Page 105 of A Tongue so Sweet and Deadly

He was nothing like the rumors.

Nothing like what he had been the times they’d interacted before the election.

When he began shaking his head, she cleared her throat. “You do not need to feel guilty. I am a bad person. I have done horrible, horrible things. This, and whatever else the king has planned for me… I deserve it. I deserve every single moment of pain life brings me.”

His hands muffled his voice when he responded, “You aregood, Lessia. Remember that I have watched you for almost five years. You treat every person you meet with kindness and respect. You rarely use the gift you’ve been given by the gods, even though it could make your life so much easier, and even me—even the Death Whisperer—you treat with compassion. What could you have done that’s so bad?”

“I killed my sister.” She sucked in a sharp breath as the words left her mouth.

She hadn’t meant to blurt them out, but she couldn’t stand seeing the guilt lining his shoulders.

Not when every broken bone, every bruise she was dealt was deserved.

A dry sob escaped her when Frelina’s beautiful face slammed into her mind, the memory of what she’d done to her flashing before her eyes.

When Merrick remained quiet, she forced herself to continue. “Mygift,as you call it. It’s no gift. It’s a curse. Like everyone else who’s half-Fae or more, I couldn’t wait for my twelfth birthday to see what gift might manifest. A few months after my birthday, nothing special had happened, and I was growing surlier by the day. Frelina, my sister, was my constant shadow, like I guess most younger siblings are. She annoyed me to no end, and this particular day, I wanted to ride alone in the woods by our home, and she kept following me. I got angry and…”

She drew a shaky breath, her voice barely a whisper as she continued. “I… I told her to jump off a roof or something, and her eyes glazed over. I didn’t think much of it then, but when I returned that evening, my parents were distraught. She’d jumped off the roof of our house.”

“Lessia…” Merrick shifted toward her.

“I couldn’t bear the look on their faces when they realized it was my fault. I was terrified, and I didn’t know what to do. So, I told them to forget about me, forget I’d ever been their daughter. And then I left for Vastala. I suppressed my magic for years. Until that night…”

A humorless laugh escaped her. “I used it once—one time—in Vastala to kill a guard that kept attacking the female half-Fae in the streets, and then I was thrown into King Rioner’s cellars. I guess it serves me right.”

Her father had worked so hard to keep her, Frelina, and her mother safe. Keep them all hidden from King Rioner and the rest of Vastala so they’d survive. Even live a good life.

And she’d ruined it all.

“Don’t tell me anything else. Please.” Merrick rose and walked over to her, cautiously sitting down on the bed.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to unload on you.”

She drew deep breaths through her nose when it felt as if her chest would burst.

But no tears came.

Like no tears had come since that night she walked through the forest, crying so hard she lost her way a dozen times. By the time she’d finally found a carriage that would take her to Vastala, the tears had dried.

She hadn’t cried since.

Placing a hand on her leg, Merrick said quietly, “You were a child. I don’t think your parents would have faulted you. You didn’t mean it.”

She slammed her hands against the mattress, grateful when the physical pain from her broken finger lessened the one in her chest. “But I did! My magic only works if I truly mean it. I am as evil as my magic.”

“I guess that makes two of us.”

She peeked at him through her lashes. “Was… was that a joke?”

Her heart nearly stopped when a crooked smile spread across his bent-down face.

“You must have rubbed off on me.”

She shook her head, not able to muster a smile as exhaustion and guilt and pain lay heavy on her limbs.

But when the servant knocked on the door, bringing food and wine, and Merrick moved the blankets on the bed so they could dine together in comfortable silence, a sliver of warmth settled in her broken chest.

At least she wasn’t entirely alone.

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