Blind Eyes Open - Katharine Jericho Book 1

Chapter Thirty-Three

I wasn't sure how much time had passed since I'd entered Glam's cell when I emerged back into the corridor. As I walked away, I caught my reflection in one of the small pools among the gardens. My hair was matted with blood, my face still sported a bloody hand-print along with some new freckles, and both my arms and legs were fully red, dripping with Glam's former life. His screams rattled around in my empty head like cannon fire from a distant, ancient battlefield. Still, I felt nothing.

I emerged into the room with twelve doors and the amniotic power that wanted to crawl into my lungs. Leonidas was on his knees on the ground, blood and char marks having replaced the white of his shirt, his face a mass of bruises. Ramses was bent over and appeared to be shouting something into the other man's face, though no sound made it through the ringing in my ears until they both turned in unison to stare at me.

Leo cursed and dragged a hand down his face.

Ramses's lips parted, his turquoise eyes wide and shining. "Katharine, what have you done?"

I walked right up to him, peripherally aware that he took a step back. "Where were you today when my people were taken?" I asked.

His hands hovered in front of me, then he put his arms around me, crushing me to his chest. "I had business in the north, and then I was delivering..." He shook his head, pushing me out to arms-length. "Everything's going to be all right. Come with me. Let me wash you."

"Do you think I'm dirty? Momma hates dirty hands." I shoved him back and lifted them, turned them over and watched someone's life drip from my fingertips like ruby tears. "She'll never invite me to her table again. The lights are all off. She's not home anymore."

I looked up at him, at the tracks of crystal tears on his cheeks. "Daddy poured something over her body and set her on fire. He said if I cried, he'd lock me in there with her. I should have cried. I should have burned with her, and Sloane would still be alive. Alec wouldn't be a beast. I should have burned because I have Daddy's evil in me."

"No." Ramses shook me. "He may have fathered you, but you are not like him."

When all I did was stare through him, Ramses turned and let out a bone-jarring roar that cracked the ceiling far above our heads. It rolled over me like a whisper.

"Christ," Leo said. "This is not what I wanted for you, Kat. This wasn't supposed to happen."

I had an urge to run, feeling a malevolent force creeping up in my mind, knowing that if I stopped long enough for it to catch me, I would die in some way. Maybe I already had. I wasn't sure if I was in a dream or a nightmare or the chaos of my own making. I wanted to go away. Get out. Run from myself. "I want to go home now."

Quiet voices spoke behind me, then Leo appeared to my right. "We need to talk about this, Lígo Machitís."

The knife that had been returned to my pocket at some point was suddenly in my hand. I drove it up under his ribs, watching blood splash onto his shirt as I yanked the blade out again. His hands covered the wound. I stared into the agony in his light brown eyes with almost no recognition, only a faraway knowledge that he was someone who'd injured me grievously. He was the bringer of pain, of loneliness. He was my enemy.

The world tilted as strong arms swept me off my feet. I turned my face into the scent of fresh growing things and wood smoke. Ramses.

He must survive, I heard in my thoughts with no understanding. I was vaguely aware that Ramses was talking to me, but I remained standing alone inside my head on that cold lake, only the red eyes were no longer trapped under the ice—they were mine. I stared at myself from a distance, those red eyes glowing with malice from my pale face, my blonde hair whipping around my head in a violent wind.