I tear my gaze away from my bag. From my secret little book.
“Finnley, what’s he talking about?” I ask through my teeth, trying not to move my mouth too much since the dagger is resting directly under it.
Yaretta grips my hair tighter. “Shut up, bitch,” she seethes.
Finnley tears his eyes away from his brother and looks at me. Fear shines in his eyes, along with something else that makes me want to puke.
Regret.
Gods no. Please, no, not again.
I can’t take one more ounce of treachery.
“Tell her. Go on then,” Rhett encourages, gripping the back of the professors’ necks and moving toward us.
Finnley turns fully toward him, his arms outstretched. “Stop it, Rhett. Please. It’s not too late to undo all of this,” he pleads, desperation making his movements jerky.
Rhett shakes his head in disappointment. “How are we even blood related?” he asks on a shallow sigh. “Allow me, then.”
Finnley steps toward his brother.
“You move, and I’ll kill her,” Yaretta warns him.
He stops and looks into my eyes, full of remorse, as his brother continues talking.
“You see, dear Norissa, your father ruined our family. Tore us apart from the bottom and watched us crumble. All because he was a selfish bastard.Our father,” he growls, rubbing his chest where his heart should be, “loved our mother fiercely, but died protecting the realm from the very monsters in this room.” He points to the battle erupting around us. “He gave his life to keep the wraiths at bay. And for what? The general to use them behind the people’s backs?” he demands in anger. “You see, there are monsters everywhere, Norissa. Different kinds hiding among us.”
He tucks a few strands of hair behind Professor Hunstal’s ear, causing her to whimper behind her gag. He pats her cheek in a condescending way. “After his death, she did her best to raise me on her own, but she was pregnant with Finnley, and the loneliness was creeping into her bones. I wasn’t enough.” Hestares off for a second as if he’s in a different place and time. The bellow of a wraith being torn in half by shadows causes him to remember where he is.
He starts talking again as if it isn’t madness to be having this conversation with pandemonium erupting around us. “After her grieving period was over and she returned to active duty, she met your father.” He rubs his chin thoughtfully. “Do you even know his name?” he asks, dipping his chin with a knowing smirk.
I bite the side of my cheek and continue to meet his stare. I won’t play his games, but a small part of me, the little girl who still wants a father, is hanging onto his every word, praying he tells me.
He drops his hand and starts pacing in front of the professors. “Well, his name was Solomon. Solomon Vynchael.”
I exhale sharply.
And for the first time since the torture started, a tear escapes.
“Our mother, Sierra, met your father during a breach of the wall. Their units were ordered to contain it. He decided that day that she was his mate.” He chuckles darkly. “If you buy into that bullshit. Anyway, she fell desperately in love with him too, explaining it as a love they had no choice but to follow through on. A fierce, ferocious kind of attachment.”
The salt from my tears burns the various cuts on my face, but I’m thankful for the sting. Anything to balance out the way my heart is being eviscerated.
He looks at me, smiling low and cold. “The kind where he can leave his pregnant lover without a backward glance.”
The heart I protected for so long, fragments in my chest.
He doesn’t pause for my pain. “They were inseparable. To the point that nothing else mattered. Not even me. I was still young, young enough to need my mother. But I just needed to bide my time. You see, everything was about to change.” He ducks as aknife soars past his head. “Solomon fell in battle, a conflict with an opposing kingdom, a misunderstanding, and our mother lost her mind with grief. She couldn’t accept that her mate was no longer in this life. To put it mildly, she went mad,” he says. “Ended up at Harkin House, where Finnley was born, and we were taken from her and raised in the broken homes of people desperate enough for coin to take in a pair of orphans.”
“Rhett, that’s enough,” Finnley says, inching closer.
Rhett ignores his brother. “Your mother, of course, found out about her ex-lover’s death, and his mate’s new home of padded walls and syringes. As a high-ranking officer, she made sure we were never allowed to visit our mother.” His angry eyes hold me captive. “She threatened every family we landed with.”
I swallow the bile coming up my throat.
A soft cry drags my attention to the professors. “Leave them out of this. They have nothing to do with our past.Wehave nothing to do with our past.”
Rhett shakes his head in denial. “Go ahead, Finnley, it’s your turn,” he orders. “Or Yaretta here will carve out your little friend’s jugular.”
