It isn’t exactly the name that hits me first.
It’s the proud glint in his glacier-blue eyes. The tilting of his head. The upward curve of his thin lips. He’s absorbing my shock with a sense of achievement, exhilarated in his deception, anticipating every reaction I will have. Because he managed to fool me. He managed to play me at my weakest.
Aurick Demechnef.
Our country’s leader.
The man who saved me from the cold. The friend who cared for me after Scarlett died. He plucked me from the snow, gave me a home, a job, a support system that came crumbling down when he first hit me.
And it was all a trick.
Why?
Betrayal sinks into the pit of my gut. Sharp and jagged, like a rusted nail. I open and close my mouth. Words rushing to the surface, then sputtering out before they reach my lips.
A large hand grazes my shoulder, and even though it’s Dessin, I jerk away like I’ve just been slapped. My wide-eyed stare rips from Aurick’s face to Dessin’s cautious mahogany eyes.
How could he keep this from me?
Pathetic, glossy tears coat my eyes and blur my vision. I’m a scared, cornered animal. Thoughts slam against the inside of my skull. Aurick Demechnef. A trick. Liar. Everyone lied.
“Skylenna,” Dessin says softly.
“No.” The small word comes out in a gasp. A puff of breath from a collapsed lung.
“Wait,” someone says from behind me. “This is Aurick?”
I focus on the flickering candle sconce to my left, the smooth cherrywood walls, avoiding the faces turned to me, avoiding my name being called, avoiding the urge to take off in a sprint.
This entire time I was building a friendship with Dessin in the asylum and he never told me. The moments he would hint at his contempt for Aurick. But what about the time Aurick struck me down? Left a mark? He didn’t think I deserved to know then?
A few men remain behind Aurick’s desk, waiting for orders, leaning back into the shadows until they’re needed.
“How—” My question falls off the face of the earth. I’m looking into those cold, glassy eyes and wonder how I didn’t see it? The money. The power. The questions about Dessin. The consistent curiosity about the asylum.
Is that what happened to Sern? Dessin said Demechnef found her, tried to use her family against her, which is why he broke her spine.
“He used me to get to you,” I finally say to Dessin. But Aurick makes a sound that is close to a laugh. As if I’m so deep in the dark he wouldn’t know where to begin with me.
I turn my head to him, cut into his silhouette with a glare of fire and blood. “You were my friend.” And this time, I don’t look away. I let the tears spill over my bottom lashes, dripping from my chin to the floor.
Aurick’s shoulders droop, but he holds my gaze as if looking away would admit defeat.
“We have much to discuss.” But that voice is detached, distant, absent of any sentimental feelings he could have had toward me.
This man is a stranger. He looks like Aurick. Sounds like Aurick, but we’ve never met.
“You—” I clear my throat. “You must have thought me such a fool.” I look back and forth between Aurick and Dessin, unable to decide who I should direct the majority of my hatred toward.
“We can discuss my lack of a moral compass, or we can get down to business,” Aurick says, straightening his back.
“This is getting down to business,” Dessin growls.
“No. He’s right.” I back into the comfort of Ruth’s hand, running up and down my back. “We’re here for a reason. Let’s get to it.”
Dessin watches me, unsure of how to continue after this obstacle.
“I assume you came here for something specific since you’ve had us on your heels for five years.” Aurick takes a seat behind the desk, pouring himself a glass of scotch.
The muscle in Dessin’s jaw twitches. “The Vexamen Breed took something from me. And you’re going to help me get it back.”
“What did they take?”
“None of your concern.”
I want to interject and scold them for getting us nowhere. But I can’t. I’m frozen, trapped in a glass shell. A broken doll to gawk at.
“It is if you want my help,” Aurick argues with a cool smile.
“Oh, you’ll help without that information. Because you’re the one that wants me to win this war.” Dessin looms over the desk like a grim reaper, shadows casting around him. And my stomach dips as his hands grip the edge of the desk, causing the wood to make a whining sound from his weight.
“Fine.” Aurick leans back in his chair. “But I know you. There isn’t anything I can say in this arrangement that will make you believe I won’t try and double-cross your plan.”
The room is so silent we can hear the voices outside the room loudly.
“And to be frank, I don’t see a scenario that you wouldn’t double-cross me. I’d have no choice but to lock you all up, pump you with Mind Phantoms, and try my best to rearrange the rebellious part of your brains.”
I look at Aurick like a tornado coming my way. A dooming presence. Why did we think we could trust Demechnef at all? They won’t help us. He’s admitted to it.
“I have something that will change your mind. Would you like to know the name of the man that blew up your betrothed? The same man that is also a Vexamen spy lurking in our city?”
Aurick pops up. “One of your tricks?”
“I have irrefutable proof.” Dessin doesn’t blink. “But if I give it to you, you’ll write a treaty right now stating my terms of our surrender. We train on my conditions. Go by my rules. No methods of torture. No Mind Phantoms. I call the shots.”
“Kind of feels like we’re eavesdropping, don’t ya think?” Niles whispers in my ear. Before I can roll my eyes, Chekiss pinches the back of Niles’s arm.
After a moment to consider, Aurick nods. “Let’s see it.”
“Write the treaty first.”
It seems as though Aurick knows better than to argue with Dessin on this. We stand here for the next fifteen minutes while they negotiate the fine details of our stay with Demechnef.
“Get behind me.” Warrose is suddenly at my side, signaling for me and Ruth to move quickly. I give him a questioning look, glancing at his focus shifting to the corner of the room.
“Now, please,” Warrose whispers, a strand of long dark hair falls over his eye. I take a small step back, standing up on my tiptoes to peek over his shoulder to watch what happens.
Dessin signs the bottom of the parchment, then reaches in his pocket to reveal an envelope. Old and crinkled. I squint to get a better look.
Wait. Is that the envelope my father left behind for Kane?
Aurick rips it open, tossing the shredded paper to the side as he pulls out a photograph with what looks like a letter. His eyes widen, hands clamping into fists, and he stops breathing.
Warrose reaches back to me and Ruth, gripping our arms to keep us put.
The room shifts like there’s a stench in the air. Dessin remains perfectly still, watching Aurick, waiting for him to react. And it’s one quick glance up from those blue eyes. An avalanche of emotion.
“Masten,” Aurick snarls, swiping his hands across his desk, sending all of its contents skittering across the floor. His bottle of scotch shatters, cold liquid bursting over our shoes.
Masten. He’s the Vexamen spy. He killed Red.
“Find him!” he barks at three of his men.
Dessin steps out of the way as Aurick breaks free of his crisp composure, kicking over his desk, bellowing into the room at no one in particular.
Warrose chuckles. “You don’t want to subdue him?”
“Not in the slightest,” Dessin says.
“I trusted you!” Aurick roars, slamming his fists into the cherrywood walls. “My closest friend!”
“It’s sick, isn’t it?” I speak up, stepping around Warrose. “To trust someone that is living a double life.” And I hope my words stick him in the ribs, crack through bone, and crush his heart the way he has crushed mine.
Aurick stills, glancing over to me with sweat dripping down his temple.
“When you wrap this up, I’ll be back to discuss strategy on how to find the Vexamen Breed. We’ll see ourselves to our rooms.” Dessin nods for us to leave from the door we came in. And as we pass his panting body sliding down a wall in defeat, I exchange a look with Aurick. One that tells him I won’t forget this.
I won’t forgive.
