The only thing I would be unlocking was a muzzle for Malum.
She pointed her pen at the three devils sitting beside me on the threadbare couch.
The four of us shifted.
“But you said last week that you loathe them?” She frowned. “And then you refused to elaborate.”
I didn’t understand her bewilderment.
My loathing should have been a statement with a period: a form of punctuation used to end a complete sentence.
For some reason, no one wanted to accept my hatred as final.
The kings.
Dr. Palmer.
The High Court.
Everyone was waiting for me to change my mind.
Ice traveled down my limbs until I was completely numb, sitting still while simultaneously tumbling deeper into nothingness.
Space buckled.
Tick. Infinity. Tock.
Dr. Palmer pursed her lips. “Aran, could you answer the question?”
I stared back at her blankly. The ice had frozen my eyelids and embalmed my corneas.
“You hate these men?”
She pointed again like I needed the reminder that I was sandwiched beside my enemies in a claustrophobic room meant for two people.
I refused to turn my head because I’d seen enough: freakishly wide shoulders, long pale fingers, callous demeanors, warm brown eyes, cheeks that blushed pink as they betrayed me. Three disturbingly handsome faces.
The problem had never been their looks.
“Um—” I broke out into a coughing fit.
The tension in the room increased tenfold as everyone focused on me. I would have been embarrassed, but I’d stopped feeling anything meaningful ten years ago.
I’d stopped feeling anything at all last week in the war camp.
Dick had spoken, and the lies had crumbled.
The truth—ancient peace accords—was a heinous beast.
Now Dr. Palmer handed me a half-filled cup of lukewarm water, and I gulped it down until I choked.
Liquid spilled onto my shirt.
Orion patted my back, and I flinched away from his touch. He made a soft, wounded sound as he pulled his hand away.
The air conditioning buzzed loudly.
A gust of wind slammed rain against the side of the building with splatter.
I focused all my attention on choking to death on the water—vexingly, it didn’t work, so I redirected my concentration into slouching my shoulders until I was concave.
Placing the half-empty water cup by my feet on the once white but now light-brown carpet, I pretended not to notice that Dr. Palmer scowled at it like she knew I was going to forget to pick it up.
I cleared my throat three times.
Coughed.
Wet my lips.
“Aran, please take all the time you need.” Her mouth said one thing, but her narrowed eyes and pinched lips said another.
“Okay.” My voice sounded far away, and it felt like someone else was speaking.
Her right eye twitched. One. Two. Three. Four times.
I rotted on the couch.
“Aran.” Dr. Palmer snapped her fingers twice in rapid succession, and it sounded like a gunshot.
I sat up with a start.
She pointed her pen at me.
A weapon.
You could puncture someone’s corneal artery with a pen. You could gouge someone’s eyes out. You could shank them in the stomach.
“Aran,” Dr. Palmer said harshly.
I blurted, “Yes—I hate my mates. In fact, they disgust me.” I stuck my tongue out and pointed my finger at it while I gagged, just in case she wasn’t picking up what I was putting down.
The good (annoying) doctor wrote something down on her clipboard and nodded as my eyes grew heavier.
I was barreling into a war blind.
Free-falling.
I tried to sit up straight, but my shoulders slumped.
My back muscles burned with the phantom weight of retracted wings that I couldn’t get to work.
Even back in the Legionnaire Games, I’d never actually flown. I’d just tumbled toward the dirt and used my wings to slow us down before crashing into a pole.
At least I’m good at throwing myself off high heights. I should be a professional cliff diver.
Time warped.
“Your soulmates disgust you and you hate them?” Dr. Palmer spoke slowly and overenunciated “disgust” and “hate” like she was making a point. “That’s what you said last week. Correct?”
If she was hinting at something, I wasn’t getting it.
I nodded and tugged at the permanent scab on my lower lip.
“Stop picking,” Scorpius ordered harshly.
I jumped and pulled my hand away from my face.
A pen scribbled across paper.
Was she writing about me? Rude.
I rolled my eyes, brought my fingers back to my lip, and ripped off a juicy chunk of skin.
“I told you not to pick,” Scorpius said. “Orion, pull her hand away.”
Anyone else plagued by men? Just me? Nice.
“Touch me,” I said tiredly, “and I’ll kill you.” I left off the “I’ll kill us all” because of the doctor.
All I needed was to be diagnosed as a serial homicidal maniac.
Was I one? Maybe. Did I want to be heavily medicated and locked in a room for the rest of my life? Also, maybe. It depended if Sadie was there.
Orion stared down at me.
I stared at the wall.
I wasn’t the type of person to play favorites, especially not when it came to my enemies—but Orion was my favorite, and Malum was my least favorite. One hundred percent.
I was grateful the quiet man was a buffer between me and Scorpius and the two of them blocked my view of Malum.
The kings were seated in order of descending awfulness.
They had their arms draped over one another’s shoulders and whispered among themselves as Dr. Palmer talked.
The three of them fit together.
Then there was me.
Scorpius leaned forward to glare at me, and Orion’s muscular thigh pressed indecently against mine. We were both wearing sweatpants, but pain streaked down my back.
I exhaled harshly and managed not to whimper.
It was funny how pain felt sharper in certain situations. Sometimes adrenaline and depression masked the hurt, and other times they amplified the agony.
Nothing was masking it now.
I was raw.
Life’s a cruel bitch.
“Lean back.” Dr. Palmer glared at Scorpius until he settled back against the couch with a huff.
“I want to remind you all that these sessions are for your benefits.” She scowled at each of us. “I’m not the one the High Court forced into therapy—I’m not the one suffering from bond sickness with the people I have to lead a war with.” She scoffed, like if it were up to her, she would never have chosen us as leaders. “But you do.”
Her glare was cutting.
Why hadn’t we recruited her for the war effort? She’d make a good general.
As if she read my mind, Dr. Palmer narrowed her eyes.
I could so see her stabbing people.
Scorpius barked out a string of profanities.
E-x-h-a-u-s-t-i-o-n.
It pulled me apart.
“You should join the military,” I said, and at the same time, she asked, “Aran, how do you feel?”
She gave me a withering look. “Don’t speak unless spoken to.”
“Yes, General,” I whispered.
A rain droplet left a trail across the glass.