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Lark
“The night is cold,and my heart is heavy with sorrow, but I know that someday we’ll be together, and I’ll wait for that tomorrow.”
I stood at my old chamber window but imagined I stood on a cliff with the broken fragments of my violin in the dirt, all around me. I couldn’t play. All I had left was my voice. And so I sang.
I hadn’t been cuffed, not this time. I’d laughed and kissed Razak and come in his hand, let him spill down my throat.It had been so much easier to fuck him before I knew what freedom tasted like…I’d surrendered pieces of my soul to cement the lie, but now, as I stood at the window of my old chamber, peering through bars that forever followed me, the bruises burned and my skin crawled, and inside my head the screams never ended.
I had so little of my soul left to give.
My hands shook, fingers trembling. I took a drag on the pipe and let the pennywort lead me away to that distant meadow, where the sun forever shone, the ocean thundered, and Arin stood on the beach, juggling pebbles—or trying to.
Fuck. I was too deep into the dance to trip now.
Something Razak had said during the meeting on the bridge, about the crowns… about Dallin. Sonya had told me Dallin himself may have once lived in that ancient castle, and Razak had implied Justice had buried him there. The clues had been in those wall paintings. The crowns, the kneeling, hollow-eyed people. It all came down to the crowns. Crowns that had always been kept apart, and when brought together, they’d unleashed Razak’s chaotic power to sap a man of his will to live. The crowns were the key. I had to get them together again, all of them,closetogether—like I’d seen in the wall art.“And I'll wait for that tomorrow,”I whispered, needing to hear the words, using them to ground me.
The door opened behind me.
“Zayan, my dearest…”
Ice touched my spine and my stomach flipped, trying to eject itself. I hadn’t eaten since arriving, couldn’t…
I forced a smile onto my lips, pushed away the wretched burn of Razak’s touch, and made sure my eyes gave nothing of my turmoil away. “Is it done?”
“The warlord’s boy is secure. Such a fighter, that one. He tried to bite me. Can you imagine it? Such a shame he’ll likely have to die.”
Draven’s son wasn’t dead, not yet, and that was all I needed to know. I’d save him. If I could save only one soul, let it be his.
Razak swooped in and nuzzled my neck. “You smell like sex. And pennywort.”
I’ll wait for that tomorrow…
Tomorrow was a lifetime away. As distant as the horizon.
I handed over the pennywort pipe to Razak. He took a long drag, filling his lungs, and blew smoke toward the ceiling.
“Kidnap Arin,” I said, when his eyes turned glassy. “He is the King of Hearts. He’s their strength. Kidnap him and it will all fall apart.” It was a logical step, to extricate Arin. And the idea would cement any notion that I didn’t care for him.
Razak eyed me with curious glee. He chuckled and sauntered to the bed, where the sheets lay tousled and reeked of sweat. “Tell me how.”
“Draven leans on Arin, his every word; he loves him. Ogden is a fool. Take Arin, and Draven will lash out. He’s strong but will rush in without preparation. Noemi wants to be seen as the one to balance them out, to bring order to chaos. But she doubts herself. She was not born a noble, she has no right to wear a crown, and she needs the support of others, like Arin, to step up. Ogden’s only here because of Arin’s insistence and because he cannot be seen to back down when, in his mind, the weakest of the courts, the Court of Love, steps up. Remove Arin and the dominoes fall.”
“Hm,” Razak folded his legs and bounced his foot, still smoking his pipe. “And what shall I do with Arin, once we have him? Do you have a plan for that too?”
My Prince of Flowers… My true love. The reason my heart beat. The sunshine to my storm. “Kill him, of course.”
“Of course.” Razak leaned back and braced his arms on the bed. “Your mind is a razor’s edge. We should hurt him first, no? Do to him what we did to that flaccid aide from Justice?”
“String him up like you did Theo? Yes.” My heart thudded so loud it drowned out my voice. Someone else said these terrible things because it couldn’t be me. “Cut him, fuck him, make him writhe in blood and choke on cum.”
Razak’s smile grew. “You are a true Prince of Pain.”
I was more worthy of that crown on his head than he was, more Pain’s son than him, more my father’s rightful heir. My heart pounded, trying to break out of its cage. I turned away and fought to level my breathing. If he heard me struggling, saw me falling, he’d know my lies.Someone help me… Arin, help me… I’ll wait for that tomorrow… Help me do what needs to be done… A beautiful lie… I am all things, and none. A boy who sings for coin. A lark on the wind…
“It is a good thought, a solid idea. Remarkable really, how alike we are sometimes,” Razak said. “Arin is truly the crutch they all lean on. But last night, while you slept, I secured our victory.”
“Oh?” I asked, swallowing my thudding heart. What had he done? When I turned, all was well on my face while pieces of my heart and soul shattered and rained around me.
“Come, my beloved.” He stood and presented his hand. “Allow me to introduce to you our victory.”
