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“You didn’t seem like it bothered you,” I comment quietly, though I know it hardly matters.
I might be an excellent liar, but no one can hide things quite like Zaina does.
“It was easy when I was in Jokith, far away from her, and I could separate those memories. I let myself remember only the bad things and pretend away the good.” She trails off for a moment before picking back up. “But even then, it took me months to make the decision to try to stop her, and only when I convinced myself that it was not only possible, but necessary. Because there are people more important than my fear of her.”
She tilts her head, casting me a significant glance.
“Like Einar?” I say, only half joking.
“Like you,” she answers flatly. “And Mel. I was going to come without him, you know. He insisted on accompanying me, but I would have left him there to get back here to you.”
Silence falls in the wake of her proclamation.
Zaina speaks around things, twists words and avoids with the best of them, but she rarely outright lies. I can hear the truth ringing in every single syllable of her statement, and still, I struggle to believe her.
“Even though you didn’t trust that I would be on your side?” I leave unspoken that she was right not to trust that, because I haven’t been, not really.
She half shrugs, one delicate shoulder rising and falling in a fluid movement. “You’re still my sister. Nothing changes that. And whatever side of this you wind up on, I’m always going to do everything I can to protect you.”
Her voice is matter-of-fact, like there was never any doubting that we were still sisters. Which leads me to realize that some part of me has, ever since she declared that Madame was not her mother.
Because if Madame is not her mother, then I am not her sister.
Except she says I am. Unconditionally. And I want so badly to believe her.
I think of the fire, of her coming out into the city at great risk to herself. Before that, she had walked alone into the palace dungeons to bring me out.
It’s enough to reassure me that at least one part of what she said is completely beyond doubt. She does do everything she can to keep me safe. She always has.
“I’ll protect you, too, you know?” I tell her, hoping it’s true, wondering if I can do that and maintain whatever tattered loyalty I have left to the woman who raised me.
If I expected to see doubt in Zaina’s eyes, she would have surprised me yet again with her steady gaze.
“I know,” she says simply. “You always have.”
I see images of the men who tried to touch her, not knowing I was waiting in the shadows. The times we have fought back-to-back or lied for one another or given the other cover. But I also see her haunted eyes and her thin form and the empty room she left behind when Madame sent her to Jokith, and I’m not sure her words are as true as I wish they were.
So I don’t respond.
Instead, I lay my head on her shoulder, breathing in her familiar jasmine scent and letting her words stitch together the pieces of my ravaged soul.
CHAPTERTWENTY-EIGHT
ZAINA
When Aika and Remy return to their suites, I drag myself into the main room where Einar still sits, already bracing for the inevitable confrontation.
He stares into the fire with a clenched jaw, flames dancing in his icicle eyes.
“I was going to tell you,” I say quietly. “When it became—”
“Don’t you dare finish that sentence with the wordrelevant, Zaina,” he growls, finally turning to face me. “Not when we’ve come so far from that.”
I sink down next to him, and some of the ire in his expression melts into faint surprise. He expected me to stay standing and on guard, but I don’t have the energy for either.
It’s all I can do not to cower at the memory of my last encounter with Damian.
His hands around my throat, pinning me to the ground. Lust and fury in his eyes, and something else. Something worse. A promise that he would drag it out. Every touch. Every bruising kiss. Every blood-curdling second of his plan for me.
