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MARA

I wanted to tell him the truth. I wanted to tell him what I intended to do. We had promised each other to be honest, to stop hiding and scheming. To stop doing what everyone else always did to us.

But Wes had made his choice. Even after begging him in front of everyone, he still chose something I just didn’t think I could forgive.

It broke me.

I didn’t go to his room that night. I went back to my own, and when he came knocking, I refused to answer. He texted and called, but I never responded.

I loved Wes. That’s what made it so painful.

We had fought so hard to find each other and had overcome so much, only to find ourselves at an impasse.

And the choice Wes had made…I couldn’t stand by it.

I couldn’t stand by someone who would annihilate an entire city of thousands of innocent people simply because things looked hopeless.

I loved him, but I couldn’t stand with him on this.

Tears warped my vision as I snuck into his room, silent as a cat as I walked to the side of his bed.

Then I faced him. Watched as he slept—chest rising and falling with the peace I deeply craved.

My gut tied itself up in vicious knots that only tightened and squirmed as I watched him.

As much as I couldn’t support his decision to destroy Telvia, I respected his need to protect his people.

And I needed to do the same.

I needed to protect the Telvian people…even if meant protecting them from the love of my life.

A mournful smile stole my lips, and I reflected on the fact that, at one point in my past, I would have placed my own needs before the needs of others. And now here I was, preparing to sacrifice myself for the people of Telvia, giving up my own happiness for their right to live .

Matias’s voice echoed in my mind, pulling up memories of a deep evergreen forest, cool rushing waters, and the citrusy notes of juniper and damped earth.

“Sometimes life has unexpected turns and bends that force you into directions you didn’t originally intend or even want. But that doesn’t mean you’re not free.”

I tucked my chin to my chest, feeling the anguish over his loss tightening my throat as I reflected on how right he was.

It’s amazing how the bend of life can change you…

take you places you never thought you’d go.

And though life sometimes feels as though it’s happening to you, you always have the freedom to choose how you face those curves in the journey.

The freedom to fall and remain conquered, or rise above your circumstances and become more than you ever thought you could be.

I was no longer a young woman on the cusp of adulthood, crying tears of self-pity and shame.

Life had swept me down a path I never thought would be mine, and in the process, polished my roughened edges into a unique precious stone.

I knew who I was now, and I knew who I wanted to be.

And I was choosing to be someone better than my predecessors—choosing others over myself.

Javier and I had a plan. It wasn’t a great plan, but it was a plan, nonetheless.

“Get some sleep,” Javi had told me. “I’ll gather everything we need and then we’ll meet in the rose garden at 0200. ”

Two in the morning.

I was supposed to sneak out and join him under the cover of darkness.

From there, we would take off towards Telvia.

I was already nervous at the thought of being back behind the wall.

Last I’d been in Telvia, I’d witnessed children gunned down by Northern aircraft.

I’d watched people scream and run for their lives.

And I’d watched my brother die in my arms.

Nausea curled in my stomach at the memory, and I worked to shove it down, burying it. I couldn’t be distracted. I had a job to do.

It was time.

As gently as I could, I held my hair back, and lowered my mouth to graze his lips. A soft brush that I hardly felt and knew no part of him could possibly register.

“I love you,” I whispered. “I hope you never forget that.” My heart pattered, anxiety already clawing up my spine. Slowly, I removed the engagement ring from my finger, hearing the muted thud as I placed it on the nightstand beside him. Then I allowed myself one last look…

Because, chances were, I would never see Wes again.

***

The house was quiet as I wandered through the halls dressed in jeans and a sweater to the back of the estate where glass doors led out into the gardens.

I passed a few soldiers patrolling, waving to the few I recognized with a forced smile, but no one asked me any questions.

I knew when Wes found me gone, he’d ask around and people would tell him they’d seen me meandering the halls.

I hoped the casual clothes would make him think I just couldn’t sleep.

It was the truth, though. Every time I closed my eyes, the nightmares were back.

Fire consuming Chase’s body .

Blood pouring out of Jacob’s eyes.

Hounds ripping out Matias’s throat.

They haunted me. Every second my eyes were closed was another heartbeat I had to watch them die. Watch the life leave their eyes, the little light of their souls snuff out.

But worse yet was that my dreams always ended with me having to face him—facing my father. In every single one, I faced my dad and begged him to change, begged him to become a different version of himself.

