Page 93 of The Curse of Golden Blood
"You fell in love with him." The words came out harsher than I intended.
She looked away, color flooding her cheeks.
"I can't believe you. That's what you're thinking about when our lives are at stake?"
"You're one to talk," Pelbie shot back, sitting up fully now. "What about you? Yes, I can see it all over your face, Miralyte. He means something to you."
The accusation hit like a physical blow and I stepped back. "You're mistaken. He doesn't mean anything to me."
"Keep telling yourself that."
I clenched my hands into fists. "Pelbie, please. We don't have time for this. The Rot is spreading faster than they can contain it. If I can't give them the cure they need, everyone here is going to die. Including Brond. Including you."
"Then give them the cure."
"I can't. The cure is my... heart." The words tasted bitter in my mouth. "They'll have to kill me."
"Kill you?" She stared at me, wide eyed. "No, there has to be another way."
"There's not. And we're out of time." I took a deep breath, trying to ignore the panic rising in my chest. "Please, Pelbie. Come with me. Help me open the portal. We can find a safe place in the human realm, and we'll figure out how to keep them from dying."
She hesitated, looking around her room. I knew she didn't want to leave Brond behind. "It's forbidden, Mira. If we're caught, we could be killed."
"If we stay, we'll die anyway."
She shook her head, pulling the blankets up around herself like armor. "I'm not going anywhere."
"Pelbie—"
"No." Her voice turned sharp, cutting. "I'm tired of this, Mira. I'm weary of you forever thinking you know what's best for me. Always deciding what I need, where I should go, what I should do."
"That's not what this is about."
"Isn't it?" She climbed out of bed, facing me with her chin lifted in defiance. "Just like four years ago when you decided I needed to leave the village. When you packed my things and tore me from all I knew without so much as asking what I wanted."
The memory hit like ice water in my veins. "That was different."
"Was it? Or was it just another time when Miralyte thought she knew better than everyone else?"
"Those men would have killed you, Pelbie. They were already speaking of it. About what they wanted to do to the daughter of the girl who slew their leader."
"And maybe that would have been better than being forced to live a life I never asked for. Then maybe, I wouldn't have been chosen for the Tithe! Maybe we wouldn't be in this mess if you'd left me alone."
"You were sixteen."
"I'm not sixteen anymore." She wrapped her arms around herself. "And I don't understand why you keep doing this. We're not blood-related, Mira. I'm not your responsibility. I never asked you to—"
"You were crying in the stables," I said quietly. "When I found you that night. You had bruises on your wrists where he'd grabbed you. You were terrified and alone and no one else gave a damn what happened to you."
Her face crumpled slightly, but she held her ground. "That doesn'tmean—"
"You were the closest person I'd ever had to a sister," I continued, swallowing past the lump in my throat. "I couldn't stand the thought of them hurting you. Of them taking away the one good, pure, beautiful piece of our lives. You were the only family I had left."
"Don't you get it, Mira?" Her voice was quiet, almost pleading. "I'm not your sister. Your sister died a long time ago. She's gone, and I'm not her."
The words hit like a knife to the gut. I stared at her, unable to speak.
"I'm not going with you," she said, her tone firm. "I'm staying here. And if you try to make me leave, I'll scream so loud they'll hear me in the lower city."
