The Essence (36 page)

Something twisted in Brook’s gut.
I’m not hurt,
she tried to convince herself, but she couldn’t say the words aloud. She couldn’t say anything at all to Charlie.

A long silence filled the space between them, and she wondered how long Charlie would stand there pretending that everything was okay between them. That killing her father was acceptable . . . justified or not.

She wondered too, when Charlie had become a killer. Or if it was even Charlie she stood beside now.

The idea that Sabara was in there—inside the body of her friend—made her skin itch.

Sabara who should have died months ago.

From the corner of her eye, Brooklynn saw Charlie move, her hand closing the gap between them, and she withdrew before the queen could touch her. “Brook . . .” Charlie’s voice came out as a plea.

“Don’t,” Brook answered. “Just . . . don’t.”

There was a pause. “I’m so,
so
sorry,” Charlie said at last.

Brook stayed where she was, forcing her gaze to remain fastened on the water long after the soft, swishing sound of fabric told her that Charlie had left her alone. Long after the sun had risen from its hiding place at the horizon and was climbing the clear blue sky. And long after her tears had dried and her sobs had subsided.

xx

I stripped out of the nightgown I’d been wearing, thinking I should have it burned. I’d had to pass the carnage in the estate hallways on the way back to my room, and it had reminded me, again and again, of why I’d had to do what I’d done . . . to Jacob Maier and to his men.

To Brooklynn.

It didn’t matter, though; I couldn’t worry that I’d made a mistake, or that I’d misused the power Sabara had afforded me. This wasn’t the time for regrets of that sort. They would have killed Angelina.

Still, I couldn’t help but wonder just how much of myself had been sacrificed when I’d allowed myself to succumb to Sabara’s baser drives. Had I become a little more like her because of what I was capable of?

Or had Sabara simply revealed the darker side of my true nature?

I was no longer certain where Sabara ended and I began.

And then there was the other question, the one that challenged everything I believed in: Had Sabara been right all along? Could peace in Ludania only be maintained through violence? Through imposed will?

Had the class system kept people in check?

It couldn’t be true,
I insisted silently as I pulled a simple embroidered top over my head.
The New Equality will work; it just needs time.

I looked up when I heard the door open, and my heart skipped.

“Max?” I breathed, grateful to see him. Grateful that he, at least, hadn’t turned his back on me entirely, the way Brooklynn had seemed to.

“May I come in?”

“Of course. I have so much to tell you, so much I need to explain.” My words rushed out as I struggled with where to start. I prayed I could do this. “That thing . . . last night in the hallway with Niko . . . That wasn’t me in control. I swear it.”

He shook his head, and I wasn’t sure if he was telling me that he didn’t believe me, or that he didn’t want to hear it, but his face crumpled, making him look wounded. I took a breath. “I should have told you,” I uttered. “I wanted to tell you, but I didn’t know how. I was so . . . so afraid. At first, I thought I could handle it. I thought Angelina could help me get rid of her. And then, after time passed, and I realized she wasn’t leaving—that I was stuck with her—I didn’t know how to explain it—how to explain her. Not without sounding”—my chin inched up a notch as I took a steadying breath—“
insane.
But you have to believe me, Max; I didn’t mean to hurt you. I would never hurt you.”

“And what about that other thing . . . that you did to the men who were holding Angelina hostage?” His eyes held mine as he asked me about their murder. “Was that Sabara too?”

I knew what he wanted to hear. He wanted me to tell him that I wasn’t responsible then, either, but I couldn’t.

I shook my head, trying to feel ashamed for what I’d done. But I wasn’t sorry, not for that. “No. That was just me. That was me saving my sister.”

Max’s gaze drifted over me, and I tried to imagine what it was he was searching for. “I suppose I have to accept that. I even understand it, sort of. The rest of it, I don’t know yet. I haven’t figured out how I feel. It’s strange, the idea of Sabara living inside of you. . . . She was my
grandmother
.”

“But that’s just it—she wasn’t.” My words tumbled over one another. I had to make him understand this much, at least. “That woman—the body that was your grandmother—is dead. The woman inside of me, the Essence I carry, is ancient, going back further than either of us can imagine.” I pictured the little girl standing ankle-deep in the river’s current. I could see the terror in her sister’s eyes as the girl was dragged beneath the water’s surface, savaged by a creature neither of them could see. “It’s not Sabara, not really. I don’t even know her true name. . . . Her
original
name.”

His brow crumpled as he started to take a step toward me, but he stopped himself. “Why Niko, Charlie? Why him?”

My eyes burned and my throat ached. I wasn’t sure Niko’s secrets were mine to tell, but I didn’t have a choice any more. Sabara had backed me into a corner.

“Niko is ancient too,” I admitted. “Sabara has memories of him that go back as far as I can see. He loves her, the Essence I carry. But it’s not me he loves, it’s her.”

He glanced out the window then, his eyes growing distant. I waited for him to say something more, but he was silent, his shoulders stiff and his hands clasped behind his back. He looked stiff and resolute, and faraway.

He didn’t ask any more questions about Niko or Sabara, and he didn’t push me for details, the way I’d imagined he would.

He also didn’t say what I’d hoped to hear: that he could forgive me. But he was still there, still with me all the same.

For now, that had to be enough.

I stayed where I was, watching him. I could be patient. I could wait until he was ready to talk again.

And then I heard her. . . . Sabara. She’d been silent throughout the night and long into the morning as I’d struggled with what I’d done. But she’d been there. I’d felt her. And now her voice was small but clear.
Layla,
she said.
My name was Layla
.

epilogue

I sat in the gardens, letting the night wrap around me like a shawl, even as I drew my arms around myself to ward away the chill. The first snow had fallen on the palace, leaving a thin layer of crystalline flakes that coated everything. It reminded me of Vannova. Of the days when I still had friends and people who loved me.

