Chosen - Kiersten White Page 0,90
closed. I’ve got her on a fluid IV, and we’re monitoring her vitals. Her pulse is weak but steady. She hasn’t woken up, though.
I’m sitting in the hall outside the medical center. Having Ruth on a cot inside with Rhys sitting next to her takes up nearly all the space, but I don’t want to be far in case she wakes up.
Imogen seems surprised to see me there. She must be here to check on Ruth. She peers inside and sees Rhys there. “You two should go rest. I’ll watch her.”
“No,” Rhys says. His voice is raw but determined.
She hesitates, then joins me on the floor. “How are you?”
“I can’t figure it out. Why would Artemis try to kill Ruth? Can you tell me exactly how it happened?”
Imogen sighs. “Artemis came into the castle through the library window. Ruth tried to stop her. I was behind the false shelves in the secret room guarding the passage. By the time I got out, it was too late.”
“Almost too late,” I correct. I need that “almost” more than I’ve ever needed anything. “She’s too old. I should never have kept her here. Or the Littles. I put everyone at risk.” I hang my head and put my hands over my eyes. “You were all at risk this whole time just by being around me. I threatened Tsip, and I meant it. And I almost—I could have—Imogen, I could have killed someone today. A person, not a vampire.”
Imogen reaches out and takes my hand, squeezing it. “But you didn’t. Your sister did, though. Or at least tried to. She cut Ruth’s throat, Nina, and she left you for dead too.”
“When are we going after her?” Rhys asks. He’s standing in the doorway. His face is grim and cold, the bandage on his arm evidence of what he was willing to sacrifice to keep his grandma alive.
“I don’t know.”
“Not good enough,” he snaps. “You knew, didn’t you? You knew she was working with these maniacs. And you didn’t tell us.”
“I knew,” I whisper.
“And now my grandma is—” He chokes on the words. When he can speak again, his voice is cold. “You protected Artemis, and we all paid the price. No more. We need a plan.”
Imogen laces her fingers through mine. “We’re going to get Leo back, which means we’re going to face her again. And we need to know that you understand.”
“Understand what?” I don’t understand anything.
“She chose a side, and it wasn’t ours. She’s our enemy. We can’t afford to think of her as anything else now. I’m worried—hell, I’m terrified—that next time you go against her, she won’t be satisfied with burying you under a tower wall. We almost lost Ruth. We still might. We can’t afford to lose you.”
I want to cover my face again, hide from this, but Imogen has my hand. “She’s my sister.”
Rhys snorts an ugly sound. “Didn’t stop her from leaving you buried under half the castle. She doesn’t care about you. She doesn’t care about any of us.”
Imogen’s voice is softer. “I know she’s your sister. Which is why it has to be you who stops her. Promise me that if it comes down to you and Artemis, you’ll make the right choice.”
“We owe it to my grandma,” Rhys says. “You know she would have died to protect any of us. Even to protect Artemis.” He spits her name.
“Promise you’ll make the right choice,” Imogen repeats.
Artemis once made me promise the same thing. That I’d choose myself over her. I didn’t, and we nearly got a new hellmouth. I thought we’d averted the end of the world, but it feels like it quietly ended in the last few days and I didn’t notice until it was too late.
Artemis chose Honora and Sean over us. Artemis tried to kill Ruth. Artemis could have killed me. And Artemis took Leo. I can’t meet the pain and fury in Rhys’s eyes, or the weight in Imogen’s.
“I promise,” I whisper to the floor.
ARTEMIS
THEY HAD A CAGE ALL ready to go for him, but Leo is in no shape to run or fight. He can barely even stand. It hurts Artemis to look at him slumped in there. She always liked him. Admired him. Envied him, even.
But he should never have passed his Watcher test. He proved he would choose his mother over the world, or at least over the Watchers. He knew what she was and he let her continue. Did he know what he was, even back in