Page 35 of Evermore (The Never Sky #3)

Paesha

H e’d tied me to a godsdamn chair and there wasn’t shit I could do about it.

My brain vibrated with pain and exhaustion and still Alastor was relentless.

My ass was sore from the hard chair, my ears tired from the echoes of my own screaming and gods, if he fucking smiled one more time I was going to bring this whole world down around me.

“Go further. You’re wasting our time,” he said, leaning against the wall as he stared at me with bright green eyes.

Eyes I would’ve liked to gouge out of his pretty head.

Maybe I would one day. Maybe I would be his downfall.

I locked the new goal in my mind, lining him up behind Thorne as his Remnants creeped lazily toward me.

My stomach churned in anticipation. “No. Stop. If I could have a break?—”

“Interesting choice of word, break. That which you refuse to do.” He took another large bite of an apple, forcing my mouth to water with dreams of the crisp sweetness.

I hadn’t eaten in three days. I’d been tied to this chair, somehow deeper in the ground than the Vale already was so no one could hear me scream.

Though I’d only been lucid for a fraction of the time.

My Remnants remained coiled within me, refusing to bow to the beckoning of a god. I hated and appreciated their refusal to break in equal measure. They were strong. Stronger than me.

It took all of one sharp breath before Alastor’s magic lashed out, drawing back only enough to rush forward with a punch. The Remnants swirled over my neck, growing tighter before brushing my lips, silencing my scream with yet another deep dive into my mind.

Papa always said secrets were the same as coin if you knew which ones to keep. He’d winked at me the first time he’d said it. Back when he smiled more than he cried. Back when he was at home more than he was away. Back when we had a home. I must have been six then.

Now, I had a secret. One that was worth more than all the coin, he’d said. And it was just ours.

Until it wasn’t.

But this was the day.

I wore my prettiest yellow dress and squeezed my feet into shoes that were too small.

I hid the stain on the lace of my sleeve by rolling it up.

Dresses never kept when they were rolled in old newspapers and used for pillows on Beggars Row, but I’d done my very best. Because I had a secret that was going to buy me and papa a new house one day.

“He might look scary, Treasure, but don’t let your feelings show. You keep your face blank, your eyes on your shoes, and you let me do the talking, you hear me?”

I held Papa’s hand so tight, the tips of his fingers turned white, but he never let go. He and I were a team. We were the heroes in our story. He’d said so.

“I hear you,” I whispered. “Don’t stare, don’t cry, don’t smile, don’t speak.”

“Fear is only an emotion and emotions are nothing more than barricades.”

We might’ve been twins, my father and I, if not for my peculiar eyes.

The dark, chestnut hair was an exact match, but any time the sun managed to come out, my skin would brown quicker than his.

He was paler, and I was… Well, I wasn’t sure, but he’d said it was the only trait I’d taken from my mother before she’d left us for someone with more coin and fewer problems.

A scary black carriage pulled up to the alley we’d been sleeping in and with two squeezes of my hand and a quick nod, all traces of the kind, knowledgeable man I’d known my father to be faded from his handsome face. “Eyes down, Treasure.”

He only used my real name, the one my mother gave to me, when others were around, preferring something from one of his many bedtime stories instead. Because, though the streets were cold and dark, and sometimes scary, his stories were always magical and there was always a heroine to save the world.

“Lovely,” a theatrical voice purred, curling down the alley and around the back of my neck. “Come here, child.”

“She’s uh, grown quite an attachment to me since her mother left, sir. It’s best if she stays by my side.” I’d never heard my father gulp before. It couldn’t have been from fear though. He was never afraid. Someday, I wouldn’t be either.

The man’s cane clacked against the bricks paving the alley as he walked nearer. “How am I to know you speak the truth if I’m not allowed to speak to the dear child, Aeronus?”

Two more squeezes came from my father’s grip before he released me, placing a palm on my back and pushing me toward the stranger.

I tried to keep my eyes down, my breaths steady, and my thoughts in my mind quiet.

But my heart, racing as it was, must’ve given me away because the cold metal of the man’s cane brushed my chin, then forced my face up.

I tried to close my eyes as raindrops fell from an endless gray sky, dampening my lashes.

Never be memorable, Treasure. Memorable people are targets for forgettables.

My eyes, one green and one blue, made me memorable, and though my father’s sage advice echoed in my mind, when the stranger clicked his tongue and commanded me to open them, I didn’t hesitate.

