Page 97 of Blackheart

“How have you been? I never see you!” Trista threw her hands up in the air, as if she had just realized this.

How had I been? The world was a spindle of thread from the tailor house, and I was unraveling with it. With every blink, my surroundings became watery, my mouth drying.

“Trista, what in Fate’s name is in this tea?”

She giggled and called for more shots. “They put ‘infused’ herbs in the tea here. They’re splendid. You see the world for what it is, and it’s so… beautifully terrible.” Tears filled Trista’s eyes as her smile dazzled. One by one, her freckles floated right into the air, like specks of dust.

I was so fucked.

Refusing the second shot, I also pushed the tea away, but it was too late.

The bar and everyone within was like a painting, yet I wielded no brush. I was at the maker's mercy, nothing but a drop of ink in the ocean of existence.

“Isn’t it magnificent?” Trista mused, finishing my tea off herself.

I felt far away, like I was back within walls. Like I should be at work in the tailor house. I was trapped, an endangered animal waiting to be poached. The Sapphires would come soon. Saffron had not begun his conquest just to end with Lestivia. Prince Payn had warned me. He said I would learn what it meant to bean heir. What did he mean by that? What did it mean to be an heir?

Oh Gods, I was an heir to Castivian.

Trista moved like a ripple in lake water. “What do you think?” she asked.

Was I really an heir? I had the mark, but Xavian had yet to declare himself king. Had I brought the deed for nothing? Was I born for nothing? Was Inothing?

“It’s terrifying,” I mumbled.

At the bar, a man dressed in black caught my eye. I nearly mistook him for Riven, my core heating at the flash of his memory.

I couldn't shake his voice, his mouth, how his hands felt on me. I needed to see him. He needed to know how I felt.

“You’ll see the beauty in the horror, just keep drinking,” Trista assured me with a clumsy pat on my shoulder.

I shook my head. “I see everything.”

Riven was not, and would never be, an option. He was just a man, and I was just another woman to him. Even Luna said he had plenty of others.

“Go see it! Go see it all!” she urged, pointing outside. The rowdy ocean rocked ships in the harbor as dark clouds rolled in.

Icouldsee it all.

As I shuffled to get up, she practically pushed me out the door. “See the world, Elora! It’s so beautiful!”

Outside, too many people crowded the streets. Too loud. Yet, eerily quiet all the same. Standing still was not an option; my body demanded to move.

I progressed through the city, blinking hard and wiping my eyes—failing to see straight. Time drifted, yet its pace eluded me.

Prince Payn was going to come for this place. I was alone. Luna was probably dead. The people in the Waywards had no way out. I had nowhere to go. My brothers were nobility. Myparents abandoned me. I’d abandoned Moonhill. Riven kissed me. I kissed him. Two men died at my hand just last night. I’d lost track of how many lives I’d taken.

Everyone around me was oblivious. War was coming, and their own kind were already imprisoned across the Sea of Blades.Why did no one care?

The sky cracked as lightning split the clouds, and thunder boomed. As the downpour erupted, the streets cleared, everyone running inside. I was the only one left in the rain, wind thrashing through my dark hair. The ocean roared as the storm waged war on the city. I did not seek shelter. I embraced it.

We understood each other, the sky and I. She was capable of setting the entire world on fire, but she spared us, time and time again. The storm was loud, but my thoughts were deafening.

Each step weighed on me, my sorrow threatening to break me from the inside out. I’d been disowned, abandoned, hated, all from the moment I was born. If I dared to reveal that it hurt me, the world would hate me for that too.

“Elora!” a voice called out.

Maybe it was the wind, or perhaps my conscience trying to bring me back from the tea. I looked towards the sky, letting the rain consume me. I was sotired. I had tried for so long to push the storm inside me away. Even here in Castivian I was not good enough. I had never known love, not even from my parents, and I never would, because no one cared to evenknowme.