Black waist-length hair cascaded in thick waves down her back and bounced as she walked. Her tall, voluptuous silhouette shadowed on the wall, though one of her was undoubtedly enough to bring this place to its knees. A bronze robe skimmed her body, cinched at her waist and trailed behind her in an elegant train. The clicking of her heels consumed the room as Thellonius’s eyes lit up hungrily.
Atop her head sat a crown of golden stars tangled in vines, and a lavender vestige swathed her like expensive silk, brimming with outrageous power.
And as she reached the empty chair, she spun and perched herself upon it, as her fingers feathered on the armrests. Her intoxicating lavender eyes flitted to Emmery for the briefest ofmoments, a cruel tilt to her lips, before turning her attention to Vesper.
Emmery had seen that face before. Not in that expression, but sheknewit. It mimicked the face of the man strapped to the chair beside her, but more delicate, feminine, less the sharpness and masculinity Vesper’s features contained, though they shared the same bow shaped lips.
Vesper opened his mouth to speak, and a sad, pained noise squeaked out before he choked, “Izzy?”
CHAPTER SEVENTY
EMMERY
The room tumbled into hushed chaos. Emmery stared helplessly as Vesper’s face crumpled, and he slumped in the chair. His sister’s name, spoken with such anguish, hung in the air.
“It’s n-not p-possible,” he stammered. His voice shook like his bones rattled, his foundation crumbled, and his hopes and dreams crushed like a dirt clod in his sister’s fist. “It’s not possible. It’s—it’s not fuckingpossible.”
A slimy smile inched across Izzy’s face like a dying caterpillar.
Emmery’s flame hungered to melt it off. How could she do this? She strolled in here and sat at Thellonius’s side like somegrotesque queen, while all this time her brother had mourned her and berated himself for how she’d died at Destonne’s hand, but—
Gods, none of that was true.
A vein pounded in Vesper’s neck as he sucked a jagged breath like he would drop dead at any moment. “How? I don’t understand. Izzy—”
“Not Izzy,” she said. Her voice mimicked a wind chime in a gentle breeze and echoed in their heads as her lips remained still. Disgust twisted her beautiful features. “What adreadfulname. You may address me as Your Divinity, Goddess of the Eternal Sky.”
Emmery’s blood iced over, like slush slogging in a frozen river. Because she’d heard Melantha use that name once before for one person.
Kahlia.
Vesper wilted like his entire world now lay ruinously in his hands, and everything he’d ever believed proved false. He stared at Zyphira’s bloodstain as if it were his only truth. His only reality.
“Traitors meet their ends in one way or another. There is only so long they can hide from their fate,” Kahlia sang, her voice taunting and stunning. “And you, children of the prophecy, have been gathered to pay for your sins.”
Emmery’s cheeks burned in anger. “Bullshit!” she spat. “What sins?”
“Silence,” Kahlia snarled. Her violet eyes locked on Emmery. “We have special plans for you.”
Emmery’s stomach sank as Kahlia rose from her throne and stalked toward her. Her gorgeous gaze scrutinized her in a way that raised the hairs on the nape of her neck. Kahlia stopped just before her chair, tilted her head, and pursed her lips.
“It’s strange looking upon you. We always did look so alike,” she said. She sneered and her hand snapped out to grasp Emmery’s chin. “Though that disgusting stain on your cheek diminishes our perfect form, I suppose it will do.”
At her side, a deep growly noise rumbled from Vesper.
The way Kahlia grabbed her resurfaced images of the night Vesper had saved her. How Fallon had studied her like livestock for purchase. Emmery swallowed down her disgust and wrenched her face free.
Amused by this, Kahlia’s lips curled into a smile. “ButI do quite like this form. It has served me well.Pity she had to be on the cusp of death before I could claim her body. That we had to have her beaten within a whisper of her life before she would relent.”
Emmery’s stomach plummeted.
Dez. They’d forced him to do that. Gods, she was sure of it. And he’d never told anyone the truth because he’d likely been compelled not to.
“Tell me what you want,” Emmery seethed, the words pushed between her teeth.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Kahlia bent at the waist, the scent of bitter apples on her breath as it brushed Emmery’s face. “I want the magic you stole from me.”
A laugh sputtered out of her. “Stole from you? I didn’tstealanything.”