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I do not dare to look toward them, even though Pollux’s eyes widen. Hesitant, he meets Andromeda in the center of the room, scoops her up in his arms, and presses her face to his chest. “Kassandra,” he murmurs, locating me. “Come here.”
He doesn’t need to ask me twice. I slip off the bed and find my way to the safety of his outstretched arm. It curls around me, and he holds both Andromeda and me tight for several breathless seconds. Kissing my forehead, he says, “Let’s get out of here.”
“But…” Andromeda begins to pull her face away from him.
Pollux doesn’t let her lift her head. “I think Pila can handle this.”
“How?” Castor’s voice shakes. It darkens, “How?”
“As my friends would say, I’m built different.” Ire drips from Pila’s every word. “And if you mess with my family ever again…”
“Pila,” Pollux warns.
“Do not try to spare him. He took my Meda away. He ought to know better than to offend a child in the presence of an expecting mother.”
Pollux’s lips graze my forehead. Painfully cool and calculated, he says, “Tor.”
“Don’t Tor me,” Castor hisses.
Pollux’s silence fills the room, makes the branches pouring through the door shiver. It presses in my lungs, filling them with liquid steel. At last, Pollux breaks the strain and turns. “Pila, I can’t get out.”
Pila’s footsteps stride up to us, and she waves her hand to part the branches filling the doorway.
“That’s it?” Castor yells. “Intimidation? And then you cast this entire event aside? I took your soulmate. I stole your daughter. And a few moments of difficulty breathing is all you have to leave me with?”
“I loved you,” Pollux says.
My mouth drops open. Dude. I’m standing right here.
“I never told you that,” he continues. “You were precious to me. My closest friend, for years. I forgave you over and over. I spoke on your behalf to Cael time and again. You meant so much to me.” His voice darkens, lowering until it threatens to make my knees go out. “And…yet…if you ever try something like this again, I will destroy you. Am I clear, old friend?”
After many moments without a response, Pollux grunts, and plows ahead.
Chapter 43
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Acceptance is only the first step.
“Okay,” Pollux scowls at his phone while seated on a dark log in somehow even darker woods. “I have texted Mom and Dad. I used emojis. They know Andromeda is on her way, and we’ll catch up with them soon.”
I trot in a circle in front of him, trying to ignore the dozens of eyes gleaming in the brush around us. Cael said it was red cap hunting season this morning, didn’t he? I seem to remember that. Was the Christmas party really only this morning?
That’s crazy.
It feels like that bit of normal happened eight million years ago.
My entire body is tingling. I tap my fingers to my thumbs in sequence.
Pardon.
I tap my gold-flecked fingers to my gold-flecked thumbs in sequence.
I didn’t notice it until we made it out of the oh-so-charmingly named Desolate Caverns beyond Castor’s palace. Now, although the world is still painted in grim shades, apparently we’re in the safety of Cael’s domain. Andromeda has gone on to my parents. Pila has gone on to let Cael know the need for an army was superfluous.
And Pollux is crouched near a trod leaking cell service.
“They replied,” he says. “It’s an emoji.”
