going to fucking do about it?”
She stared at him, wordless. Kier was gone—Kier was in her place. Butshewas Locke, and Locke was her, and she was a well with the power to actually do something. Even now, she felt it, curling inside of her, vibrant and visceral with anger, a wounded animal ready to strike. She pressed one hand to her stomach as if she could grip the power in her fist and drag it out of her.
She sat down heavily on the forest floor. As she did, something in her boot pressed to her shin. She dug into the top and pulled out Kier’s ring. She stared wordlessly at the silver in her palm, everything aching.
Not Kier’s ring, not at first. Lot’s ring. Lot, who had lied for her, who had died in the war the sovereigns started because she was not strong enough to tell the truth, to claim her Isle; Lot, who had died because she ruined everything.
“They’re all dead,” she said to the others, to Kier, to no one. “Do you know what that’s like? Everyone who ever cared for me is dead.”
“You’re not,” Ola said. “We’re not.”
“Not yet, but the odds aren’t promising,” Brit pointed out. Someone hit them; they swore in response.
Grey looked up at the sky far above. It was impossible to tell where they were. Her heart, broken and bruised, had retreated somewhere deep inside of her.
