Page 74 of Dark Prince's Captive

Her eyes turn hard, the blue-green glittering like brilliant river stones.“Who did this to me, Aruan?Who destroyed my life?”

“It’s not destroyed,” I say, taking her hand, although I understand why she’d feel that way.

“Who?”she asks, watching me with that steadfast, unforgiving gaze.

“My mother,” I admit with no small amount of anger.“And it’s time to find out why.”

Chapter16

Elsie

“Everything is a lie.”

My voice sounds strange to my own ears, as if it belongs to a different person, which it does.Because I’m not Elsie.I’ve never been.I’m someone else, and I have no idea who that woman is, except that she’s a stranger.An alien from a different world.

And that scares the living daylights out of me.

Already, I feel her, this stranger, creeping into my mind with her weird notion of power and slowly taking over my body.Even that’s not my own anymore.The scars and weakness that have defined me for so long have made space for this being, this female with a strong, healthy body.She’s molding it to her needs, growing stronger inside me by the minute.

I slam my hands over my ears, not to block out sound but to keep the madness at bay.

I’m going fucking crazy.

Aruan reaches for me.“Elsie.”

I step away from him.

A big, fat lie.

My existence is nothing but a farce.

Do I know what’s real?It sure as hell doesn’t feel like it.

Actually, it does.Even now, the power is vibrating beneath the surface of my skin like a parasite that’s invaded the body of a host.

“Elsie,” he says again, this time sterner.

Shaking my head, I bite out, “I’mnotElsie.”And I’m so fucking angry about that.

“Do you prefer that I call you Laliss?”he asks in a gentler tone.

No, I definitely don’t want him to call me that.

He doesn’t lower his arm.He holds out his hand, offering it to me like an olive branch.“It’ll get better.”

That same empty promise again.

It won’t.

I can never get back the life that was stolen from me here or the life I had on Earth.I’ll never know my biological parents.Neither will I see my adoptive parents again, not if it depends on Aruan.My life here was finished before it began, and it looks as if my life as Elsie Barnikoff is dead for good.

So what now?Am I supposed to simply pick up the pieces and move on from where I left off when my name was Laliss?Except, I’m not Laliss.The only name I know is Elsie, but I don’t feel like her either.

A hollow laugh tears from my chest.

“Elsie.”Aruan closes the distance between us and catches my wrists to pull my hands from my ears.He holds them at my sides in the vise of his fingers, not allowing me space or a chance to flee.“This isn’t the end of the world.It’s just the beginning.”

“The beginning of what?”Another hysterical laugh bubbles over my lips.“Of our happy ending?”I wrestle to free myself from his hold, but he doesn’t let up an inch.“If that’s what you think, you’re fucking naïve.”I lift my chin.“Do you know what this is?This isn’t you and me galloping off together into the sunset.”Thinking about that prophecy again, I continue, “This is the beginning of the mother of all clusterfucks.”

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