Page 105 of Evermore (The Never Sky #3)

Paesha

T he streets of Silbath stretched before me like the skeleton of a memory—familiar bones stripped of flesh, hollowed and haunted.

Shiny, new and ultimately terrible because of the hand that touched them all.

That took away what made this city beautiful—the wrought iron railings, the history, the stories of this city.

One day. One day I’d come back and undo what Aeris had done, but not this one.

I moved through the gilded streets with purpose, my dagger from Harlow a comforting weight at my hip. My footsteps echoed against cobblestones that had once known me as no more than another desperate dancer, not a queen, not a goddess.

Just Paesha. Another girl trying to survive.

Funny how things changed. Funny how they didn’t.

Misery’s End loomed ahead. I could almost see myself as I once was, younger, hungrier, slipping through the back entrance with my worn slippers clutched to my chest, heart pounding with the anticipation of the stage.

I didn’t bother with stealth or subtlety. What was the point? Ezra knew I was coming. He’d orchestrated this entire production, after all. Might as well give the bastard the entrance he expected.

I kicked the front doors open, standing in the corridor. Empty. Silent.

I moved up the stairs, through the hall and to the theater doors, again kicking the door in.

The theater wasn’t dark and empty as I’d expected. No, that would have been too simple for Ezra’s twisted sense of drama. Instead, the space blazed with light, every lamp burning, every candle flickering, illuminating an audience that made my blood run cold.

Mortals. Hundreds of them, packed into every seat, spilling into the aisles. Their faces were pale with fear, eyes wide as they turned toward me. I recognized so many of them.

Mortal people. My people.

Unmade Guardians stood at every exit, their blank eyes and rigid postures promising swift punishment for any who dared move. But the stage, that was where my attention fixed, where fury and dread coalesced into a hard knot in my chest.

Ezra stood in a pool of light, wearing all black, his perfect features fucking giddy with anticipation, as if we were meeting for tea rather than whatever nightmare he had planned.

“Huntress! Right on time. I do appreciate punctuality in my performers.”

I strode down the center aisle, deliberately slow, deliberately casual, even as my mind raced through options, calculations, possibilities.

“Love what you’ve done with the place. The whole ‘summon your enemies for dramatic confrontations’ aesthetic is so last century, but you’re really pulling it off.

Should I have brought snacks? Evil monologues are always better with snacks, don’t you think? For the dramatics and all.”

Ezra’s smile didn’t falter. If anything, it widened. “I do adore your spirit.”

“Wish I could return the compliment, but your taste seems questionable at best.” I gestured to the filled theater. “Kidnapping? Really? That’s a bit pedestrian for a supreme being, isn’t it?”

I reached the edge of the stage and stopped, looking up at him with deliberate insolence.

“I prefer to think of it as ‘gathering an appreciative audience,’” Ezra replied, extending a hand as if to help me onto the stage.

I ignored it, hoisting myself up with a fluid movement that required no assistance. “Cut the shit, Ezra. You’ve got your audience. You’ve got me. What’s the fucking point of all this? You can’t kill me now, so why bother?”

His laugh was soft, almost gentle. “Oh, Huntress. I promised my brother that I would drag this last one out, and I plan to do so.” He circled me slowly, power rippling around him in waves I could almost see. “There are worse things than death.”

I rolled my eyes. “Please. I’ve heard more creative threats from drunks in the alley behind this theater.”

In a flash, he was before me, so close I could feel his breath on my face. “Dance for me, Huntress.”

I blinked. “Excuse me?”

“Dance.” He stepped back, gesturing to the stage around us. “That’s what you do, isn’t it? That’s what you’ve always done. Dance for these people who adore you so. Dance to save their miserable lives.”

“That’s your big plan? Swordpoint dancing? And here I thought you couldn’t disappoint me any more than you already have. Pity.”

“I won’t ask again. Dance. Of your own free will. We wouldn’t want it to be a binding contract, would we, Huntress? We both know how those tend to work out.”

A woman in the front row whimpered, drawing his attention. Without hesitation, Ezra pulled out his favorite bow and shot her right in the chest. She gasped, those around her cowered. With no warning at all, the woman was dead, slumping forward in her seat until she fell to the floor.

