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I flashed Zane a grin. And he retracted his hand.
“Where’s Bella?” I took a bite of cake. It was light, airy, and sweet.
“She’s not here?” Calli looked around the room, frowning.
“I thought she was helping you,” I said.
“She was,” replied Calli. “But then she went to the bathroom.”
The cake’s sweet flavor soured on my tongue. “How long ago was that?”
Calli was frowning now too. “Nearly half an hour ago.”
I jumped up, rushing to the house’s sole bathroom. But I didn’t find Bella in there. I found a note instead, penned in her beautiful, loopy handwriting.
“What’s it say?” Gin squeezed herself into the tiny bathroom beside me.
The others waited in the hall, just outside the door.
I turned to face them all now. “Bella surrendered herself to Faris for judgment.”
Calli froze, Tessa gasped, and Zane kicked the doorframe.
Harker looked like he wanted to do a lot more than kick something. “What?” He was about to explode. “Why?” he growled.
“She says she did it to keep us all safe.” I clutched the note in my hand. “From her.”
20
THE DUNGEON
“You shouldn’t be here, Leda,” Stash sighed when I showed up at the gods’ castle.
It was a large castle, even more ostentatious than their own personal castles. The floors were a bright, glossy white, as reflective as a mirror. The gods must have really loved gazing at their own reflections.
“I need to see Bella,” I told my cousin.
Stash was standing guard in front of a four-story door that obviously led to the dungeon.
“No one is allowed to see the prisoner,” he told me. “Faris’s orders.”
But Stash must have known that I wouldn’t back down. “I’m not no one. I’m her sister. I need to see her.”
“But does she want to see you?” he countered. “She turned herself in.”
“She’s just scared. She thinks she’s going to lose control and hurt someone.”
Stash frowned. “You saw what she did in the gods’ hall.”
“She’s cursed. That…thing,” I hissed, “it’s not who she is. I have to remind her of that. I can’t just leave her in this dungeon, alone and afraid, with all the time in the world to imagine all the terrible things Ava is planning to make her do.”
Stash watched me, still and silent. Finally, he said, “You’re a good sister.”
“I don’t give up on family,” I said forcefully. So forcefully, in fact, that all the lights in the hall started to flicker.
“Well, I hope that if I’m ever in trouble, you won’t give up on me,” said Stash.
I clasped his hands and told him, “Never. You’re family too.”