Sebastian had been long gone by the time we’d returned to the palace, along with any clues linking him to Queen Elena or Astonia. But that didn’t mean he didn’t leave evidence of his duplicity behind.

Before he’d vanished, he’d killed one of the stable boys, and the only explanation anyone could come up with was that somehow the boy had learned what Sebastian was up to, or discovered his true identity. The boy had just turned twelve.

Niko and Xander had set out after Sebastian, hoping to catch up with him before he’d gotten too far. They’d wanted answers. We all did. Declaring war was tricky business, and none of us wanted to act too rashly.

As it turned out, we didn’t need Sebastian’s confirmation that Queen Elena was involved in the conspiracy. Brook had found enough evidence when she’d gone to tend to her father’s business. He’d been using his butcher shop as a means to communicate—sending messages hidden inside the meat parcels. Brook had discovered plenty of damning information when she’d torn his place apart.

His extremism had made him careless.

But none of that changed the fact that Brook was still barely talking to me.

I didn’t push her, though. Maybe she’d never get over what I’d done. Maybe no one would.

Angelina hadn’t.

Max either.

He pretended to. He tried to. But things weren’t the same between him and me. Neither of us said as much, but I could feel the difference—in his words, his actions, his touch.

When he was ready, I’d explained as much as I could to him. I told him about Niko, and the connection he and Sabara—who had once been a little girl named Layla—shared. I held nothing back, and maybe that was the problem. It was all too much. It was all too strange.

Could I blame him for pulling away from me, when I wanted to pull away from myself?

Sabara was the only constant in my life. She was the only one who hadn’t changed after everything that had happened.

She was still here, inside of me. And still promising to help me.

I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. . . . Now more than ever.

She’d let me save my sister; how could I ever repay that?

By letting Niko stay,
she’d repeated time and time again. And I hadn’t answered her, one way or the other, which was an answer in itself, I supposed.

“Mind if I join you?” It was Avonlea, her thick coat buttoned up to her chin.

I smiled as I scooted over, despite the fact that there was plenty of room on the bench beside me.

She sat, and we were quiet for a long while. Avonlea, like Sabara, had become permanent. She’d taken a liking to my father—or rather he to her—and he’d started mentoring her in the kitchens. I doubted she needed the tutelage, especially since I’d tasted her cooking, but she seemed to enjoy his company. I think, in a peculiar way, a part of her missed Floss. He had been the father she’d never had.

“Everyone’ll get over it, you know? Even Angelina,” she said at last.

I just shrugged, unconvinced. I’d thought that once too, especially about my sister. I thought, once the dust had settled and we’d found Eden injured but alive, that Angelina would forgive me. Or at least stop looking at me like I was some sort of monster.

But she hadn’t.

Yet I didn’t fault her, not really. Because I realized, it wasn’t
me
she hated. It was that she no longer knew me, that she could no longer trust whether it was even
me
she was looking at. “I don’t know. Maybe they shouldn’t. You weren’t there, Avonlea. Maybe I’m too dangerous to be around.”

She snorted and shoved me with her shoulder. “You’re crazy.” And I knew that she, at least, didn’t mean it in the literal sense. “You,” she said, more seriously now, “are the kindest person I’ve ever known.” I glanced up at her, afraid to trust the sincerity in her voice. “You saved me.”

“Charlie, wait.” Max’s voice stopped me just before I slipped inside my bedroom. Zafir wasn’t with me tonight as he and Claude met with Brooklynn to coordinate mounting our defenses at home.

My new guard turned away when Max reached me.

“Xander and Niko are back.” And before I could ask, he shook his head, reading my thoughts. “No word on Sebastian. They lost his trail near Astonia’s border.”

“Dammit.” I exhaled. “So what now?”

“Xander’s leaving in the morning to Astonia. He and Elena were friends once, or at least he thought they were. He wants to ask what her intentions are. He wants to hear it from her directly.”

“Why would she tell him the truth?” I asked.

Max shrugged. “She might not. But then again, she doesn’t have any reason to lie. If she wants you dead, she might as well just admit as much. We’ve already discovered the messages, presumably in her hand, to Brooklynn’s father. Denying it just makes her a liar.”

“And if she doesn’t deny it? If she admits she was behind the plot to have me killed?”

Max came closer to me then, and his nearness made my heart lurch. His hand moved up and down my shoulder, almost absently. “Then we have no choice. We have to protect you.”

I closed my eyes, not wanting it to be a duty—his allegiance. Wanting it to stem from desire.

“It’ll be okay,” he said, misreading my hesitation.

I looked at him again. “I know.”

I turned, then, to go into my room, needing to be alone so I could sort through my tangled emotions.

“Charlie?” he said, pulling me back to face him. “I do love you.” My breath caught on his words . . . words I’d waited so long to hear. His fingertips found mine, just barely. “I just need time. Not much, just enough to get used to . . .” He grinned as he watched the skin beneath his touch ignite. And then he was reaching for me, and his lips were on mine, and we were kissing desperately, and the world faded away around us.

When I finally drew away, just enough so I could breathe again, I glanced up at him, my gaze sheepish. “I thought you needed time,” I teased.

Max’s grip, when he reached for me the second time, was confident. And final. “I lied.”

kimberly derting
is the author of
The Essence
, the sequel to
The Pledge
. She has also written several other teen novels, including
The Body Finder
,
Desires of the Dead
, and
The Last Echo
. She lives in Western Washington with her husband and three children. Visit her online at
kimberlyderting.com
.