His mouth curved into a smile so small Scarlett doubted he was even aware of it. He really had admired her mother.

“Paradise didn’t trust my church not to betray her. So, she only brought them one card—the card that happened to imprison me. She said the rest of the deck was hidden somewhere safe and that she’d share its location after her payment was delivered. She’d planned on fleeing the city. But things didn’t go as she planned.

“The Church of the Fallen Star first formed in order to track down this Deck of Destiny and set me and the other Fates free. Before paying Paradise, they had to make sure the cards were authentic, so a member of their congregation sacrificed himself to release me.”

Just the word sacrifice made Scarlett want to cringe, but the Fallen Star’s smile twitched wider, the way someone else might at a fond memory. If he was actually trying not to frighten her with this story, he was doing a wretched job.

“As soon as I was released, I went after Paradise to find the Deck of Destiny and free all of my Fates. But she no longer had the deck. While my church had been releasing me, Paradise and her lover had used the deck to read their futures, and they’d seen the magic in the cards. Paradise still didn’t know exactly what the cards were, but she was clever enough to recognize that they were worth far more than my church was offering. She had planned to ask for a larger sum. Only when she woke the next morning, her lover had taken the cards and vanished. I found her tied to a bed. She had no idea who or what I was when I arrived. She threatened to kill me if I didn’t untie her, and I was instantly intrigued.”

His voice turned wistful as if he were reaching the romantic part of the story, and yet the fiery colors around him where growing rabid, licking at the steps, clawing at his cape, and making Scarlett nervous that her plan was not going to work the way she wanted.

“We started as reluctant allies. The world had changed so much since I’d been trapped that I was in need of help to locate the Deck of Destiny, and she needed someone to protect her from my church. Neither of us wanted the other to know how intrigued we were with each other. I didn’t admit to myself what I truly felt for her until the day she told me she was pregnant with you.”

This was the part where Scarlett would have expected him to look her way. And he did. But it would have been better if he had not. There was something almost savage in his golden eyes—they held all the violence of hate mixed with the passion of love, as if all of this had happened yesterday rather than eighteen years ago.

“I was going to make Paradise an immortal after she gave birth. But before I could tell her who I was, she found out on her own and chose to turn on me. She had located the complete Deck of Destiny and instead of sharing it with me, she put me back inside one of the cards. I wanted to spend eternity with her, and she betrayed me.”

The Fallen Star stopped abruptly, pausing on a landing that overlooked a glistening white canyon. He’d never taken Scarlett here before, but she recognized the cracked wheels of death scattered around the edge, and the river of red cutting through it. This was the place Tella had described when she’d told Scarlett how he’d murdered their mother.

Scarlett took a step back.

He immediately grabbed her arm. “I’m not going to harm you—I need you, and this is why.” He squeezed until it hurt. “Paradise took the strongest feelings I’d ever had and used them against me. If I’d loved her she could have killed me. Love is the one weakness I’ve never been able to defeat. Humans try to make it sound as if it’s a gift. But once they find love, it never lasts, it only destroys, and for us it brings eternal death. But I believe that once you conquer your powers, you can permanently take away this fault that would allow me to return human love.”

49

Donatella

“Next time I see my brother I’m going to put him on a leash.” Legend’s voice was low, but Tella swore it rattled the artwork that lined the hall.

After finding Julian’s note, Tella had gone to wake Legend. It appeared he hadn’t slept much after she’d left him the night before. He stood in his open doorway in a wrinkled black shirt he must have just thrown on. His dark hair was in tangles, crescent shadows lived beneath his eyes, and his movements weren’t quite so precise as usual.

“I knew that girl would get him killed,” Legend muttered.

“She’s not just some girl! She’s my sister, and she’s been risking her life to fix the mistake that we both made.”

Legend scrubbed a hand over his face. “I’m sorry, Tella.” He looked at her again, and the shadows beneath his eyes disappeared. But Tella knew that they were still there, hidden under one of his illusions. He cared about his brother. Julian might not have felt it, but Tella had seen it, and she could hear it in his voice when Legend said, “I’m going to go find them.”

“We’re going to find them,” Tella corrected. This was her sister. She’d let Scarlett go back to the Fallen Star, and she’d asked her to steal the blood for the Ruscica—which had clearly been a fool’s errand. “Before you tell me it’s too dangerous, just know that I’ll be going after my sister and Julian no matter what you say. If you don’t want to bring me with you, I know someone who will.” She held out the luckless coins she’d found upon waking up.

Legend glared at the discs and they vanished.

“Bring them back!” Tella said. “I know they’re still there, even though I can’t feel them.”

“What are you going to do with those things?” Legend grunted.

“I’ll contact the Assassin and ask him to help me rescue my sister. He could take her in and out of those ruins in a blink.”

“You’re the one who said the Assassin is mad.”

“The Fallen Star is far worse, and I’m not going to stay here while my sister’s in trouble. I don’t love this idea, but I think the Maiden Death and the Assassin might be our best option to get your brother and my sister away from the Fallen Star.”

Legend worked his jaw, and Tella braced herself for another argument.

“If we do this, you go in with the Assassin, find your sister, and get out of there right away.”

“Are you actually agreeing with me?”

The coins reappeared in her hand, but Legend looked as if he already regretted his decision. The muscles in his neck were taut. “I still don’t like any of this. But Aiko and Nigel haven’t seen either the Maiden Death or the Assassin in the palace, Jovan hasn’t seen them in the ruins, and Caspar hasn’t heard any chatter about them working for the Fallen Star. I don’t want to trust them. But while I can get us into the ruins where your sister is being kept with glamour and illusion, if Julian and Scarlett are both there, it will be a challenge to get all four of us out undetected. Just promise me, Tella, if we do this, you won’t take any unnecessary risks.”

Legend met her gaze, the dark crescents beneath his eyes back. It only lasted for a second, but for that moment, he looked more human.

50

Scarlett

Upon reaching the door that led back to her room, the Fallen Star gave Scarlett a luminous smile, as if they’d just had their first father and daughter heart-to-heart. She must have been a better actress than she’d thought. If he’d known that Scarlett would never become the reason he became invincible—that she would never master her powers and make him immune to love—he would have put her in another cage.

Scarlett was ready to reach for her Reverie Key as soon as the Fallen Star returned her to her suite and left. But once they stepped inside of her rooms, he welcomed more Fates to join them. Her Handmaidens, lesser Fates, recognizable from the red thread sealing their white lips shut.

“Oh, goody!” Anissa cooed from inside her cage in the center of the sitting room, though she looked far from happy about this arrival.

“What are they doing here?” Scarlett asked.

The Fallen Star waved a hand toward the box he’d brought in earlier. “They’ve come to help prepare you to meet the empire.”

“They’ll also make sure their mistress knows everything about you,” Anissa murmured as soon as the Fallen Star left. “The Undead Queen spies through Her Handmaidens. Queenie and Gavriel had an affair long ago. We Fates might not love, but we are very passionate and jealous. She wasn’t happy to hear he’d made a child with a mortal, and I’m guessing she’s been curious about you.”

Scarlett didn’t know if this was the Lady Prisoner’s way of warning Scarlett not to escape right now. But it didn’t matter. Her Handmaidens were already upon Scarlett. They removed her gown with unnatural speed, tossing it onto the carpet, along with the precious Reverie Key still inside its pocket.