My Dying Screams Went Unheard

Chapter 2 The Stolen Future

I reached for the ceramic pot on my vanity and covered the mark with moonpetal and silver-ash paste.

“An herbal treatment,” I said. “It purifies the bond.” The paste cooled my skin and hid the dead color beneath it.

His grip left my chin.

I changed the subject before he could press further. “Do you remember what today is, Cassius?”

He went still. “Today is.”

“Our centennial. The hundredth anniversary of our blood-bond.”

Cassius looked toward the calendar on my desk. Too late.

“Eve, I forgot.”

“I know you’re busy. Victoria needs so much of your time.”

He watched me closely. Once, I would have demanded an explanation and made him account for every forgotten hour. My quiet bothered him more.

“I can make it up to you. What do you want? Jewels from the eastern mines? I’ll turn the entire northern wing into a library and fill it with every book ever written.”

One gift for a century.

“I don’t want anything,” I said.

The chamberlain entered with a sealed scroll. “A decree from the council, my Prince.”

Cassius broke the seal. By the time he finished reading, the apology had disappeared from his face.

He folded the decree. “The Blood Moon Embrace ceremony is next week.”

I waited.

“I will escort Victoria. Her health is delicate, and the council agrees she needs the ceremony’s restorative magic more than you do.”

The Blood Queen’s place at the ceremony had always been mine.

He set the decree on my vanity. “She will also need the Sunstone Amulet and access to the royal elixir reserves. Transfer them to her custody until the ceremony is over.”

My seat. My amulet. The reserves sealed to the Blood Queen by sacred law. Cassius was taking my public place as well as my private one, and he listed each piece as though he were emptying a storeroom.

I simply nodded. “As you wish, my Prince.”

After he went to bathe, a black lace garter belt slipped from his discarded coat. It carried the same cloying perfume as his collar and the stale smell of s*x.

I dropped it into the fire and watched the lace curl.

That night, his voice carried from the next balcony.

“Don’t worry, my love. It’s arranged. After the ceremony, every royal resource she had will be yours. Permanently.”

I went inside and shut the balcony doors.

Two days left.

On my vanity, the gray bond mark showed through the drying paste.