I cry out, clutching my son to my chest as I fold in on myself, turning my back to Peter, but I am too late. He wrenches my child from my arms.
My boy wails at the separation, and I lunge for him, but Peter’s agility outmatches mine tenfold.
“Give him back!” I scream, like a child might a toy being held over their head.
But Peter only looks down at me, annoyed. “You should have listened.”
“Don’t worry, Peter,” says the Sister. “You can still have her. Do whatever you wish with the girl. Just drop the child off with Malia on your way out. You remember where the guest room is, I’m certain.”
“I will make these years miserable for you,” hisses my husband as she drags him toward the door to her bedroom.
The Sister halts in place. “Actually,” she says. “I’ve changed my mind.”
Just then, she whirls around. Shadows eject from her fingers, wrapping around my throat.
Vaguely in the distance, I hear Nolan cry out my name. As my vision blurs, I watch him struggle against his restraints, but to no avail. Peter’s shadow self wails in a possessive fury.
“She’s mine,” he screams, but the Sister silences him with a word, Peter unable to fight her compulsion thanks to the bargain he made.
“You can’t hurt her,” gasps Nolan, struggling with the Sister’s shadows that are wrapped around his neck. “The curse?—”
“Yes, about that curse,” says the Sister as I flail, her shadows constricting tighter around my throat. “I’ve been developing a theory about that. You see, my curse states that I cannot harm the Mate of a descendent. But recently, I’ve been considering—what if that Mate severed the Mating Mark? What if she destroyed the bond?”
“My Mark is healed,” says Nolan.
“Your Mark, yes. The bond between you? Well,” says the Sister. “We’ll just see about that.
“You should have cooperated,” she says to me, stalking closer. “But you’ve never been one to cooperate. Never been one to listen, have you? Oh, so spoiled. So used to all of yourdecisions being applauded. The one who could never do wrong. Everyone’s favorite.”
The words are a puzzle piece, fallen under the table, finally found, ready to be snapped into place.
“What did you say?” I croak, though the shadows are strangling me.
The Sister’s shadows relax on my throat for just a moment as she cocks her head to the side. Then, as if remembering that she is the one with the power, she closes the binding around my throat again, cutting off my air.
I writhe, clinging to the shadows. I can’t be strangled in the same room as my son, not while my son is watching. Regardless of whether he’ll remember this or not, I can’t let him watch his mother die.
Everyone’s favorite, the Sister had said.
But she hadn’t been speaking about Nolan.
That is my last thought before I succumb to the darkness.
CHAPTER 59
Iam not at all pleased with the tapestry I am weaving. Though, it’s more complicated than that. I suppose if I were weaving it from scratch, I would be more inclined to be pleased. But as it is, my Eldest Sister started it, and ever since I stole it from her lair, I have found finishing it an arduous task. The path my Sister has set this poor woman upon is a treacherous one indeed, full of much pain and strife and, worst of all, little growth to make it worthwhile. Now that the girl has lived out a good portion of her life, even if I attempt to unravel what will happen in her future, what has already been woven causes difficulties in me altering the rest of the tapestry.
If I were creating this from scratch, it would be much simpler. But as it is, I have to work with what I’ve got, and my Sister has made sure that is not much.
This tapestry belongs to yet another poor soul that my Eldest Sister has chosen as a Mate for one of the Descendants of my Middle Sister’s late lover. This has been going on for centuries now—their enmity. My Eldest Sister is so heartbroken over the loss of her lover at my Middle Sister’s lover’s hands, she allows her hatred to seep through her. The end result is thatshe’s made a game not only out of my Middle Sister’s misery, but out of the misery of these poor mortals.
This particular woman’s name is Ebonette. She is fortunate enough to be Marked directly over her heart—easy enough to hide—usually meaning she will have no difficulty in securing a husband. Typically, that would be a benefit.
Not in Ebonette’s case.
I acquired the tapestry too late. She was already wed, not to her Mate, a Descendant, but to the man she’d loved since childhood.
Her Mate had already found her by the time I secured it. Now, there is little I can do other than kill him to keep their futures from unraveling. And I wasn’t able to secure his tapestry.
