46. Decipio

dēcipiō ~ipere ~ēpī ~eptum, tr.

1. to deceive, mislead

2. to deprive of an expected advantage

Clutching my heavy body, I stagger up the path to Moonlight’s End. My legs tremble, my thoughts vibrating against themselves. All that matters is surviving. No. Winning.

Move one step at a time. Frantic barking, hollow tapping on marble, someone’s fingers without rings reaching for the cross on my chest. I push away, but my legs fail. Someone with the scent of moths picks me up and carries me away.

“I told you not to go, brave one.”

My bed. A dream, but my own memory this time—Father’s office in wood and gold and marble. These are his last moments. His ceremonial dagger I grabbed off his desk rests in my hand. His face is clearer than memory should be—like reality, like old hate swelling. Blue-blue eyes, blue-blue suit. Lines around his brows, his mouth…a life lived as Mother can’t anymore. His nose, my nose. His shoulders, mine. He gave me his body.

But he gave me his ruthlessness, too.

Father is still and quiet, hands behind his back. He turns and faces away from his only daughter, looking out of the expansive window and into space. Into nothingness. His lips—my lips—move in the window’s black reflection, voice crackling. “I loved her, Synali.”

He doesn’t get to say my name. He doesn’t get to say the word “love.”

He was supposed to love me. Protect me.

Fury and despair and injustice come together like fire. He ended my world for reputation, for “honor,” for a seat beside a dying old man—he decided power was more important than me. My feet move forward. My hand comes down. My dagger flashes bright, and then red.

My whisper in his ear: “Tell her that yourself.”