Page 63 of Bound to the Shadow Queen
Every night, we sat by the fire, sipping on the single glass of wine Mirelda consented to bring each of us. Well, technically, she had offered to bring more if we finished our dinner, like a parent bribing a child with the promise of dessert.
I didn’t have the heart to tell her that all food tastes like ashes when there is carnage every time I close my eyes, a sentiment Wynnie shared.
So we nursed our paltry glasses of wine and took the small win.
“The Visionary is…interesting,” Wynnie said, casting a sad look at her half empty glass.
“She is,” I agreed, not entirely sure what to say about the ethereal female who had almost been my friend.
She hadn’t come to see me, and I wasn’t naive enough to think that an order from Draven could have kept her away.
“Whatever happened, I think that Draven blamed her for it, at least at first.” Wynnie’s tone held the slightest hint of a question. “They argued while the assface locked me in an ice cage.”
I pursed my lips. I had thought about my last conversation with Nevara enough times to make myself physically ill, turning her words over and over until they burned like bile.
I don’t blame you,I had promised.
Sometimes you do, she had countered.
She was right, and she was wrong. It was hard not to wonder how much of the past few weeks could have been avoided, but I would never give back the chance to save my sister, even if I had known it would end like this.
“I don’t envy Nevara her choices,” I said quietly.
Wynnie nodded, hearing my answer for what it was. I had seen the weight of the Visionary’s burden. If she was to blame for the things that had happened, she certainly wasn’t alone.
We had all made choices we couldn’t come back from.
Nevara wasn’t the only one I hadn’t seen. The healer had only returned once to help heal Wynnie’s injuries and make one final check of me. Soren had likely actually been banned from my rooms—though I had no doubt he knew I was here. I suspected there was little in the palace he wasn’t aware of.
Then there was Draven.
I saw small images from him, a snippet of a conversation with his Lord General, frozen shards of monster sailing through the air. And of course, I felt him. The marriage bond had taken to acting like a particularly stubborn compass, endlessly tugging me in whatever direction he was.
It was worse when he was in his rooms, his power humming along my skin like a hoard of stinging insects, painful in its intensity, burning with just enough frustration to match my own.
His fury had dampened somewhat, morphing into something closer to an angry resignation. It was a feeling I could relate to.
He hated that I was a liar and a Skaldwing, and I hated that he was a bastard who couldn’t see past his own privilege long enough to understand the position he had put me in.
Neither of us ever broached the door between our rooms, and I hadn’t yet been willing to change that. Though, each day without the Archmage tested my frayed nerves.
I had no answers and no way of moving forward until he came. That was assuming he even had a solution… something that felt more doubtful by the hour.
So I stayed locked in my rooms with Batty and my sister, pretending that the world outside wasn’t on fire.
If only it had been as easy to pretend my nightmares away.
Every night draggedme back to the cave, to the clink of chains, the agonizing scrape of the blade, and the metallic rasp of someone who found perfection in other people’s pain.
It was worse tonight, the images more vivid. I could feel his breath on my skin, hear the lilting way he chided me.
Seelie Whore.
His hatred was branded on my skin over and over again, and my blood poured out of me in agonizing streams.
Then, just like every night, I saw myself through Draven’s eyes.
Small, broken. My face stained with crimson tear tracks. Every gaping wound exposing my weakness for what it was. And it was worse, somehow, than feeling my torment firsthand.
