Page 62 of The Shard and the Serpent (Shard Daughters #1)

Our Greatness

Rayze

The Truth, Pt. III

You fight, my mother’s voice whispered. A never-ending scream from beyond the grave, anchoring me in a torment I couldn’t pull free from.

Omen shaved my head, my hair too far gone. I stared into the mirror, my knobby knees hugged to my chest, but I didn’t cry.

Instead, I fed the power in my gut, and my arrows hit target after target. Seventeen years old. Eighteen. Nineteen.

I laughed again at twenty.

Killed at twenty-one.

You taste their blood before they ever taste yours .

Saved my first innocent at twenty-two.

Went on my first mission with Aleksi and Sonya at twenty-three.

Slept in my room, alone, for the first time at twenty-four.

I grew my hair but kept it short, Omen cutting it for me every time. A sacred ritual that only her, Fate, and I shared together. My queen always appeared for it, even if only for a few seconds, starlight bright across Omen’s frame.

Somewhere along the way, I stopped feeling so infinitely alone.

Then at twenty-five, I saw Warrick for the first time since the Daughters took me in. He was leaning against a wall outside Fang’s Edge, his Heir mask clipped at his waist and his head tilted back to the rain. His eyes were closed, his shoulders stiff.

I stood there, watching him, feeling the sharp pinch of our Bond in my gut and hating it— hating him .

“Synlon,” I told the Daughters as we stood in The Crown’s Temple. “I want Synlon.”

“Are you sure?” Aleksi asked. “I can take The Serpent, Angeline.”

“No.” My glare fastened to Russell Ivor’s city among the threads of the realm. “He’s mine.”

“Then I’ll take Rathem,” she answered.

“No,” I hissed between my teeth.

Omen, Sonya, and Aleksi watched me, waited for me, and I knew then I loved them. The fact they were willing to give me whatever I needed to heal myself—no one had ever given me that.

“The Kraken is mine, too,” I said.

Aleksi stepped toward me, her gaze stern behind her glasses. “You have us,” she told me. “Wield us.”

“I’ll start with The Serpent,” I said, my fists tight. “Then, I’ll take his son from him. You want me to use your help, then make sure The Kraken infiltrates Synlon when the time is right.”

Starlight sparked over the spikes of Omen’s head. She dipped her chin. You have Fate’s blessing, Angel of Sin.

I didn’t tell them it didn’t matter. I had no plans on living in a realm where Russell Ivor and Torren Trask breathed the same air I did.

Warrick—he was only ever meant to be a tool for chaos.

I believed the boy I cherished was long dead.

I bought in to the persona he’d created, to The Serpent Heir as terrible as his father.

I didn’t know what he would become to me, and the truth is, I’m worried I damned myself the moment I let him become more.

This Bond between us, it’s fucked. A chain. A noose. I can’t take my power back from him until I can finally be done with the mess I created as a child, twining our souls in desperation.

I can’t fully let myself love him until I know this hasn’t all been a fabrication of magic. No matter how real it may feel, he doesn’t know just how long he’s been warped by magic— my magic .

There’s only one way to be done with this, all of this, and it’s going to hurt like a motherfucking bitch.

“There is no power without sacrifice,” Aleksi said one day among the marble of the training coliseum. The sunlight brought out the red in her curls, her blue eyes glistening with unshed tears as I stood there before her, sobbing.

Twenty six years old. It was the only time I broke, the first time I willingly let another person hold me, and the first day I’d spent in the presence of my rapist, toying with Russell Ivor’s mind.

She clutched me to her chest, the two of us dropping to our knees. She swept a hand through my short hair, her breath hitching against my ear.

“Brave is a burden, Sin,” she whispered.

“It just fucking is. In every story, they talk about it like this noble, heroic thing, but in the end, the true heroes are the ones who fight despite how badly they’re bleeding.

There isn’t a single Daughter who isn’t bleeding alongside you, and all that blood, it feeds an endless wrath. ”

I wrapped my arms around her waist, my fingers curling against her spine.

“What you are doing for yourself, for Synlon and Rathem, for the Daughters is one of the bravest things I’ve ever seen anyone do,” she said. “So, I see you, Hallie.”

A sob cracked out of me.

“I see your blood, and when the time comes, I’ll match it with my own.

Our bodies are weapons. Our pain is our power.

Our hearts are our greatness,” she said, taking hold of my shoulders and grasping me tight, forcing my gaze to hers.

“The only thing that ever stands in the way of all three is our fucking minds, and guess what, bitch? You can control them .”

A half-sob, half-laugh tore out of me.

“You are destined to strike,” she promised. “Fated to Godsdamn win. So get on your feet, dry your fucking eyes, and fight .”

I lifted from the ground, wiping my eyes with the back of my hand.

“Fists up, Angel of Sin,” she commanded and raised her own. “If you can’t kill a man with nothing but your fucking willpower, then you’re not tapping into everything your soul has to offer. Do you understand?”

I spread my legs, anchoring my weight. I readied my fists, power rumbling awake through my veins. White flared over my knuckles, blood trickling from my nose.

Aleksi grinned. “There she fucking is.” She lunged for me, and I ducked with a snarl, her grin widening.

“They can beat us. Fucking electrocute us. Invade us and chain us. They can even take pleasure in hurting us, Sin, but it doesn’t fucking matter because the second they’re in our presence, they’re facing their end. ”

She landed a punch to my side, my breath leaving me before I regained balance and shot forward. She was quicker than me at that point with three extra years of training, but I managed to knock her to the side.

“You were prey. Then you became,” she commanded.

“Prey always becomes,” I returned, low and dark.

Aleksi kicked her head back with my favorite laugh of hers. Crazy fucking bitch.

“Shine bright, Daughter of Starlight,” she commanded and nodded to the power breaking from my fists. “No one can take that light away from you. It’s yours in every lifetime. Own it. ”

I smiled.