“My mother trades a Caelorian resin—ironsap—to Nymeris. Ironsap, when combined with threvenar, makes it permanent. Transforms it into something that cannot be extracted from the body,” Marin admits, her words grave. “A monopoly on memory.”
Holy fucking Stars.
Elyssara stills, the gravity of it all finally landing in her bones. But Marin keeps going.
“And we do not hold the Memory Orbs. Ilyra has them, too. She has them all. Pays us to pretendwedo.” Marin admits, her eyes serious.
Gods.
Elyssara’s mind stumbles over the admission.
The Memory Orbs.
Everything they had risked to recover them.
Another lie.
Another layer peeled back.
“You’re saying we’ve been chasing fucking shadows?” she grits out.
Marin sighs. “I’m saying you’ve been doing exactly what Ilyra and my mother wanted you to do.”
Rhaema’s words echo through her mind again.
Wherever you’re looking is exactly where she wants you to look. Wherever you’re not looking is exactly what she wants you to miss.
She opens her mouth to speak, but Marin raises a hand?—
“That’s not all.” She sucks in a sharp breath, as if she’s steadying herself before something big. “We do not just make our wealth from the Orbs and the resin, Elyssara. We make it from the weapons we export to Nymeris.”
Elyssara’s mind spins. Her stomach drops.
Something clicks, but doesn’t fully form.
“No—” Elyssara cuts herself off. “Nymeris don’t evenhavean army. What need could they possibly have for weapons? For the resin? To alter threvenar?”
Marin and Saana share another glance, their fingers entwining atop the table.
The air in the small home thickens. Time slows.
“Because Ilyra is the one taking Dravara’s memories, and because… she always planned on using Zerynthia’s General of War to train her army, provide her strategy, reveal your plans. She has an army, Elyssara—the General is training them. And they are not your allies. They are the army that will join Caeloria when we move to conquer all of Aevryn.”
The air is stolen from Elyssara’s lungs.
Her chest squeezes with the pressure of breathlessness.
No.
No.
Teddy.
Rubi.
They’rethere.
Her stomach drops so violently she nearly retches.
