Page 154 of A Storm in Every Heart
“It’s for precisely that reason that I wanted to come here in the first place. I never had any intention of getting married, but we—Vernallis, I mean—needed information. I know Magnus can’t be allowed to simply exist beside Vernallis, and our court will need to do something about him, even if Kastian never wants to take his throne back.”
Lyra winces. “He won’t be taking his throne back.”
“I know, he doesn’t want to?—”
“No, that’s not what I mean.” She looks pained. “Shit, I meant to get you out of the tower first before talking about this.”
“About what?” I ask dangerously.
She closes her eyes. “I came up here to help, yes, but also to tell you that you don’t have to marry my father to try and save Kastian…because he’s already dead.”
I hear her, but the words don’t penetrate.
The world reels. I hear her say it—hear the syllables, register the words—but my mind simply refuses to shape them into a reality that can exist.
That’s impossible. It can’t be dead, because I can still feel the bond pulsing in my chest. He can’t be dead, because most people don’t survive the severing of a bond.
“You’re lying,” I hiss. I shake my head, still not fully comprehending. “I don’t believe you. That’s impossible. I would have felt it.”
Lyra’s brow wrinkles. “Felt what?”
“The bond,” I say, clutching my chest, as if I can dig through bone and muscle and find the evidence Lyra has missed. “It—it’s still here.” I press my palm harder, expecting to feel blood or maybe a name seared into my skin, but there’s nothing except the anxious, frantic beat of my heart. “I would have known.”
Lyra looks away. “Maybe you haven’t processed it yet. Maybe it takes time.”
“It doesn’t take time,” I shoot back, too sharp. “Bonds don’t just linger after death. They snap. They shatter. People have—” I falter. “Some people die from it. If he were dead, I would know.”
“I’m not lying. I knew he would be in the dungeon where my father always keeps prisoners. I got to him a few days ago, then I went and found some people to help…but when we got back he wasn’t responsive.”
“Wasn’t responsive?” I ask sharply. “That’s not the same as dead.”
“In this case it is—or, it will be. My father likes to use this sedative on his victims. It paralyzes your entire body while causing extreme pain.”
She shudders, and I’m suddenly certain beyond a shred of doubt that Magnus has used it on her before. I remember like it was yesterday, hiding under the desk while Lyra tried to say shedidn’t want to kill anyone and Magnus warned her what would happen if she disobeyed.
Lyra swallows thickly. “If you use enough sedatives over time, or too much at once, the body forgets how to breathe and you suffocate, all the while fully aware of what’s going on. That’s the point Kastian was at right before I came up here, and there’s no antidote to the sedative, so even if he’s not dead yet, it’s only a matter of hours. I’m sorry.”
My ears ring and I stare blankly into space.
Maybe that’s why I didn’t feel the bond break? Or maybe it’s just that I don’t know what I’m supposed to feel. Maybe I’m defective and our bond is broken, and now I’ll never get a chance to fix it. It’s too late.
“I’m sorry,” Lyra says again. “Really, I am. I didn’t want to be the one to tell you, but I thought you deserved to know. You shouldn’t get married because you think my father will let him go…that would never happen anyway.”
What am I supposed to do now?
I feel numb—distant—as if I’m someone else standing off to the side and watching myself sitting on the bed. I nod, or at least try to, but my head is too heavy, as if it might snap off my neck.
If Kastian is dead, then what’s the point of any of this?
My eyes land on the ocean, and I swear, it’s as if the water calls out to me, begging me to go home.
KASTIAN, PRESENT
“Maybe you should take it easy for a minute,” Jett says, without even a hint of his usual smile.
I’ve been awake for barely five minutes, and already the pain of the last several days is starting to feel like a distant memory. Like a nightmare that happened to someone else, rather than the thing that nearly killed me.
The thing that did kill me-—at least, I think it did. I don’t know what else it could mean that my heart felt as if it stopped beating.
