Page 190 of The Stars are Dying

“I only wish I could have seen the danger to you both sooner. I managed to slip into her mind to wake her up when I saw it, but I was too late.”

I could hardly breathe, slowly lowering to my knees. “It was all you,” I realized. Nothing I had done had been for me. My strings hadn’t been untied; their control was simply slipped cunningly into far more masterful hands.

I was his ultimate plan.

Get me here.

Play the game.

Win the key.

Free him.

But not me. I was never free.

“Astraea—”

“Go away, Nyte,” I barely whispered, but he obeyed. The gray around me grew darker and darker. I became so hollow when the shattered pieces of my soul settled. “I wish that room had been empty.”

54

“Nightsdeath, commander of the vampire army,” I drawled.

“What made you come to that conclusion?” Nyte asked, leaning against the far wall.

With my back to him I continued flexing my wrist, regaining my strength and remembering I wasn’t helpless anymore. I could hardly recall much of the time that had passed while I’d overcome the worst of my cravings for the Starlight Matter, but though I felt a new will to refuse it, I had to find distraction, otherwise the temptation threatened to creep back in.

“It’s how the king has kept them under control all this time,” I said, reflecting on what I’d gathered so far now I had a face to attach every sin to. “You’ve been amassing an army behind your father’s back, making him believe it washisarmy. The fae—you capture them and strip them of their memories to switch their enemy from the vampires to the celestials.”

“That was my father’s demand.”

“And you enforced it. Even when you were chained. Why?”

“He would have killed them all instead.”

I barely cast him a glance over my shoulder, only to see if his expression matched the note of irritation I heard. It didn’t. He remained indifferent.

I hated that that only riledmyfrustration.

“The all-powerful Nightsdeath.” I continued to toy with the name.

“You flatter me.”

“Your ego is incredible.”

“Yet if I deny what I’m capable of I’m a coward.”

I turned to him then. He kept enough distance between us that I wouldn’t be able to reach him through the bars. Lines of moonlight cut his face, which yielded flickers ofsomethingat my prodding.

“You don’t need to deny anything to be that.”

“Is that what you think of me?”

“I think a lot of things of you.”

“Anything of endearment?”

“All of them.” My fist flexed. “Like how I would love for you to open that damn door so I can stab you.”

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