Page 60 of Sinless Demons
“Then pardon me.”
“Pardon you? Pardon me.” I throw the words back in her face, and it only makes her eyes blaze larger.
“I mean, pardon my banishment. Only a royal of the Kingdom of Roses can welcome me back. Welcome me back, Aries.” Inky hair flicks over her pale features.
My heart kicks up all over again with rapid apprehension.
“Not tonight.”
“Tonight!”
“No. It’s incredibly bad timing.” I try to plot my next moves. After the party, after I show the crowd my father’s inability to rule, after I’ve been crowned and the kingdom is safe, then it would be safe for Corva as well.
But not tonight.
“Aries. Fae do not give something for nothing,” Corva says in a cutting tone I’ve heard her use a time or two before.
It’s eerie and singed in the natural dark power that courses through her bones.
“And I keep my word. I’ll bring you back to court. I can’t pardon you tonight, though. There’s too much riding on tomorrow, Corva.” I tip my chin up slowly and hold the edgy gaze of my older sister.
A beat passes between our held stares.
“Tomorrow, then.” She, too, tips her head up with composure. “Tomorrow at midnight.”
I nod slowly.
“Say it, Aries.”
I swallow slowly, and it only makes my heart pound harder when I’ve been given a time limit. A deadline. A fucking execution date.
“Tomorrow. At midnight. I pardon the banishment of Corva of the Unknown at midnight of tomorrow eve,” I say with as much etiquette as I can muster.
A soft smile curls her lips.
“Thank you,” she whispers.
Her hand reaches out to clutch mine.
But a flash of light shields her touch. Her fingers dip ripples into the unseen barrier that separates her from me. It separates her from her home.
And I know what that feels like.
Her smiles wavers, but just as our mother taught us, she lifts her head high and pulls away from me. She nods as though she’s about to say her goodbye.
I don’t know why it hurts my heart to see someone go through what I’ve been through.
It didn’t used to.
I can’t explain it.
At the last second, just before her wafting black wings sweep her away, I step forward. I walk across whatever line that says she’s not welcome here, and I wrap my arms around my sister in a way that I haven’t done since I was a little girl.
Slender shoulders stiffen against my embrace. Her heartbeat pounds against mine for several seconds before her thin arms slowly slip around me. And then she hugs me so hard, it wells up emotion deep in my chest. Emotions I didn’t realize I held for her.
We’re sisters.
She isn’t kind, and she isn’t perfect. But neither am I. And neither of us want the future our family has tried to thrust us into.
