“But you said he didn’t want this shit to kill Gaetan,” Nicolette argued. “So whatdoeshe want?”
Nik studied the letters and numbers. This was the prize his father had dangled above his head for so long. He’d wrapped it in false promises to end the fighting and bring the Restes to peace. Now he knew that his father didn’t give two shits about the Restes.
Not even for Haydee’s sake.
If he couldn’t kill an entire quarter, then what—
Nik bolted up.
Nicolette drew her knife. Fernand cocked his pistol.
“What?” Chantal asked.
“I knew I’d seen these components somewhere. I knew they didn’t belong. I just remembered.” He paced, forcing his mind to go back tothe exact page in the first item his father had ever gifted him: the Arts Humains primer. A textbook for children. Nik had devoured every fucking page to make him happy. Had copied every word enough times to make his fingers bleed.
“Scorpion root.” He snapped his fingers.
“The stuff Elara used in the competition?” Blai asked.
“Exactly. My father had no idea how to control it… until Elara showed him in the first round. But it shouldn’t be mixed with this compound.” He pressed his fingers against a group of letters and numbers. “Somnique. It dulls the senses, almost to a catatonic state.”
“So, he wants to heighten people’s powersandput them in a coma?” Nicolette asked.
No. He had to be missing something.
What did his father really want from the Restes? What did he think they deserved?
We make themfeelequal, Nikolas! That doesn’t mean theyare!
We treated the symptom, not the disease.
We’ll be able to end the violence, hunger, and turmoil… for good.
The truth had been there all along.
“It destroys magie.”
And Elara was going to help him do it.
37ELARA
Elara rolled over and reached to find the bed cold and empty.
She sat up, staring blearily into the golden haze of morning spreading across the ravaged room. It looked worse than if looters had gone through, because thieves would’ve at least had a mind to steal some of the more expensive items Elara had broken.
Yesterday came back in hazy flashes.
Nik’s warm breath against her neck as she nestled in against the morning chill.
Lavender crushed beneath her boots.
And shame. Enough to last a lifetime and then some.
It made no sense.
How could Nik hold her so tenderly with the same hands that murdered her mother? She tried to imagine him slitting her throat as she begged for mercy. The image wouldn’t come.
Nik was vile for manipulating her. Weak for following his father without question. But a murderer? It didn’t match the boy who’d sat with her in the garden, letting her sleep on his shoulder. The boy who tended to her wounds with such care. The boy who learned to bake with her in secret.
