Page 38 of Insolence (Eisha’s Hidden Codices #1)

Elodie

H er head is outlined in a flaring red aura—a crown of magnificent rage. Lips peeled back, teeth bared, she hisses, “Tell me what you’ve been keeping from me, damn it!”

She’s lost complete control of herself. Like yesterday, but worse somehow.

“Tiss, I’m not—” I can’t do it. I can’t lie again. Not in this moment with her hatred gnawing at the edges of me. “Look. You once asked me if you came here of your own accord.”

“Yep,” she snaps. Her grip tightens around my neck. “What about it?”

Gagging, brain fogging, I force my next words out: “I wasn’t entirely honest when you asked.”

She cocks her head. “Yeah?”

“I lied by omission,” I wheeze.

“By omission. Hmm.” She adjusts her grip on the handle, and I choke. “So you lied .”

Fuck! “C-can’t breathe,” I rasp, fingers fumbling against hers.

She relents slightly, backing the blade off my artery. Loosening her grip on my throat.

Blood resumes its journey to my brain. Oxygen fills my lungs. “Yes, I lied to you.” About so many things… “It was wrong. I apologize. I hope one day you can forgive me.”

“Noted. Now, talk .”

“Your intuition was correct. Most of us don’t come here willingly. We’re… brought here, all right?” I gasp. “Usually in large groups from all over the realm.”

The next noise she makes sounds equally as choked, her hand dropping from my neck. The paper knife stays.

“This is a legitimate temple that serves the realm in many ways.” I take a thin breath. “It’s also a prison, of sorts. It’s both.”

She glances at the window, and I know she’s thinking of the dome. The stick smoldering on the ground.

“But you were not forced to be here, Tiss. You came voluntarily and stayed of your own free will. So far as I know, you’re the only initiate to ever do so. Despite what they tell us.”

Her eyes are glazed. I’m not sure she’s really even seeing me anymore. “How do you know that?”

“Because,” I sigh, already exhausted. Already knowing where my next revelation will take us and seeing no way around it. “I spoke to you the day you arrived. You pledged yourself willingly to the goddess.”

“You what ?” The blunt blade digs in again. “Why didn’t you say so before?”

“I’m already questioning my decision to mention it now.

” My voice drops low, almost to El’s register: “I swear, I never meant for you to feel crazy, but when you came here, you asked me… told me to keep you safe”—her mouth drops open—“which I am trying my damndest to do. But you don’t make it fucking easy, do you?

” I grasp her suspended wrist and risk trying to nudge the desktop tool from my neck.

She over-breathes in sharp bursts. Resists my attempt to free myself from assault by paper knife so that we’re locked in a stalemate.

Unless I overpower her. Which I don’t want to have to do.

Goddess . I don’t even recognize her right now. I might not be able to this time, even with her right arm mangled to fuck.

“Keeping you safe requires I be judicious about what information I divulge. With how you’ve been acting, it also requires I keep my hands and mouth off of you.” Which I shouldn’t have to keep reiterating.

But here we fucking are.

“Did you know me before? You know, before before?” Her wrist shakes in my grip. “And don’t you dare lie to me again.”

So be it. Without missing a beat, I push through the fear crowding my brain. The hatred crawling all over me. “You said I did when you arrived.”

The blade comes away. For half a second my strained muscles loosen.

That’s when pain explodes in my right shoulder with a burst of heat that sends the air from my lungs. “ Fuck !” I look down to see the knife’s wooden handle sticking out of me.

“ Damn it, Elodie.” A veil of shimmering crimson washes her body. “You’ve done nothing but spew lies and deceive me from the get. I ought to have stuck that in your throat!”

Fuck’s sake. The room tries to swoop out from under me. “You’ve lost your damned mind,” I garble, blood dribbling down the front of my shirt. I slide edgewise down the wall on unsteady legs.

Who is this creature so full of rage and hatred?

“How the hell else am I supposed to be at this point?”

The further away I get from her, the more seriously my knees contemplate collapsing.

“You’re not entitled to information that could endanger my standing at the temple, Tiss. Possibly my well-being,” I croak, clutching my impaled shoulder as if I can cram the agony back inside my skin. “Although you don’t seem too bothered about that at the moment.”

Stumbling, I skirt around the arched doorway and toward my escape, goddess willing. “You’re clearly not ready to have the rest of this conversation.”

A noise—a heinous sound between a roar and a shriek—breaks out of her. Raises every hair on my body.

“I hate you, Elodie. I should’ve shoved that in your eye!” She follows me, fists clenched, aura pulsing. Expanding. Clashing with mine until the intimate contact is unbearable.

“Hate me. Hurt me. This is the way things have to be.” I’m rambling like a moron. Saying anything I can think of now to keep her occupied while I inch backward to the door.

I’m definitely not about to turn my back on her. Not before I’m on the walkway. But she stays where she’s at, anger roiling around her, fists clenched at her sides.

I finally breathe again when her bedroom door doesn’t immediately spring open after I shut it. Unconfined by physical boundaries, her aura invades mine while I clutch the wrought iron barrier to regain my breath.

