Page 3 of Psycho Gods

Bowed my head.

Stood at attention.

He made a strangled noise and said, “Please, don’t do that—just stand normal.”

My shoulders slouched as I stood normally. “Yes, sir,” I whispered.

He flinched like I’d slapped him.

Silence spread between us, and the temperature in his small office plummeted. Ice crackled as it trailed up my arms beneath my sweatshirt, toward my heart.

Lothaire cleared his throat a bunch of times. “Lyla has hinted that there are—things I don’t know about you.”

I harrumphed.

Understatement of the year.

I picked at my lip and waited for him to demand answers. I waited for him to get aggressive and pry, but he didn’t do any of that.

Instead, he started talking.

He told a story about a man with excessive power who’d committed horrible atrocities in his youth and was owned by the High Court as a result. He told me about how he’d been forced to conceive me with Mother. How he was trapped and had no choices.

He said he’d thought I was better off with her.

He said he’d thought I was safe.

He said a lot of things.

Finally, he pointed to his missing eye, then pointed to mine, the one that had a little more gray in it than the other.

He explained how he’d pulled it out of his eye socket for me, then he’d slashed his own face.

He was the reason I had two eyes.

The reason I could see.

My shivering intensified, and ice crawled up the outside of my throat.

I was numb all over.

I felt as if I hovered outside my body and watched him talking to me from a faraway vantage point.

Finally, he finished his heart-wrenching tale.

We stood in more uncomfortable silence.

I pulled my pipe from my pocket and inhaled enchanted smoke.

The room was freezing, and our breath puffed in frosty clouds between us.

I realized it was my turn.

Lothaire waited.

Silently.

Calmly.

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