Page 129 of Dancing with Vipers and Shadows

“Odessa.” My eyes widen to their full capacity as I’m now the one gripping her shoulders for dear life. “Don’t tell me…”

I can’t dare say it.

All she can do is give me a smile.

One that shatters my struggling heart because I know that look better than anyone.

The look of defeat.

“Why?”

It’s all I can ask.

“The night of our eighteenth birthday, when we got our powers, we were chosen to attend N.M.U.,” she surprisingly reveals. “I feared if our parents found out, they wouldn’t hesitate to send us. Despite us training our whole lives for that moment, having that invitation in my grasp left me fearing the worst. If I brought it from the mailbox home, our parents would have seen it and sent us to the gates to pursue the entry trial. I felt that it was my burden to carry as the firstborn. Not yours, so I decided to attend alone.”

“Odessa…”

What can I say to her?

“I know it was stupid, Ophelia,” she pleads for me to understand. Her eyes are screaming for me to listen to her side of the story. “But for years, I’ve heard that twins who attend N.M.U. always turn on one another. It’s happened so many times that it’s deemed a curse. As if the deity that rules the school foundation ensures it. N.M.U. has the highest twin attendance rate because any twin who gains their gifts at the fruitful age range is automatically enrolled in N.M.U. I was scared if we attended together, the same thing would happen. I mean… everything was set for us to despise one another.”

She sighs and lowers her head in shame.

“Just because I came out a few seconds earlier, you were basically shunned by Mother. Everyone put me on some sort of pedestal, as if I’d be the one to bring honor and grace to our family heritage. My ultimate fear was that you’d turn against me. That all those years of torment and misery of being the ‘second’ child would lead you to despise me enough to kill me,” she reveals and lifts her head so she can look into my eyes.

“I decided the least I could do was attend on my own, so you could be free and no longer be tormented by Mother and the constant training we had to endure. I knew you were into the Heathcliff guy. I thought maybe you’d get to have a relationship with him, seeing as our families would have to try to get along, despite our obvious competitiveness. I just wanted you to have a future that didn’t put you at risk of entering this sinful world of shadows and bloodshed.”

“Then what happened?” I whisper pleadingly. “Why didn’t you ever come home? Or call us when you passed the entry trial.”

She tries to smile, but it only makes my heart want to shatter in her name.

“He betrayed me.” I can see the heartbreak in her eyes just as I hear the agony in her quivering voice.

“Who… betrayed you?”

“Alaric.”

Now I’m completely confused because it doesn’t make sense.

“Odessa... Alaric entered N.M.U. this year. Azrael is his twin brother and is on my team. Alaric betrayed Azrael during their entry trial, and he’s the one who tried to kill me before the tsunami hit us.”

“When I went straight to the entry gates of N.M.U. to participate in the entry trial, Alaric Hawthorne ended up being my partner through the challenge. I was the first in line, with him being second, and together, we made it to the golden gates, where I stopped the massive snake from killing us and used that creature as Alaric’s living offering.”

Just like what I did with Blair.

“What was your offering?”

“The roses growing outside of the fountain,” she declares and watches how I smirk.

“Copycat,” I mutter. “The golden snake, Ophira. She’s the one that wrapped around me before the tsunami hit.”

I can see hints of relief in her eyes.

“Ophira… a good name for her. She helped me a few times. She’s loyal, and if you gain her trust, she’ll show you her real form.”

“Real form,” I whisper. “If you know that much, what happened after the trials? Why didn’t we hear from you?”

“I decided not to call home to say I’d arrived at N.M.U. I didn’t want them freaking out and especially didn’t want Mother putting further strain and torment on you. I thought I’d call once I finished an arc or two… but…”

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