Page 155 of Curse of Darkness
Everyone falls silent.
Maren arches a brow. “What would you have of us, Adaia?”
“I wish for the council to formally recognize my heir.” She gestures behind her and the Asturian delegation opens up, leaving a small hooded figure right in the middle. “Come forward, my dear.”
I don’t know why my stomach drops as the little girl takes a tentative step toward us, her hood sliding back from her face. She’s wearing a gown of cornflower blue with little pink flowers stitched around the neckline, her silky black hair falling to her waist and her big blue eyes so wide, it’s like staring into the depths of a lake. She searches the room, looking like she’s trying not to run, trying to swallow down the knot of fear in her throat.
And my breath catches, because it’s like looking at Amaya. Not by feature—though the two are startlingly similar—but by the sensation in my chest.
I’m halfway to my feet before I can even think the move through, Thiago’s hand locking over mine in warning.
Mother smirks, guiding the child toward the table. “May I present my heir—my granddaughter, May.”
The little girl freezes, caught in the sudden intake of breath from everyone in the room.
Even Maren straightens as if she cannot believe Mother would throw down this gauntlet right in front of me.
She’s not my daughter.
But I feel it as our eyes meet, May’s wide and frightened.
Becauseshethinks she is.
And the look on her face slays me.Why did you abandon me? Did you not love me? Why did you leave me withher?
I have been in those shoes. Pushed and guided by Mother. Punished by her. I see mother’s touch all over the straight line of those shoulders as May dares to stare right at me—or no, right at the hollow of my throat, as if she’s taught herself to leash the terror within her by focusing on something else.
As if she doesn’t dare see my response written large over my face.
It’s a trick I learned when I was seven.
“Greet your mother, May,” Adaia purrs.
Smoke smolders on her throne.
“Vi,” Thiago whispers in my mind. “Vi, control yourself.”
“You want your crown back?” I lean toward her, seething with a fury so blinding that I’m almost trembling. “Then I challenge you for it. Set your time and date,Mother. I will meet you in the field. You and me. Winner takes the crownandMay.”
31
Thiago waits until we’re safely through the Hallow in Ceres before he captures my wrist. “Are you okay?”
I still feel like I can’t make sense of the world. Everything is a rush of gray stone and the unrelenting black of his leather tunic. He hastened me out of the court room and straight to the Hallow before I could set Mother’s throne on fire.
Fae rush around us. I catch a glimpse of Thalia’s worried face, but it’s too much. All I can see is May. All I can hear is my mother’s voice.
“Leave us,” Thiago commands.
The rest of our party clears the room, and none too soon. I tear at the buttons at my throat, ripping the fabric in my haste. His hands push mine out of the way, but he’s too gentle, too slow…. I push him away, unable tobreathe.
“You’re safe,” he says, pacing after me. “You’re here with me now, Vi. She can’t touch you.”
She already has.
And I can’t even describe why seeing May impacted me so much.
“I’m so sorry.” I swallow down the emotions fisting in my throat. “Goddess. I couldn’t stop myself. I walked right into her trap. The second I saw May it was like… like looking into amirror.” The word comes on a gasp. “I know what she’s doing to her, because she did it to me. I know… how much it hurts. How much it ruins some piece of yourself. I sent Theron to rescue May because I wanted to protect her, but it wasn’t until today that I realized that some part of me was trying to protectmyself. If I could fight for her, then in a way I’m fighting for myself—for the little girl whodeservedbetter.”