There was something monstrous about his smile as he examined me.

Even the twist of his curly, red mustache felt sinister to my young heart, which ceased to beat as my breaths fell short.

Frozen in place, I waited, the world filling my ears like a tidal wave as this man, with the power to turn secrets into riches, stared down at me.

“How old are you, child?”

“Eight,” I managed.

“And your name?”

“P - Paesha Marian Vox.”

The man knelt, though he didn’t pull the cold metal cane from my face.

“I hear you like to dance. Is that true?”

My skin was on fire, my heart still afraid to beat. He hadn’t blinked. Not once. And there was something very scary about a man that didn’t blink.

“I’m… I’m not very good.”

“I’m quite sure that’s not true at all.”

“Sometimes I sneak into Madame Fourth’s ballet. She lets me sweep the stage and when I’m all done, she shows me how to spin.”

The scary man’s jaw ticced, and I knew immediately I’d said something wrong. “I’m… I’m sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry about, child.” He rose, finally pulling his cane away, though my face felt like he’d set it on fire. “How would you like to dance on stage in front of a real audience?”

I turned from the scary man to look into my father’s brown eyes, but I couldn’t read his expression. No emotion. No weakness. He was a master at it. I’d be one too, someday. No fear.

“I think I would like that very much.”

“It’s settled then. Tomorrow, we will play a game. I will hide my cane and you will find it for me. When you return it, I will allow you to dance on my stage for… let’s say, ten years. And after that, you will have to earn your right to perform. Do we have a deal?”

There was weight in his words. The world pulsed with pressure. But it was as if something held my throat in a vise. Refusing to let me say no.

“You must answer aloud, girl.”

I looked at my father once more, terrified and so worried, I could feel the ache in my belly growing. But he simply dipped his chin, and that was that.

“Yes, sir,” I whispered.

The man stared down at me as if he were waiting for some grand gesture. Unsure of what I should do next, I curtsied. But it wasn’t my posture that he studied. Nor the smile missing from my face.

He stared at my arm and then spun to my father with a growl. “What is this? Why has it not worked?”

I blanched. I’d done something wrong. But there was no time to evaluate. Not a second to think over my words as the scary man rushed and gripped my father’s lapel.

“Please!” I screamed, running at them, unable to hide my fear a moment longer. “I’m sorry. What did I say? What did I do? Please don’t hurt him.”

As if he were slowed by time, the man turned inch by inch. His grip on my father loosening as a smile that wasn’t much of a smile at all grew on his ugly face. “Just a game, dear. Just a game. Isn’t that right, Mr. Vox?” Again, he’d used a voice that felt strange. Loud, but insincere.

My father nodded. “Perhaps she is too young, Boss.”

“Yes. Perhaps.” He walked to the giant carriage and swung the door open before turning back to me.

His calm facade was startling, as if he’d never been upset at all.

“Tomorrow, you’ll find my cane and return it to me.

If you can manage it, I’ll arrange for a private dance lesson with…

” he sneered, “Madame Fourth. Do we have a deal, little Huntress?”

I didn’t like him. I didn’t like the way he’d put his hands on my father, nor the smile that looked like a snake’s.

I didn’t like the tone of his voice or the way he walked without needing that cane at all.

But I could find it. And if that’s all that was needed of me, if it made my father happy and the scary man less scary, then I’d do it. But only this once.

The world beneath my eight-year-old feet tilted and spun until I was yanked back to the present, the burn of the Remnants barely fading as I leaned back in the chair, in my damn prison, hating every memory. Every na?ve thought I’d ever bore as a child.

“I’m not interested in your past. We’ve been over this. The Maestro is of no concern to me.”

It took every ounce of energy and every muscle I had to pick myself up enough to look at Alastor, still eating his fucking apple.

I didn’t look down at the blood collecting on my trousers from my dripping nose.

I didn’t consider the fact that I could hardly open my eyes.

I simply lifted my middle finger and hoped he knew exactly what it meant.

His boots ground against the floor as he walked toward me, his gait slow. Deliberate.

He squatted and spoke, but I couldn’t hear the words. Not beyond the smell of the apple filling my senses. I knew how to be hungry. I knew suffering. But it’d been a long time since I’d felt the familiar pit of emptiness in my stomach. He meant to wear me down. To force my will to bend and break.