“That’s one,” he said calmly. “Shall we try for two? Or would you prefer to dance?”

Rage surged through me, hot and violent.

I reached for my power, for the destruction that had become as much a part of me as breath, but it flickered and died before I could grasp it.

Fucking perfect timing. The erratic surges Thorne had felt with the imbalance affected me as a goddess now too, leaving me powerless when I needed it most.

Ezra smiled, seeing my struggle. “Tricky thing, isn’t it? Power. So unreliable these days. Almost as if someone had broken the balance.”

I wanted to tear his throat out with my bare hands, god or no god.

But the theater full of innocent people stayed my hand.

They were looking at me now, hope and fear warring in their expressions.

Most remembered me. Remembered the dancer who had once given them moments of beauty in their harsh lives.

“Fine,” I spat. “I’ll dance. But when this is over, when they’re safe, you and I are going to have a very different kind of conversation.”

Ezra stepped back, gesturing to the open stage with a flourish. “That’s a really pretty picture of a fictional future. Still reading your books, I see. Please, by all means, the stage is yours.”

I kicked off my boots, letting my feet connect with the worn boards of the stage. This place knew me. Had known me when I was nothing and no one. The muscle memory was still there, buried beneath layers of grief and rage and power. “What shall it be? A waltz? A jig? Something classical, perhaps?”

“Oh, I think you know exactly what these people came to see,” Ezra replied, settling into the chair sitting center stage. “The piece that made you famous in this little corner of misery. Your magnum opus.”

Of course. The dance I’d created in this theater, the one that had first caught the Maestro’s eye. The same performance Ezra claimed stole his heart when we were lovers. Not ballet. Nothing fluid and beautiful. He wanted the burlesque.

I closed my eyes, drawing a deep breath.

When I opened them, I refused to see Ezra.

Instead, I looked at the people, the clock tinkerer who dabbed tears from his eyes, the old chimney sweep whose gnarled hands twitched as if longing for his tools, the young woman who’d once slipped me extra bread at the market when I was starving.

My people. Requiem’s people. The ones I’d sworn to protect when I took a crown I never wanted, presiding over a city that was simply adjacent to this one.

I began to move.

There was no music, but my body remembered the rhythm, the cadence of a melody that had once been my only salvation.

Each step, each turn, each sweep of my hips was defiance.

I wouldn’t let Ezra corrupt this, would not let him turn joy into misery.

Misery’s End… The irony wasn’t lost on me.

The spotlight had once been my escape from suffering, and now he sought to make it the source of my greatest humiliation.

But as I danced, something unexpected happened.

The audience, these captives who should have been cowed with fear, began to respond.

A murmur of appreciation rippled through the crowd.

Their fear held them glued, unmoving, but there was love there.

Appreciation for me that bloomed a warmth in my heart.

This was how a goddess drew power. This feeling was euphoria.

A drug even. I spun faster, threw myself higher, poured everything I had into each movement.

This wasn’t surrender. This was rebellion. This was reclaiming what was mine.

And the people saw it. They felt it. Their fear began to transform into something else, admiration, then defiance, then a fierce sort of joy that built like a wave.

They’d known me as Paesha, the dancer who gave them moments of beauty in lives of hardship.

That connection hadn’t died when I’d left Requiem.

If anything, it had grown stronger in my absence, polished by memory into something magical.

Their love, their energy, fed something within me.

Not quite power, but a strength that had nothing to do with godhood and everything to do with belonging.

With home. If I could just grasp my power, I would have this fucker on his knees so fast. I only needed to wait.

It always came back around. That was what Thorne had said. And I could be patient.

Ezra must have sensed it though, because his face darkened. “Enough.”

I ignored him, moving faster, drawing more from the audience, feeling their response lifting me. One more spin, one more leap?—

“I said enough!” Ezra’s voice cracked like thunder.

The music that had built in my mind, in my movements, came to a jarring halt as Ezra seized me by the arm, yanking me out of the dance with enough force to send pain shooting through my shoulder.

“Charming display. But I think we’ve had quite enough. No need to strengthen you, Huntress.”