him, ignoring his answering scowl, because someone in this world had to point out that what he had described might not be a good thing, even though he obviously felt it was, and it was down to her to do it.
“Who lives in this imposing, dreaded castle of yours?” She stifled a smile when her choice of words only caused his expression to blacken further.
“Only I live there.” His eyebrows rose slightly. “Although you could include my two servants.”
“Why only could include? A strange thing to say, Thanatos. You speak of them as if they are not real. What are their names?” She twisted to face him, walking backwards with a bounce in her step as light filled her, chasing some of the darkness away. She was enjoying this. Teasing him. It felt good. Like how she had felt long before her captivity.
“They do not have names,” he countered.
She pulled a face at him. “What kind of people don’t have names?”
She had forgotten hers, but she had known she had one, and it had turned out she did.
“They are golems.” He said that as if it would explain everything, and when she continued to look as puzzled as she felt, he waved his right hand through the air. “I made them. Fashioned them from the earth of my realm and a fragment of a fractured soul.”
“That’s… sad.” She weathered his glare, frowned at him as she thought about what he had said and could only feel sorrow for him. “You want to be alone so much that you will not even have someone alive in your castle to serve you. Do you really not trust anyone? Not even me?”
He didn’t answer that. He strode past her, his long legs carrying him swiftly away from her, and she turned and looked after him. His great black wings twitched and he rolled his shoulders, spread his wings and flapped them, and she knew that for a heartbeat he had considered taking flight.
Leaving her.
Because she wasn’t afraid to speak the truth around him and say the things he didn’t want to acknowledge? She believed it was better to know the absolute truth, whether it was about something else or about herself, than it was to bury her head in the dirt and believe in lies.
Which was why she had resolved to believe Thanatos about her family. No more swaying back and forth between what she had believed to be real and what he said was real. He was right. She knew that now.
When he didn’t slow, didn’t even look back to check on her, her mood took a dark turn. She glared at his back, the light inside her swift to give way to the encroaching darkness that whispered to her, spoke of how Thanatos wanted to leave her.
Everyone wanted to leave her.
No one wanted her.
Calindria tipped her head up, squared her shoulders and stormed after him, because there was no way in this world she was about to let him walk away from her. He had a duty to her father, and therefore a duty to her. He was getting her out of here whether he liked it or not.
The soles of her feet hurt as she marched towards him, but she refused to let it show. She kept her head held high, even when Thanatos finally glanced back at her.
“Keep moving,” he grumbled.
Something inside Calindria snapped.
“Order me again and you will not like what I do,” she growled, her hackles rising, anger surging like a hot tide through her to set her blood on fire. She curled her fingers into tight fists and clenched them, her breaths coming faster as her heart thundered, and wasn’t surprised when black brambles burst from the ground all around her.
Thanatos eyed them and then her, coming to a halt and pivoting to face her. His expression dared her to attack him again. If she did, he would deserve it this time. For the last day, all he had done was boss her around, making all the decisions for her, as if she couldn’t think for herself.
Because she was female?
Well, she might be female, but her father was Hades and her mother was Persephone, and their blood flowed in her veins. She had her father’s darkness and her mother’s ferocity, something she had witnessed in a distant memory, when someone had dared to try to hurt Calindria. Her mother had been swift to put them in their place, to reveal a darker side that few rarely