Chapter 9: Trembling Hands

Thalia's POV

I didn’t even have time to scream.

Only enough breath left to wonder what I had done this time.

Pain throbbed through my back and my scalp still burned from the force of the yank. My chest rose and fell in ragged, startled gasps as I lay sprawled on the cold marble floor, the ceiling above me blurring through tears I didn’t remember letting fall.

But as I slowly looked up still dazed and still trying to steady my breath...I froze.

It wasn’t Kael.

It was Amara.

Alina’s older sister.

She stood above me like a storm in human form. Her eyes were blazing, lips curled into a sneer, and her fury was practically shaking off her in waves. Her expensive heels clicked as she stepped closer, her fingers twitching like she could barely restrain herself.

“I’ve waited so long for this,” she hissed.

My heart plummeted.

I pushed myself up weakly, but my limbs were still too unsteady. My hands slipped on the floor, useless, as she crouched beside me.

“You don’t deserve to stand,” Amara said through clenched teeth. “Not after what you did.”

“I—” My voice cracked, thin and broken.

But before I could even form the words on my lips, a sharp slap cut me off.

The sting snapped my face sideways, but I cried ever so quietly. I couldn’t. The pain wasn’t new. It was just another layer.

“You think I care what lies you’ve fed Kael?” she spat. “You murdered my sister. And you get to breathe? Walk these halls? Sleep in her fiancé’s bed like you earned it?”

I shook my head, trembling. “I didn’t kill her—”

“Liar!”

Amara’s nails dug into my arm as she pulled me up just enough to shove me back against the wall. My head knocked into the paneling and stars exploded behind my eyes. She leaned in close, her perfume cloying, sickly sweet over the scent of my fear.

“I’m not like Kael,” Amara whispered as her voice shook not with grief but with pure, venomous hatred. “I don’t need you to suffer.”

She leaned in closer, her lips brushing my ear.

“I need you dead.”

I couldn’t speak.

My lips parted, but no sound came out. Just the soft rasp of my own shattered breathing. The world around me was spinning, collapsing, and the only thing I could hear that was louder than her threats was the sound of my hope and will breaking.

Before I could brace myself, she grabbed a fistful of my hair and slammed me back down to the floor. My head struck something hard. Marble or wood, I couldn’t tell and the impact stole the light from my eyes. I didn’t pass out.

Worse, I was still awake.

Still conscious.

Still trapped in my own pain.

But I couldn’t open my eyes. I couldn’t lift my arms.

Then suddenly, I felt it her steps getting closer.

And before I even knew the reason why, I curled my arms protectively over my belly.

Was it instinct or fear? I did not know. All I know was that I need to protect myself this time.

And then it began.

The first kick hit my side, sharp and brutal as the pointed tip of her jewel-encrusted heel stabbing through my skin like broken glass.

I cried out, a strangled, voiceless wail.

The next one landed across my forearm and I felt the skin split.

Then another.

And another.

She didn’t stop.

She didn’t care.

I don’t even think she saw me as a person anymore.

I couldn’t defend myself anymore than this. I couldn’t fight back. I could only try to shield the small part of me I didn’t even understand I was protecting. My arms ached. My ribs screamed. And somewhere between the pain and the helplessness...I thought I might die.

Then...

“Miss Ruelle!”

A panicked and desperate voice called.

Nana Marie.

I heard her footsteps race toward us before she shoved Amara away from me with trembling hands. The sudden stop in pain was so jarring I thought I’d gone numb.

But Amara wasn’t finished.

She raised her hand and struck Nana Marie across the face. I heard it and I felt her fall.

The sound of the slap was cruel. But what broke me wasn’t the violence...it was what Nana did next.

Because she turned and shielded me with her body.

She wrapped herself around me like I was her own child and whispered, “No more. You’ll have to go through me first.”

“Nana…” I whimpered, barely able to move, while my eyes were still shut and my mouth tasting blood. “Please… just go…”

“No, dear,” she said in a cracked voice, her hands trembling as she tried to press my wounds. “Please… please hold on…”

She was crying.

Not because she was hurt, but because I was.

She pushed at Amara again, and again...despite her age, despite her fear.

In the middle of our desperation, out of nowhere, an unexpected voice echoed through the space.

“What is this?!”

Kael...

His voice boomed through the corridor, echoing off the marble, loud enough to make even Amara pause.

I didn’t see his expression.

But I heard the moment his breath hitch.

I felt him rush to us.

And the last thing I knew before I completely passed out... were his trembling hands gripping my shoulders carefully and turned me over.