“I’m quite aware of what you’d like to do to me,” he says, his voice barely a whisper.
My fists clench, fingers twitching. I reach for what still won’t respond. What can’t respond. “More Silent Stone,” I mumble, saying the words like a curse. The polished orbs of my wearable prison gleam. “You must be running low by now.”
“Thank you for your concern, but the supply is well in order.”
As I did in the cells beneath the Bowl of Bones, I spit in his direction. It lands harmlessly at his feet. He doesn’t seem to mind. In fact, he smiles.
“Get it out of your system now. The court will not take kindly to such behavior.”
“As if I— Court?” The last word sputters out.
His smile spreads. “I did not misspeak.”
My insides cringe at the sight of his grin. “Lovely,” I say. “You’re tired of keeping me caged up where you can’t see me.”
“Actually, I find it difficult being this close to you.” His eyes flicker over me with an emotion I don’t want to place.
“The feeling is mutual,” I snarl, if only to kill the strange softness in him. I would rather face his fire, his rage, than any quiet word.
He doesn’t rise to the bait. “I doubt that.”
“Where’s my leash, then? Do I get a new one?”
“No leash, no collar.” He angles his chin at my manacles. “Nothing but those now.”
What he’s getting at, I cannot begin to fathom. But I’ve long stopped trying to understand Maven Calore and the twists of his labyrinthine brain. So I let him keep talking. He always tells me what I need, in the end.
“Your interrogation was very fruitful. So much to learn about you, about the terrorists calling themselves the Scarlet Guard.” My breath catches in my throat. What did they find? What did I miss? I try to remember the most important pieces of my knowledge, to figure out which will be the most harmful to my friends. Tuck, the Montfort twins, the newblood abilities?
“Cruel people, aren’t they?” he continues. “Bent on destroying everything and everyone who is not like them.”
“What are you talking about?” The Colonel locked me up, yes, and fears me still, but we are allies now. What could that mean to Maven?
“Newbloods, of course.”
I still don’t understand. There’s no reason for him to care about Reds with abilities beyond what he must do to get rid of us. First he denied we existed, calling me a trick. Now we are freaks, threats. Things to be feared and eradicated.
“It’s such a shame, to know you were treated so badly you felt the need to run from that old man calling himself a colonel.” Maven enjoys this, explaining his plan in slivers, waiting for me to piece it together. My head is still foggy, my body weak, and I try my best to figure out what he means. “Worse still, that he debated shipping you off to the mountains, discarding you all like garbage.” Montfort. But that wasn’t what happened. That wasn’t what was offered to us. “And of course I was very upset to learn the true intentions of the Scarlet Guard. To make a Red world, a Red dawn, with room for nothing else. No one else.”
“Maven.” The word quivers with all the rage I have strength to call. If not for my manacles, I would explode. “You can’t—”
“Can’t what? Tell the truth? Tell my country the Scarlet Guard is luring newbloods to its side only to kill them? To make a genocide of them—of you—as well as us? That the infamous rebel Mare Barrow came back to me willingly, and that this was discovered during an interrogation where the truth is impossible to hide?” He leans forward, well within striking distance. But he knows I can barely lift a finger. “That you are on our side now, because you have seen what the Scarlet Guard truly is? Because you and your newbloods are feared as we are, blessed as we are, Silver as we are, in everything but the color of blood?”
My jaw works, opening and closing my mouth. But I can’t find the words to match my horror. All this done without Queen Elara’s whispers. All this with her dead and cold.
“You’re a monster” is all I can say. A monster, all on his own.
He draws back, still smiling. “Never tell me what I cannot do. And never underestimate what I will do—for my kingdom.”
His hand falls on my wrist, drawing one finger down the manacle of Silent Stone keeping me prisoner. I tremble out of fear, but so does he.
With his eyes on my hand, I’m given time to study him. His casual clothes, black as always, are rumpled, and he does not stand on ceremony. No crown, no badges. An evil boy, but a boy still.
One I must figure out how to fight. But how? I’m weak, my lightning is gone, and anything I might say will be twisted beyond my control. I can barely walk, let alone escape unaided. Rescue is all but impossible, a hopeless dream that I can’t waste any more time on. I’m stuck here, trapped by a lethal, conniving king. He dogged me over months, haunting me from afar in everything from broadcasts to his deadly notes.
I miss you. Until we meet again.
He said he was a man of his word. Perhaps, in this alone, he is.
With a deep breath, I poke at the only weakness I suspect he might still have.
“Were you here?”
Blue eyes snap to mine. It’s his turn to look confused.
“Through this.” I glance at the bed, and then far away. It’s painful to remember Samson’s torture, and I hope it shows. “I dreamed you were here.”
The warmth of him recedes, drawing back to leave the room cold with oncoming winter. His eyelids flutter, dark lashes against white skin. For a second, I remember the Maven I thought he was. I see him again, a dream or a ghost.
“Every second,” he answers.
When a gray flush spreads across his cheeks, I know it’s the truth.