Her reaction to that was so calm, I wondered if she might not have understood what that role required of her.
Until she said, “I will not do it.”
My brows pressed together. That was the last thing I’d expected. “No one else can do it, Kes.”
“I almost killed you, Simon, and the pain of it, the guilt, nearly drove me to madness. What if I succeed in killing Endrick? I’ll become as evil as he is now.”
“If you succeed, you will end his evil for good.”
“At what price?” Her voice rose in pitch. “It is not fair to ask such a thing of me.”
“No, it’s not. But if you refuse this, then Antora is lost!”
“I must have tried it already and failed. That’s why he took my memories, why I’m wearing this necklace. If he took a piece of my heart, then he’ll use it to make me do something he wants. Maybe he already has and I don’t even know it!”
My heart crashed against my chest. “Since leaving Woodcourt, has he given you any orders?”
Tears filled her eyes, and she shrugged, whispering, “I genuinely don’t know.” Then she sucked in a quick breath and her expression darkened. “I’ve got to leave. I will not be part of this any longer!”
Before I could reply, she was on her feet and rushing out the door. Still aching from the effects of the poison and a hard day of work, I was slower to follow. By the time I stumbled outside, she was running away.
She was easy to spot in the moonlight, and so although I was walking slower than she was, I knew exactly where she was going. She was headed toward a narrow gap inside a nearby slot.
I understood why she had chosen that path—she thought she could lose me there, but she was wrong. The slot would close up before she went much farther. There was nowhere for her to go.
I could follow her in, and I would, but she couldn’t be my prisoner any longer. The only way I’d ever get her back to Rutherhouse was if she chose to come. And as upset as she was, I had no idea if that was possible. This might be my last chance to truly reach her.
I’d hoped Simon wouldn’t see me, but he obviously had. He was still weak, and I had a good lead. If I hurried, I might escape the slot before he caught up to me.
I laughed bitterly to myself. Escape what? I’d never outrun my own mind, my fickle thoughts. I’d never outrun the memories that were seeping back into my life.
Darrow. My father.
My mother dancing with me in the gardens of Woodcourt.
No, she had been my adoptive mother, though I still had no idea who my actual mother was.
The depth of Lord Endrick’s evil—I only carried fractions of his crimes in my head now, and they horrified me. Surely he had done far worse than what little I remembered. How could I ever have knelt to such a man?
And with all of that, the question: Were any of these memories real?
A minute later, the slot that was supposed to have offered me an escape ended in straight walls with a few scattered vines crawling up the spine. I’d gone as far as I could here.
Maybe I’d gone as far as I would in every sense. That was obvious by now.
“Come back with me, Kes.” I turned with a start. I hadn’t realized Simon was already here, only steps behind me. “I meant what I said before, that we will find a way to fix everything.”
“You can’t fix me!” I lashed out. “No one can. Please just admit that.”
His eyes darted away, but slowly he nodded, conceding defeat. I wished he hadn’t, even if I had asked him to. Knowing that he believed there was a solution had given me some bit of hope. That was gone now.
A heavy silence followed. Finally, with obvious reluctance, Simon said, “There is one possibility. Tenger and Loelle want to take you to the Blue Caves.”
They had said nearly the same thing to me, but I still didn’t understand why. “That doesn’t make sense, because the Blue Caves only affect—” My breath caught as the truth flooded into me. An awful truth that made my hands tremble and put a hard lump inside my throat. With tears filling my eyes, I shook my head at Simon.
&n
bsp; “Tillie told me I wasn’t a Dallisor. Loelle said my mind wasn’t like other Antorans’.”