“Please, Dad. You can be good . We can be a family again. Come home with me and mom,” I would say as I sobbed at his feet. That was the most shocking part of it all, to hear myself begging him to become a family once more.

I guess I shouldn’t have been that surprised, though. What kid didn’t want their parents to get back together again? What person didn’t want to feel like they had a family to come home to?

Everyone.

Everyone wants a home.

Everyone wants to belong .

I paused mid-step, already at the garden door, and stared at my hand on the handle. Looking over my shoulder, I soaked in all the red plush fabrics, stained-glass, and gilded light fixtures.

Castle Calvernon was breathtaking, but it wasn’t home. Charles had stalked these halls, threatened my life, harmed his wife and child. This was Charles’s home. And even though he was dead, taken out by his own son, it was still his .

I blinked, pushing on the handle and letting myself out into the chilly night.

The temperature had dropped to freezing, but the sky was clear and glittering with stars and a crescent moon that was slowly fading from the sky.

I wrapped my arms around myself, wishing I had grabbed a jacket.

But if anyone had seen me walking around with a jacket in the middle of the damn night, there would have been questions.

Taking shallow breaths and curling into myself, I hustled to the rose garden.

Calvernon Estate wasn’t my home, nor would it ever be.

But neither was the Presidential Palace.

That was another box of nightmares for me.

The Presidential Palace contained a basement where I spent days in solitude as I was punished for any trespasses I had committed.

It started with being left alone without food or water when I was really young.

But as time went on, the physical punishments began.

Slaps across the face

Made to kneel for hours on stone floors littered with gravel.

Broken fingers.

And then, eventually, lashings.

Belinda was extremely abusive, and it all started that day my father instructed me to never call him daddy again.

I was to only ever call him by his name.

And since that day, that’s what I did. It was made very clear to me that the world was to believe Belinda was my mother, and I was the First Daughter of the Presidential Family, but I knew better now.

After speaking to my mom, I understood that I was to replace the daughter Belinda lost, but only in outer appearances.

I didn’t belong there either.

I guessed the truth was I had no home. No place to truly call my own.

Everywhere I went, I was nothing more than a guest. At the end of the day, the closest thing I had to a home was Telvia.

Places like the Academy where I gained reprieve from my abusive stepmother.

Places like Central Park where I could lie peacefully and stare at the sky, imagining myself a bird with the ability to fly away, to be free.

But war had come to Telvia, and all of it was going to come to an end with thunderous booms and blood and fire. Good people were going to die. Jacob said it. He warned me that day I witnessed the Northern plane shoot down dozens of children running out of the Academy.

I freaked out. I tried to wave the pilot down, screaming that they were only children, hoping I could save them. Had it not been for Jacob, I would have been gunned down with them all. Just another limp body lying on a pile of broken rubble.

“There’ll be more kids,” he had said. “And women, and babies, and families. This is just going to keep going, and it’s just going to get worse. And that’s why we have to stop it. It’s got to end, Mara. And we’re going to finish it.”

God, he was right. I hated to admit it, but he was right. If control wasn’t gained and the city considered a loss, it was all going to burn. It was all going to go up in fire and ash and choking plumes of smoke that would stain the skies with blood.

But my father…he could end this. Appealing to him, getting him to listen, could finally end this war without further bloodshed. Without children and infants and innocent people burning alive.

That couldn’t happen. I couldn’t allow it.

Not this time.

“?Prima?” I looked up to see my cousin, a thick aviator jacket bracing him against the cold. “You must be freezing,” he said as he unzipped his coat and shrugged it off his shoulders.

“I’m fine. I just didn’t want anyone to ask questions.”

He handed me the coat with a look that said he was not going to argue about this with me. I sighed and accepted it, slipping it on and relishing the warmth with a delicious shiver.

“Are you okay?”

I blew out a breath. “Sorta, I guess.”

He placed a hand on my shoulder. “We’re doing the right thing, cousin. We have a duty to make this right.”

I snorted. That’s what everyone thinks about the choices they make—that they were in the right. Whether this was right or wrong, I didn’t know, but I felt confident in the choice I had made. Deciding to avoid the philosophical debate with him, I switched topics. “Are we going or what? ”

“Sí, pero tenemos que esperar por los demás,” and then translated when he noticed my raised quizzical brow. “We need to wait for the others.”

“Others?”

Sounds of crunching boots on the trail of decomposed granite caught my attention, causing me to whip around. And when my eyes landed on three individuals, I froze.