Nyx’s words keep playing in my mind like a broken record—sharp, bitter, and laced with so much hatred it felt like they cut right through my soul. I’ve tried to make sense of them, but I still can’t. She said so little, yet somehow it felt like she revealed everything. I hated that she couldn’t just tell me everything I needed to know all at once. Why was she feeding me breadcrumbs? And what was that whole talk about me not being ready? How long was she going to use that as an excuse? The more I thought about it, the more tangled everything became. The only clear takeaway from our conversation was that both she and Xena knew Kaden—and that Xena and Kaden did something awful to her. Something that caused her to hate her sister. Something that turned sister against sister. I fell back in