Hobbling away as fast as I can, I’m halfway to Maida’s rooms before I realize I’m in the clear. Allow myself to feel the fury spreading through my chest like a disease.

Taking the first turn, I practically jog past the atrium and whirl down the shadowed hallway leading to my friend’s quarters. My vision washes white at the edges.

The adrenaline finally wears off, pain churning my stomach to slop. Lightheadedness forces me to stop.

Maida’s door is just there.

“Fuck.” Concealed from the nuns’ prying eyes, I lean against the wall in the dim hallway and gulp air. Make myself clear my mind and wait for my blood pressure to normalize.

Agony radiates from my shoulder. Blood plasters my shirt to my skin, seeping outward from the wound. There’ll be more when Maida removes the damn paper knife.

Hatred electrifies me from head to toe, and I grind my teeth. Fight the urge to go back and snap Tiss’s neck.

This is what makes me realize the rage seething beneath my skin doesn’t actually belong to me. Not all of it .

Borrowed emotions shuttle down the bond between us.

“I’m sorry, Tiss,” I hiss. Tip my head back against the wall. “Really, I am. But I’m not the one who fucking asked for this mess.”

Every time I think I’m used to a dynamic or development, she shocks me all over again.

I thought nothing could be as jarring as watching her fuck herself in the greenhouse yesterday. Or seeing her walk up the path to the arch before Delia fetched me. Told me Lady Madoc had come seeking my audience.

Goddess knows she keeps finding fresh new ways to prove me wrong.

“I hate this,” I whisper to nobody. No, hate isn’t nearly a strong enough word.

I abhor lying to her and despise myself for doing it, but I have no idea who she is, and I can’t trust her in her current state.

You are my greatest weakness, Tiss. If you had any idea how much power you hold… If you knew what actually goes on in this godsforsaken place, you’d understand.

I know you would.

Morday, the 12th of Emberglow

Less Than 1 Month Ago

T he morning of Tiss’s arrival at the temple, a kestrel dives right into the side of the Residential Quarters.

I hear its call long before I see it. The sharp, repetitive cries stop me cold as I cross the courtyard, prompting me to turn and scan the skies.

Kestrels typically don’t venture to scrubby, barren mountaintops, preferring the lush lowlands and forests. What is it doing all the way up here?

Its cries get louder. More frantic. That’s when I clock it. A dark mass against the sky, except for the light upper tail feathers.

It takes a deep dive just as I spot it, as if going for prey—right into the side of the building. The impact is bone-crushing. Hair-raising.

Motionless, it drops to the ground.

A shriek erupts from my throat as I sprint for it. Pray to the Goddess of Destruction and Regeneration that it isn’t dead.

I throw myself to my knees. Scoop the poor creature into my lap. Blood trickles from what remains of its obliterated skull, spilling over tawny brown and white spotted feathers. Its body is limp and warm in my hands.

It’s far too late for prayers. A sob escapes me while I cradle it, hands shaking.

The incident is so upsetting, so sudden, it takes a long while to stand. Wrapping it in my cloak, I place it carefully beneath the Waymark. Head back inside, shaking from cold and shock.

I wash my hands and change my overdress, which is spattered with blood droplets. Relative to their size, birds don’t have much blood. There isn’t much on me. Still, I can’t feel clean until I’m changed.

I find an empty wooden crate and grab another cloak. Borrow a spade from the greenhouse. Set on burying it somewhere high, I place it gently into its makeshift coffin. Begin the trek to the Observatory.

The climb up the rocky path is difficult with both hands full. At least the spade makes a decent walking stick.

I’m only just finishing my task, patting the freshly-turned earth over the kestrel’s grave, when I see her.

At first I have no idea who’s cresting the winding ceremonial road. All I know is a visitor’s coming out of season.

Then cold foreboding grips my heart.

Slinging the spade hastily over my shoulder, I hurry back down the steep path. I’m trying my damndest to ignore the twisting terror, to stop wondering whether the kestrel’s death dive was supposed to mean something. I barely make it to the bottom without spraining my ankle.

Sweat plasters my dress to my body. My breath comes in ragged huffs. Vision swimming, blood pressure dropping from exertion, I lean against the Orrery Tower.

My body eventually evens out. When my eyesight clears, the visitor’s nowhere to be found.

Calm down. Everything’s in order. The kestrel set your teeth on edge.

Almost convinced my apprehension is nothing more than paranoia, I take off toward our residence. Only to be stopped by Delia.

She’s talking before she reaches me, excitement shining in her brown eyes. “Someone’s here to see you, High Priestess.” A breeze lifts her veil off one side of her head, and she gropes for it. “Lady Itissa of Clan Madoc is asking to speak to you. Only you, your holiness.”

Lady Madoc? I nearly choke. Why the fuck is she here ?

“What’s the matter?” Delia eyes me, fingers working to re-pin the sheer gauze.

“Nothing. Feeling a little light-headed.” I glance at my empty hands, absently realizing I left the spade at the Orrery Tower. “Does she know me?”

“Says she does.”

For fuck’s sake . “Do you know what she wants?”

Veil re-pinned, Delia’s hands land on her hips. “You’re the one she wants. She won’t divulge much to any of the rest of us. You had best come along now.”