stupid. At this moment, I’d say both. Either way, I’m suffering the consequences.”
Once again, he didn’t deny my accusation. Instead, his face twisted into a grimace, and he clutched his ribs, as though he were in pain.
My eyes narrowed. “What happened to you?”
“Nothing,” Leonidas muttered, dropping his head and turning away from me.
But it was most definitely something, so I rounded the table and planted myself in front of him. The prince sighed, but he lifted his head and stepped forward, so that he was finally standing in the light.
Leonidas had been tortured—again.
He had two black eyes, plus a broken nose. I hadn’t noticed his injuries before, due to my own anger and the shadows cloaking the workshop. He kept clutching his ribs, as though it hurt to simply breathe, and he only wore a thin tunic, instead of the formal jacket he’d sported at the ball.
I eased to the side. His black tunic hung in tatters on his back, and long, thin, angry red marks crisscrossed his skin—the same marks I had seen on my own back when Delmira had healed me. I lifted a hand to my mouth, trying not to be sick.
A humorless smile split Leonidas’s battered face. “Mother had me . . . restrained when I objected to you being brought to Milo’s workshop. Wexel decided to teach me a lesson for disobeying my queen. So did Milo.”
So Maeven had had him imprisoned, Wexel had beaten him, and Milo had whipped him, just like Maximus used to. Once again, my treacherous heart softened, but I shoved the feeling aside. Leonidas Morricone had done nothing but use and betray me, and I would not be fooled by him again.
I started to step away, but he reached out and touched my arm. It was the softest, lightest, gentlest touch imaginable, no more than a brush of his fingers against the sleeve of my ruined gown, but somehow, it hurt worse than all of Milo’s torture.
“Don’t you dare touch me,” I snarled, jerking away. “Not even here, in my dream.”
“Our dream,” he insisted. “Our world. Don’t you remember how we used to talk to each other as children?”
I didn’t respond. That had come later, after our first encounter in the woods. When he had been back in Morta and I had been home in Andvari. More painful memories I didn’t want to dwell on.
“We used to talk all the time. At least until you put that damn necklace on.” Leonidas stabbed his finger at the gargoyle pendant still dangling from the chain around my neck. “You bottled up your power for the last sixteen years. Why? Why would you ever do that?”
“You know why,” I muttered. “You saw what I did to those turncoat guards in the woods all those years ago. How I killed them with a wave of my hand. With a bloody thought.”
“Ah, so you were afraid of your power. All this time, I thought you just didn’t want to speak to me anymore.” He frowned. “But why would you ever be afraid of your own power?”
Anger and frustration surged through me. He didn’t understand. He would never understand. We might both be mind magiers, but Leonidas Morricone could turn himself to pure ice, when need be, and nothing seemed to scratch the surface of his cold, cold heart.
Me? I could lie, and fight, and kill, but I still always felt too much, whether it was my own fear of being paralyzed—or the twisted joy I took in inspiring that same paralyzing fear in others. There was no balance, no silence, no fucking calm in my stormy mind and heart.
“Gemma?” Leonidas asked again. “Why are you afraid of your own power?”
“Because I can’t control it,” I snapped. “I can’t control my magic any more than I can control how I bloody feel about you.”
My confession boomed out as loud as a thunderclap. As soon as the words flew off my tongue, I wished that I could take them back, and I once again cursed my own foolishness, my own weakness. Even now, after everything that had happened, I still couldn’t hate Leonidas.
I just . . . couldn’t.
Perhaps that made me even more naïve and stupid than he had been.
Leonidas eased toward me. He didn’t touch me again, didn’t even try to, but he stood as close to me as possible. My hands balled into fists, but I lifted my chin and glared at him. I would not back down, and I would not run away. Not