𝐒𝐲𝐧 ┃𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐞

119. 𝑇𝑖𝑟𝑒𝑑

Queen

My fingers trailed the smooth railing of the stairwell. I wasn't going to come down for dinner tonight. If it were up to me, I would've locked myself in my bedroom and counted down the moments Syn would "come to my rescue".

I knew he would.

I didn't doubt that in the slightest. But every second I sat complacent, helpless, I was reminded of the weak girl I was before I met him.

The old me would have bided her time, hopelessly waiting for a man desperate to get to me. He would crash the doors down, guns blazing without so much as a second thought for his safety.

She waited for her Prince Charming. She believed in fairy tales. But, I, the one who had lost him once before, didn't. I had outgrown those outlandish notions that I needed to wait to be saved, and I didn't want that burden on him alone. I had to do something. Even if it was as minuscule as attending this stupid dinner with the last two people I wanted to. It was better than staying in the room and letting my dignity waste away.

I heard shuffling as I neared the dining room. Hushed voices no doubt belonging to my two cellmates in this now prison of a cabin. Why were they talking? I halted my steps at the entrance to the open room, my arms crossed. "Syn"— I scoffed, giving Lilith a stern stare as she tried her best to plaster on a painfully obvious rehearsed smile for me.

I eyed the pair.

Something happened and I was the odd one out.

I had been around my fair share of shady people long enough to know when I was intruding on a conversation about me. It was a distinct feeling. The only one that made your ears hot, and made your body want to fold in on itself until you vanished into thin air.

My lips pursed to the side and I bit the inside of my cheek. "Am I interrupting?" I drawled out slowly, taking measured steps toward the table.

Lilith began to speak, yet failed and Aiden stepped in. He cleared his throat. " You're the guest of honor, Princess. What could you possibly be interrupting?" He asked, sending waves of nausea through my gut. Princess. It was Syn's voice but it sounded venomous and unpleasant coming from him.

He pulled out a chair, tilting his head for me to sit. I glanced away from him, my eyes landing on an unusually fidgety Lilith. "Everything okay?" I questioned with as much sincerity as I could muster. She nodded, the same fake smile spreading across her face as my own faltered. "Yes, everything is okay. Come have a seat."

Lie.

By the time she gestured toward the chair Aiden pulled out, my smile had completely vanished.

I had no idea what was going on, but my paranoia was scraping painful warnings against my abdomen. These two— having anything to talk about, immediately quieting the moment I walked in...something was off.

If I truly trusted Lilith at all I'd give her the benefit of the doubt. Maybe...just maybe they were just talking, and my imagination was running wild.

Maybe I could trust her...

That thought went away as quickly as it came up, a lingering wonder that I wanted to be true. But look where that ideology got me in the past. I lost everything because of that stupid fucking word: Trust.

If history was any indication— which it was, she had sided, once again, with someone who wasn't me. Whenever a threat was imminent and Lilith was in the picture, I could expect her...without a doubt, to be on the other side. Pulling the strings. I was a marionette to her Machiavelli. Just a puppet to a sick puppeteer whose strings always somehow surrounded me. It couldn't be an accident every time.