Page 190 of Gladiators of the Vagabond Boxset

“It’s lovely. All your artwork is beautiful,” I told her truthfully, our eyes meeting. She gave me a soft smile, still sleepy, and I felt my heart race in response. Her emotions were soft and receptive; it was almost enough to convince me that if I leaned in and kissed her, she would let me.

We’d never know how that would have ended.

A sound at the door had me lean back and leap to my feet.

I was standing protectively in front of her before I’d even made any conscious choice to move.

My mother stepped into the room, her high heels clacking on the polished stone floors of the suite.

She already had a haughty, disdainful look on her face, as if she’d known exactly what had been going on in here moments ago. Or rather, almost had.

Noa straightened from the couch. I could hear the rustling of her clothing as she fixed her uniform.

I held my mother’s cool stare, trying not to feel like I was that fourteen-year-old again, the one who got called into her office all the time—the one who had refused to believe how much she’d changed since the accident.

“Lukalyn, I can’t believe what I’m hearing.

You still haven’t learned a damn thing, have you?

I can’t believe you’re cavorting with the housekeeper when your eager fiancée is about to arrive!

” she said, her lip curled in disgust as she gazed at the hovercart with cleaning supplies.

“My own son, cleaning? And you,” she turned to glare at Noa, “think you can get away with lazing about, think you have him twisted around your little finger, don’t you? ”

I sensed the spike of fear coming from Noa—her alarm.

Which was warranted, because the next moment, my mother lifted a hand with long, manicured nails glimmering the same icy blue as her dress.

She pointed one finger at Noa, and a torrent of pain unleashed itself on the small human female.

She let out one startled yelp, then collapsed to the floor on her hands and knees and bore that current of pain in silence.

No way could I be as stoic about it as Noa was.

While the pain I felt coming from her was only an echo—not the full blow—it still stung, and it was all too familiar.

I’d experienced that kind of treatment far too often over the past three years.

I leaped at my mother and slammed her hand down.

“You do that again and I will kill you!” I growled into her face.

But that only made her smirk, so I added, “I will fight you tooth and nail on every single plan you’ve got for me.

I would rather die than cooperate, you hear me? ”

Her bottomless black eyes were entirely dark, not a hint of a glimmer or shine.

She inclined her head slowly, indicating that she had heard me, and I backed up, slowly letting go of her.

Then, I turned to Noa to help her up from the hard stone floor.

“Are you okay?” I asked, even though my senses told me the pain had gone and that she now felt shaky but otherwise remained unharmed.

She looked up, her blue eyes shiny with tears, but she gave me a firm nod as she climbed to her feet.

The hate-filled glare she gave my mother—I felt it all the way down in my bones—I couldn’t agree more.

I was relieved, however, that Noa kept her smart mouth shut and just glared.

If she made one of those snappy, sarcastic comments that she liked to aim my way, I wasn’t sure if my mother would care, in the heat of the moment, that I’d threatened her.

“You,” my mother said, pointing at Noa, “finish your damn work. Don’t let me see you again.

” Noa tilted her head to give me a look that I couldn’t decipher, her emotions a tangled, angry mess.

She took her cart and darted from the room.

As the door opened, I was grateful to notice that neither of my cousins was out in the hallway—just the Rummicaron guard, but he didn’t seem interested in anything but doing his job.

As the door closed, my mother stepped in front of it and into my line of sight again.

I had managed to topple her fancy hairdo, so it was now in some disarray, and she was fastidiously fixing it up as she glared at me.

“I don’t care what you think, son, you are not consorting with some lowly housekeeper. ”

“Don’t you mean slave?” I said, then added, full of derision, “As I’ve been for the past three years?

Did you even care enough to look for me when I was taken?

Did you know what I went through?” I was furious with her, with how abandoned I’d felt while I’d been forced to work for Drameil.

I knew my mother hadn’t been capable of feeling any kind of love since the accident, but to her, family was everything—our reputation, our name.

I couldn’t believe that she’d just drop me like a stone.

I’d surfed the data streams after I’d been freed and seen the pretty act she’d put on about how her beloved son was gone—how she was horrified by what had happened and prayed for my safe return.

But no real search had been undertaken. It was all an act, one she’d had to carefully orchestrate because she wouldn’t have been able to fool any empathic Aderian.

That footage had all been recorded in private—by my cousins, probably.

She waved a hand in dismissal. “That wasn’t real slavery; that was just to teach you a lesson.” Her words sank into me like poisoned arrows, hitting me so hard that I staggered back into the couch that Noa had just vacated. Had she really just admitted that she’d known all along where I was?

At my horrified look, she made a tsssking sound.

“Oh, don’t act so surprised. I was sure you knew.

Didn’t Drameil tell you why you were there?

I was sure that would teach you that a hospital was no place for you.

When you got free, you were supposed to run back home with your tail between your legs.

” The disappointed look on her face told me just how much she thought I’d failed her by staying away.

It only confirmed how right my choice had been to stay with the gladiators aboard the Vagabond.