Page 24 of Lies That Bind
I swallowed hard, hating that it had come to this. Elaine was going to torture Caruso to make sure she was loyal to the empire? Then Caruso was going to question all my friends? What would they think of me?
“Fine,” I croaked.
With that, the car took off, and we were heading to a familiar spot. My father’s house. My childhood home. The emperor’s palace.
“This will be a front for Riverine. We’ll keep the lawn maintained. You and your sisters can make sparse appearances. Let people think you still live here. I’ll have you and your sisters’ rooms packed up and transferred to the new house, as well as your father’s office. I’ll do it in the dead of night so no one sees. Is there anything else you want specifically from here for the time being?”
This was all happening too fast. I just wanted everything to slow down a little so I could think. I had to be at Sky Reach by tonight to make a retaliatory attack on Luska. I’d be living and training there during the week and then flying back here on the weekends. I just wanted a break.
“No,” I said finally and sat back against the seat.
This house was never really a home to me anyway. It was my father’s, and I’d walked on eggshells here around him my entire life. It was for the best that we moved into this new place. Better to look forward instead of back.
“There’s one more stop we have to make,” Elaine told me. “Change into this while we drive there.”
She pulled a knee-length black dress from a garment bag, and my stomach sank. It was a funeral dress, and suddenly, I knew where we were going.
Chapter
Five
The car pulled up to the Riverine Imperial Fleet Cemetery just as the service began.
I counted twenty-six mounds of freshly churned earth to mark the deaths of those who fell at the attack on our training campus. I knew Nikhil was among one of them, and was reminded of his sacrifice to save Anika and all of his help in our alliance in the Wilds. I suddenly felt so selfish for not thinking of them over the last two days. Not even once.
Some empress I was.
I stepped out of the car as imperial guards shadowed behind me and I grabbed a handful of feathers from the basket at the entrance and held them in my hands. We believed that the sky and stars held the keys to our creation, and feathers from birds who lived in the sky would be our payment to the afterlife. Placing them in the graves was a sign of respect and payment to the creator to pass into eternity among the stars.
The people, amassed in the hundreds, made way for me, and I nodded to them as I passed. Half a dozen imperial soldiers flanked around me and Elaine. It was an eerie feeling to be among people and yet set apart from them. I didn’t feel different, but my status said that I was. My father relished his title asemperor; he loved seeming above everyone. I hated it, and I wondered if I would ever grow used to it.
As I reached the first grave, a grief-stricken mother was bent on her knees before it, silent tears streaming down her face. The nameMateo Bradenwas carved into the headstone. I didn’t know him. I should, but I didn’t.
She looked up at me, and when I was fully confronted with the pain in her gaze, suddenly, war made no sense. They killed us. We killed them in retaliation. Back and forth until the end of time? I shook my head to dislodge the thoughts and then kissed my two fingers, touched the feather, and dropped it into the open grave. It slowly fluttered down onto the top of the maple-stained casket, landing among the dozens of other feathers.
The mother nodded at my show of respect. “Thank you,” she whispered up at me.
I had no words for her; nothing was coming to me.Thank you for your son’s service? He died a hero? I’ll get back at Luska in his honor and kill their sons?They were empty sentiments, screaming into a void of pain and desperation.
Instead, I kneeled down and met her gaze head-on. “I’m sorry,” I said earnestly.
She nodded, letting the tears fall freely, and then I stood.
I’m sorry. It was all I could offer. Two stupid words to mark the death of a healthy young man.
I moved to the next grave and the next, kissing my fingers and sending my blessing and well-wishes to the souls who had passed on their journey to the sky. Each dead body broke something in me. As the newly appointed leader, I took each one personally. Even as I grieved my own father, I also grieved these sons and daughters, mothers and fathers. When I was met with a family member, I could only offer them two words.
I’m sorry.
I felt like an imposter. My father would have handled this so much better. He would have given some speech about how these soldiers died heroes, and we would pay back Luska in kind, but I didn’t have the strength for that. It was too sad, and I was grieving my own loss. I’d have to find it, though, because tonight, we would retaliate on Luska for what they did, and I’d need all the might I could muster then.
When I reached the final grave, I saw that it was Nikhil’s headstone. Beside it, Kohen crouched next to his fallen best friend’s grave, and my body went rigid. He peered up at me, and our gazes locked. Kohen’s eyes were red-rimmed and my heart twisted in my chest. I wanted to stay with him, to take him into my arms and tell him everything would be okay, but I couldn’t. Especially not after what he said last night.
I love you.
Saying those words had ruined everything. But I couldn’t think about any of that now.
Gasps and murmurs rang throughout the space. I spun to see what the commotion was, just in time to see Liana descend from the sky.
