Page 60 of Captive of the Stolen Empire

“You think I’m his nephew,” he whispered into the moon-touched night.

“Yes. And I suppose none of these books have given you any other possibilities?” I gestured to the mess around the room.

He frowned at the strewn handful of tomes on his bed. “No. But I remember my past. I can still feel the hunger, the desperation and deep sorrow in that cabin before Emperor Ryszard found me.” He turned away at the end as if the admission embarrassed him. The hard edges of his jaw smoothed out, his eyes turning downward.

Despite the kernel of anger in my heart, I stepped closer, drawn by the aura of sadness that could be felt without any magical touch or power. “And before that?”

His head snapped up. “Before what?”

“Before the cabin. What do you remember?”

His brows wrinkled, and he grit his teeth. “Nothing,” he said at last. “I remember nothing.”

“What if, before that memory, you were someone else?”

“I was an orphan, Ilya. Poor. Starved. Near death. If he hadn’t found me, I would have died in that cabin like my parents had.” His voice rose in volume and intensity as the words continued to spill out.

“How did he find you? All of you?” So many powerful magic users.

“Ilya,” he warned.

“Tell me. What harm can it possibly do?”

He crept forward, moonlight rolling up his face. “He can sense magic. It’s how he found me—most of us. He saved us from death or other horrid fates and trained us from childhood.”

Saved…or created his own perfect illusions for each child?

Dawning horror twisted my insides. It was all too convenient. Powerful children in need of a savior. Children who would undoubtedly wish to aid the man who put a roof over their head and food in their bellies. He acted like some kind of noble hero from a storybook, yet the man himself exuded not the slightest hint of mercy or kindness.

“I don’t know what happened in that cabin or how you got there, but what if you were someone else somewhere before that? Not an orphan, but a beloved son. An heir. Cherished. Protected.” I gasped as he grabbed my shoulders.

“I know what you want me to believe. But I’m the one who led the attack on their city, Ilya. I killed their men—many of them. I crafted illusions for others that likely broke their minds. I stormed their halls and entered their throne room to accept surrender just like I did yours.” He pinched my chin, drawing my face closer to his. “I can’t be from there. I would have remembered something.Feltsomething.” His hand squeezed tighter, almost painfully so.

“Let me go, Lucien.”

He jerked me closer instead. “Do you loathe me now?”

“I should hate you. I want to.” He released me, but I held my ground. Mere whisps of air separated us. His heavy, heated breaths ghosted over my skin in sharp contrast to the cooling night.

“But?”

I couldn’t answer him. To say the words aloud would mean admitting them to myself. I’d said too much already. Instead, I walked away from him onto the balcony and changed the topic. “You were all recruited as children? Before your magic had fully manifested?”

My knowledge on the topic was limited, but from what I knew, magic grew as the person did, reaching its full potential after they reached maturity. A young child of five or six cycles would show little evidence of their power, if any.

He was quiet for so long, I wondered if he wouldn’t answer.

“As much as I remember,” he said at last.

“But your emperor started to conquer only recently. And even then, he’d only ruled Zhine for the few cycles since after his brother’s death. What did you do before then?”

“Trained, mostly. Physical and magical skills. We all lived together in a large manor in the hills, growing up as brothers and sisters.”

A family. My chest clenched. I should have known he regarded them that way, with Ryszard as their weird father figure. The truth of it made my goals and wishes so much more impossible. He’d never turn on family, which meant I had no hopes of bringing him to my side, but only using him for whatever knowledge or favor I could garner.

“Brothers and sisters of death,” I whispered into the night, so quiet I wasn’t sure Lucien could hear me. “That’s why you follow him. Even though it means so much war and terror against cities living peacefully.”

“Peaceful?” Lucien scoffed. “The city-states have squabbled with each other as long as anyone remembers. The emperor talked about it often. How no one respected his brother’s rule in Zhine. Raids on farms. Threats against us.”

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