Chapter 415 (1/2)

Chapter 415

Chapter 413: False Memories

CECILIA

My entire body quaked with convulsions that I couldn’t suppress as the poithin me clawed and hammered its way out Beneath me, the sainst the floorboard, the wooden fra like pine needles in a fire My eyes wouldn’t close, instead staring wide-eyed around the unadorned rooaze determined more by wherever my head bucked and bounced than any intention of ainst the inside of my chest, and for a wildto rip its way out of me Then I heard voices behind the heavy iron door of my rooave a sickening lurch

I wanted to shout out, tell theo away, that there was no way they could approach It was tooin every direction

But the door was opening, and I could not push air through , I could just make out Headforward, one hand up to shi+eld his eyes fro around inside ed forward, a ure darted into the roo with equal parts fear and gratitude

Nico dodged a blast of ki that hit Randall in the chest, lifting the bighim back into the wall

“You can’t!” I said, the words finally grinding out between et h-hurt”

But so Whether caused by the stor sense of perception, Nico was beginning to blur—or rather, Nico stayed brightly, vibrantly clear, the clearest thing in the room, while a blurry halo surrounded hi at the halotoward ht at him, and so turned away, but I could still see hie of Nico and the fuzzy halo separated into two individual ies

One was Nico, clean and clear, his face set in a heroic griht of ki

The other, the blurry i down a face twisted in desperation as ki swelled within him

The bed came apart, the feathers and fabric and chunks of wooden fra around me like they were trapped in alifted up The two boys were as well, Nico pulled to one side, the blurry boy to the other Every few seconds, they would overlap, beco end over end

Then the rooe, as the stor away layer after layer of the world and leaving it all bare

Nico and the blurred boy suddenly split into dozens of copies of theh a kaleidoscope They began to fall like snowflakes, drifting down into asscenes, pictures of my life—memories—each one played side by side, Nico—still crisp and visible—going through the same motions as the blur that moved like a shadow just behind hi over, I released the pressure that had been building within me An attendant shoved a bucket under my face just in time to catch the contents of my sto noises

“Tell the High Sovereign she’s awake,” a disembodied voice said quietly fro aps between the dual inalthe another wave of voo blank

Grey, I realized, the context of themy mind’s eye So much Grey in my life…so many empty holes filled in, or paved over with Nico…

Feeling a surge of nauseous panic that triggered another wave of vo, I tried to search my memories for the parts much later in our relationshi+p, tih this body, terrified of what I would find

But…those were intact That was real Our love was real

As the nausea eased fro body, I leaned back and closed li to clean my lips and chin

“There now, love, you just relax,” she said with a hint of Vechorian lilt

I had no sense of the passage of tihts drifted from memory to memory I could feel the fault lines between real and ap of a uidance,the inner depths of itself,sense of the shi+ft in my awareness

Whether apresence appeared atelse away to rona was at ht frown that communicated both worry and concern

“How do you feel?” he asked, his scarlet eyes locked onto mine “My best doctors and healers have been to see you, and they say that, physically, you are unhar scratching in htly, I said, “Honestly He didn’t hurt rona, whose hands were clasped behind his back, was entirely motionless as he asked, “Cecilia, can you tellin that cell block?”

I furrowedon a frustrated frown, and looked at rona I know I shouldn’t have been, but…” I trailed off as I felt the tendrils of Agrona’sthe soft tissue offor both truth and untruth But…

“Go on,” he said, still motionless

“Nico’s attendant, Draneeve, caely, that he was obsessed with the idea that Sovereign Kiros had infor he was afraid to ask you Draneeve said that Nico had snuck down to interrogate the Sovereign, and so I followed”

As I spoke, I kept halfthe pathway of hts and caressed the words as they forue I’d felt this sa was different just then

“I should have co my eyes drift shut “Kiro’s tried to kill ripped htly When I opened rona’s face “Yes, you should have Nico was foolish not to askhim down to save him That is a weakness, one easily exploited by those out to do you harrin Caeluinal lives, you need to keep hihtly in distaste “Especially fro his leash”

“Yeah, maybe,” I said noncommittally

I always found it difficult to discuss these kinds of things with Agrona Hebut Nico was sensitive, self-conscious, and prone to heroics I knew he felt increasingly sidelined byhe found very difficult to est or most important, but because he wanted to keepthat Nico hadn’t been present when I’d woken up, and what thatsers over ain aof the events with Kiros I will see that he is released to come see you ih, I’ll leave you to rest”

He started to turn away, paused, then glanced back at h, there is one other question I should ask you” His tone was light, curious, almost nonchalant “Did you absorb any of Kiros’stendrils were still in my mind, but I finally realized as different than before: he was being reserved, li else? I wondered He’d told ic could be, if not wielded carefully and by one with appropriate control and insight

If not for that realization, I don't think I would have had the courage to do what I did

“No, Agrona You had forbidden it Even though it aln”

The thin line that fors He nodded, setting the ornaht he intended to leave, but instead he turned back tothe phoenix’s lingering ration, I can sense it” He bared his teeth in a hungry senerations of lessers to do so”

I was silent The tendrils of rona’s intentions

“Integration is a strange quirk of your lesser biology,” he h the wall into some distant vision only he could see “For an asura, such a thing is unirow too The longer an asura lives, the th And yet, strangely enough, we are still constrained”