Page 66 of Insolence (Eisha’s Hidden Codices #1)

I shoot to my feet. “You and I, we belong to each other. How can you forsake that? How can you forsake me ?” Suddenly, the world is coming apart at the seams. I’m coming apart at the seams. Wrecked with the thought of facing down the one thing I’ve always feared.

“Let me go .” She’s prising my hands from her arms but not using her full strength against me. Not yet.

“ Never .” I shake my head. Tighten my grip. “Nobody can give you what we have. Nobody else will ever—”

“I said stop it , El!” She overpowers me, yanking her arms away with such effortless force the buttons tear from one silk sleeve. Bounce across the kitchen floor before I realize she’s broken my hold.

“What can he p-possibly give you that’s enticing enough to k-keep you from me?” I choke between wracking sobs.

“I really am sorry,” she murmurs, agony shuttling between us. “This is how things have to be. We always knew it was inevitable.”

Not inevitable. Possible, sure, but… The word digs into my heart with barbed hooks. She strides to the door, snatches her cloak, and pauses. Studies me with a remorseful sort of appraisal. “Love is sacrifice, sweetheart. And you didn’t need to make this one so damned difficult .”

She exits my family’s house. Leaves me in tattered pieces, ruined and slumped at my kitchen table. Staring at three pearl buttons on the floor.

And that’s not even the worst part.

The worst fucking part of it all—the part that will haunt me—is the wave after wave of misery I feel spilling down the arcane thread strung between us.

Elodie

Morday, the 12th of Emberglow

Approximately 1.5 Months Ago

“ Y ou’re the one she wants. She won’t divulge much to any of the rest of us. You had best come along now.”

Merciful Eisha. Goddess preserve us both.

Delia ushers me toward the Gallery with urgency. My heart hammers in my chest the whole walk. Banners hanging between the portico columns snap and sigh with the wind, their edges ragged and in need of mending.

We climb the short row of steps.

“Ah, Lady Elodie. At last.” Deirdre meets us inside the vestibule.

Goddess. It really is her. Wrenching behind my navel comes on so strong I nearly cry out.

My hand goes to my abdomen. Her pull is so strong from the moment I step inside the building, I don’t know how I didn’t feel it outdoors.

“Is everything all right?” I fight to keep my voice measured. My breathing controlled.

“Lady Madoc insists on speaking to you directly, it seems.” Deirdre studies me with new appreciation. “I didn’t know you had such high associations.”

“Me neither, your reverence.”

She turns, escorting me down the center of the main hall.

The Gallery of the Goddess yawns around us, dim and dusty. Urns sit empty. Braziers are cold. The long runner is caked with dried leaves and other detritus dragged in from outside.

Daylight pours through an uncovered skylight. Dazzles me to momentary blindness as we pass through it. My thoughts flit to the poor dead kestrel.

The wrenching has become teeth and claws, ripping and prising my insides toward the enormous altar. The closer I get, the stronger her force, until I’m nauseous with our proximity.

My eyes adjust, Eisha’s soaring statue coming slowly into focus. Withered yew branch in one hand, stone finch in the other, the marble figure towers to the angled ceiling. The goddess’s proud face is obscured by shadow.

Usually it’s Eisha’s presence that fills this building. Today, it’s Itissa of Clan Madoc.

Although I’ve been told she’s here, although I’ve been feeling her, it’s a whole different thing beholding her in the flesh. Her gasp when she sees me is almost imperceptible.

That’s when it sharpens. Fear.

It’s rushing at me. Smothering me. It isn’t mine, but it’s mingling with the dread that I can’t stave off any longer to consume me.

What the hell are you playing at, Tiss?

F uck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

“Of all the impetuous, moronic, idiotic things to fucking do,” I fume to nobody on my way across the deserted Gallery an hour later.

I’m going to kill her. I’m going to get down there somehow, find her, and put her out of her gods-be-damned misery.

I’m hunting Deirdre down after that. Grabbing her by the neck and throwing her over the side of this miserable mountain. Then I’m going to set this whole bloody place alight with myself locked inside.

I burst onto the portico, the door crashing open. Behind me, the finches shriek in surprise. The air surrounding the statue shudders with the wild flap of wings before the door slams, cutting the ruckus.

My skin tingling, ice and fire vie for dominance in my veins. Panic buzzes between my ears while the world blinks in and out. I’m suddenly not getting enough oxygen.

I need Maida. Now. Or I’m going to commit a series of increasingly violent crimes.

Bibi’s riding on my shoulder, and my system is much more regulated when I arrive at my friend’s door.

My shoulder is a cramped space for an adult raven. It’s difficult for her to balance on such a narrow perch. She’s hardly ridden there since her fledgling days.

But sensing my distress, my sweet bird spotted my trek across the courtyard. Decided it was shoulder or bust. That’s where she’s going to be, and she’s not budging.

She slowed me down in my blind fury. Forced me to breathe properly. To try and feel my fingers and toes again. Good bird.

She gives an amiable croak when I knock on Maida’s door.

My friend lights up as soon as she clocks us. “Bibi! Hello!”

“Bibi! Hello! Bibi!” Head bobbing, my raven imitates Maida’s voice perfectly.

“Elodie?” My friend’s glee falters when she sees me. “Whatever is the matter?” She stands aside, holding the door when I fail to produce an answer. “Come in.”

Bibi pushes off me with the rustle of wings and as much grace as she can muster once I’m across the threshold. Flaps through the arched doorway. Without looking, I know she’s settling on the canopy at the end of Maida’s bed—her favorite perch in here.

Maida turns to me once we’re safely behind closed doors. Folds her arms over her chest. Now that I’m finally safe to let my walls down, the words somehow won’t form.

I glance around absently.

“Elodie, you’re frightening me. What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

“No. Yes.” Fuck . My hands go to my head. “Everything’s wrong, Maida.”

“You can tell me anything. You know that, yes?”

“I know. It’s just that—” I take a deep breath. Goddess , my secret’s almost bigger than I am at this point. It’s slitting open my own tender belly to so much as think it. Reminding myself that I’m safe with her, that she is safe , I close my eyes. Force it out: “I remember everything, Maida.”

She stares, perplexed. “You remember everything about what, dear?”

“No. You don’t understand.” I wander into her bedroom. Sit on the padded bench at the foot of her bed. Bracing my elbows on my thighs, I scrub my hands over my face. Whisper, “I remember everything about my life before I came to the temple.”

Every word is harder to say than the one that came before.

Silence expands in the room. Even Bibi stays motionless above us.

“ How ?” Maida finally manages.

“Wish I could say for sure. I have theories,” I shrug. Look at her. “The ritual didn’t work on me.”