Page 70 of The Bargain

Underneath the picture are the words:

From Broken to Brilliant: This is What Your Donation Can Do.

My stomach churns, and I’m hit by a sudden wave of nausea so powerful I can’t do anything but run out of the ballroom, hand clasped to my mouth, tears burning in my eyes.

Alone in the bathroom, I lean against the marble sink, hissing in a deep breath. The nausea is still swirling in my stomach, but there’s nothing to throw up. I was too nervous and sick with dread to eat, and there was no chance I could choke back a single mouthful of champagne while looking at the disgusting display the Pearsons have put on.

I run the tap and watch the water circle the drain, blinking fat droplets of tears that disappear as soon as they land. A low, hoarse whine hisses out of my throat. A lifetime’s worth of sadness seems to have fallen on me, so heavy that I know it can’t possibly all be my own sadness.

And how could it be Elias’s, when he can cross that ballroom with a smile on his face? When he can have his own face displayed across that dreadful meat market of pity, that humiliation ritual? How can he laugh through any of it, when it knocks me so sick I could throw up?

No wonder he could have knives thrown at him so easily. I’d interpreted his stillness as lack of self-preservation or self-respect, but it was just simple calculus. Physical pain, to Elias, must be infinitely inferior to the other things he’s been made to endure.

When the tears finally stop, I dab my eyes dry and look up at the mirror. My reflection shows me a clean, elegant dress, a clutch adorned with freshwater pearls, a hairpin of solid gold keeping my hair up in its simple coil. I’m not wearing much make-up, and I’m wearing no jewellery except for a single white-gold tennis bracelet—a present from my dad when I won my first tournament.

And yet I might as well be encased in gold and dripping with blood diamonds and stolen sapphires. For the first time in my life, I feel disgusted with myself, with everything I own and everything I’ve never even thought to question.

My phone lights up.

Unknown Number: I’m going to go get you a glass of water.

Struck with sudden shame, I flick open my phone and quickly—finally—save the number in my phone.

A moment later, a second text follows:

Elias: You better not be wasting any of your pretty tears on me, love.

I lock my phone and swallow hard. I’m hit with a terrible, crushing wave of want. I want to wrench open the bathroom door, find Elias, take his hand in mine, squeeze it hard, and take him away from here, from this, from everything and everyone. And at the same time, I want to press my open mouth to his, to absorb his smile and swallow his laughter, to feel his skin against mine, his heartbeat. And those two wants are so inextricably tangled that for a moment, I can do nothing except stare at my own flushed face in the mirror.

Elias. My mouth forms the shape of his name.

Ever since the Halloween party, I’ve been wondering why he’s been avoiding me. I’ve seen the Inquisitor’s posts, the photographs splattered all over social media of Elias hanging out with Dimitri and Blaise and the rest of the Brotherhood, sitting wide-eyed and grinning at exclusive clubs or rugby games, girls crowding his sides despite his hands and eyes never straying near them. His plan was working, I realised, and until I was needed for the next step, the next stage, I could remain behind the scenes.

Elias would call upon me whenever he needed me. Which is exactly what he did, in the end.

Except that this gala—this whole night—none of it is part of Elias’s game, his plans. The opposite. This gala, the photos, the slogans, the Pearsons’ expressions of tearful pride—I get it now. I should’ve realised that day in the library, the propaganda article ripped hastily out of the newspaper and crushed into his pocket.

Elias’s plan was never about climbing—it was always about escaping.

And this is what he’s escaping from.

And it doesn’t matter if it hurts, to be used by him, because I understand. If I were him, I too would hurt and use and manipulate anyone I could just to get away from this situation. I wouldn’t care what it took, or what price I had to pay.

And the worst thing about this realisation is that Elias isn’t the only one using me. I’m using him too. What I’ve asked him to do—what will happen if Birnam wakes up, if his parents demand a sacrificial lamb—none of it is going to be worth it.

If Elias goes to jail, the Pearsons will turn on him like jackals on meat.

His life will be destroyed, his future reduced to ashes.

And I’ll emerge unharmed from the wreckage.

Just like every other rich, despicable person in Elias’s life.

27

Rare Quality

Desdemona