He tugs me off the bed and then gets Carver to tie us back together around the waist. I feel unsteady, and not because of the euphoria.
“Is that really necessary?” I ask, glaring at the rope.
“You make it necessary,” Beta Sinta responds.
He’s right. I’d be gone like an arrow from Artemis’s bowstring if I could get away. “Did you really think I’d hand over my loyalty just because you say you won’t randomly massacre Sintans, and your sister, the Alpha, is ‘so nice’？”
“I thought you’d see reason,” he says stiffly.
“Reason and I don’t mix.”
“I can tell,” he mutters.
My blood instantly boils. Everything about him sets me off, builds up pressure I don’t know how to deal with. With no other conceivable outlet for my visceral reaction to him, I swing at Beta Sinta, my fist connecting with his gut.
Pain explodes in a flash of blistering heat, fracturing my body into brittle shards. I crumple to the floor, my cry muffled by a clap of thunder so violent it rattles the inn. I scream. On fire. Burning up. Ripping apart. Lies are nothing compared to this. This is Olympus raining fire, scorching my skin, my eyes, my soul!
I claw at my throat and chest where the burning is excruciating. The room echoes with a long wail. It’s me. The wail is me!
Beta Sinta grabs my hands and hauls me back up. “You’re hurting yourself!”
I fight him, kicking and screaming, thrashing like the Furies. Oh Gods! The Furies!
“What in the name of Zeus is wrong with her?” Flynn demands, joining in the struggle to keep me still.
I whip my head around. My skull splinters, leaving me half-blind with pain. “Get it out! Get it out!”
“What? What, Cat?” Flynn looks as panicked as I feel.
“It’s the betrayal.” Beta Sinta’s hands are like manacles on my wrists.
“What betrayal?” Flynn asks.
“She gave me her binding word she wouldn’t punch me for a day. She broke it.”
I can’t believe I swore a false oath. I’ve never broken a vow. Only Beta Sinta could make me mad enough to forget my binding word. I had no idea what the Furies would do to me, but I never imagined this—frantic to tear myself apart, consumed by fire, screaming my head off. What about a lesser Goddess slap on the wrist? An annoyed zap from the Underworld? No one ever told me about this!
I fight like a caged beast. I could rip the fire from my flesh if Beta Sinta would just let go.
Carver grabs me around the waist and stops me from kicking his brother. “I’d hardly call that a betrayal,” he grates out, barely holding on to me.
I’m wild, frantic. Pain rages inside me. Blinding. Jagged. “Burning” doesn’t even begin to describe it. It’s unbearable.
“She’s practically made of magic!” Beta Sinta snaps. “What do you expect?”
“But she punches you all the time,” Flynn says, grunting when I elbow him in the ribs.
“And I’m supposed to let her?” Beta Sinta snarls.
“What do you expect when you keep her tied up? Tied to you?”
“I’d had enough!”
“She’s had enough!” Flynn thunders.
“Whose side are you on?” Beta Sinta thunders back.
“Fix her!” Flynn roars.
“I don’t know how!” Beta Sinta hauls me against his chest, pinning my arms down with his much heavier ones.
I go limp, in too much pain to fight anymore. I’m sobbing now. I haven’t sobbed in years. Tears stream down my face, salty and wet.
“What do I do?” His voice urgent, Beta Sinta crushes me against him. The weight of his arms makes my bones ache. “Tell me, and I will. Tell me!”
I can only guess. It’s not something anyone ever talks about. When you make a vow, you don’t break it. Period. Now I know why.
It takes all my strength to scrape two words from my throat. “Release. Vow.”
“I release you from your vow.” His breath rushes over my temple. “I release you, Cat. Be well again. Be well.”
Something inside me shifts. The vow dissolves instantly. The pain melts slowly, leaving me shaking.
Beta Sinta’s arms stay locked around me. “Cat?”
My nose is buried in his chest. I leave it there, breathing raggedly. Breathing him.
“Are you all right?” he asks.
My skin stings where I scratched it, and I must have bled, but that doesn’t matter right now. I peek at my hands, thinking they’re charred black. They’re not. They look normal except for the bloody fingernails, but they feel fried, like the rest of me.