“I’ve been feeding you ice chips, and maids have been changing the bedsheets hourly to keep you comfortable.”
At his words, I noticed the dampness of my nightgown and sheets. My skin, too, felt sticky with sweat. I must’ve looked like hell. “How long was I out?”
“Three days.”
I groaned and sat up, rubbing my clammy face. “Shit.”
“Has this ever happened before?” He searched my face as I threw off the blankets and shivered from the cold night air.
“Of course not.” Though I tried to remain civil, the words came out sharp, and his expression hardened.
“Ansel thinks the burning did it. He said he told you not to watch.”
The burning. That’s all it was to Reid. His world hadn’t gone up in flames at that stake. He hadn’t betrayed his people. Anger rekindled in my belly. He probably didn’t even know Estelle’s name.
I headed to the washroom, refusing to meet his eyes. “I rarely do what I’m told.”
My anger burned hotter when Reid followed. “Why? Why watch when it upset you so?”
I turned the tap and watched the steaming water fill the tub. “Because we killed her. It was the least we could do to watch it happen. She deserved as much.”
“Ansel said you were crying.”
“I was.”
“It was a witch, Lou.”
“She,” I snarled, whirling on him. “She was a witch—and a person. Her name was Estelle, and we burned her.”
“Witches aren’t people,” he said impatiently. “That’s a child’s fantasy. They aren’t little fairy creatures who wear flowers and dance under the full moon, either. They’re demons. You’ve seen the infirmary. They’re malevolent. They’ll hurt you if given the chance.” He raked an agitated hand through his hair, glaring at me. “They deserve the stake.”
I clenched my hands on the tub to prevent myself from doing something I’d regret. I wanted—no, needed—to rage at him. I needed to wrap my hands around his throat and shake him—to make him see sense. I was half tempted to slit my arm open again, so he could see the blood that flowed there. The blood that was the same color as his own.
“What if I were a witch, Reid?” I asked softly. “Would the stake be what I deserve?”
I turned off the tap, and absolute silence filled the chamber. I could feel his eyes on my back . . . wary, assessing. “Yes,” he said carefully. “If you were a witch.”
The unspoken question hung in the air between us. I met his eyes over my shoulder, daring him to ask it. Praying he wouldn’t. Praying he would. Unsure of how I would answer if he did.
A long second passed as we stared at each other. Finally, when it became clear he wouldn’t ask—or perhaps couldn’t—I turned back to the water and whispered, “We both deserve the stake for what we did to her.”
He cleared his throat, obviously uncomfortable with the new direction of the conversation. “Lou—”
“Just leave me alone. I need time.”
He didn’t argue, and I didn’t watch him leave. When the door closed, I inched into the hot water. It steamed, nearly boiling, but was still a cool caress compared to the stake. I slipped beneath the surface, remembering the agony of the flames on my skin.
I’d spent years hiding from La Dame des Sorcières. My mother. I’d done terrible things to protect myself, to ensure my survival. Because above all else, that is what I did: I survived.
But at what cost?
I’d reacted instinctively with Estelle. It’d been her life or mine. The way forward had seemed clear. There had been only one choice. But . . . Estelle had been one of my own. A witch. She hadn’t wanted me dead—only to be free of the persecution plaguing our people.
Unfortunately, those two were mutually exclusive now.
I thought of her body, of the wind carrying away her ashes—and all the other ashes that had been carried away over the years.
I thought of Monsieur Bernard, rotting away on a bed upstairs—and all the others who had waited to die in torment.
Witches and people alike. One and the same. All innocent. All guilty.
All dead.
But not me.
When I was sixteen, my mother had tried to sacrifice me—her only child. Even before my conception, Morgane had seen a pattern no other Dame des Sorcières had seen before, had been willing to do what none of her predecessors had ever dreamed: kill her lineage. With my death, the king’s line also would’ve died. All his heirs, legitimate and bastard, would’ve ceased breathing with me. One life to end a hundred years’ worth of persecution. One life to end the Lyons’ reign of tyranny.