Chapter 48 Like mother like daughter

Chapter 48 Like mother like daughter


LILY'S POV

"She is awake." I laughed, all shaky and relieved, and I looked back at the three of them standing there near the door. Then I looked back at Anya who was blinking and looking everywhere with this confused expression on her face, as she couldn't figure out where she was or how she got there.

She stared at me for a long moment. Then her face just crumpled and she started crying. Silent tears running down her cheeks, into her hair, soaking the strands around her face.

"Hey, hey, hey." I grabbed her hand and squeezed it tight. "You're okay now. You're safe. We got you out of there."

Anya tried to speak but nothing came out, just this rough raspy sound, her throat was too dry and scratched up.

Raven appeared next to me with a cup of water, making Anya flinch so hard she nearly hit her head on the wall behind her.

Was she scared Raven was going to hurt her?

I gave Raven a grateful smile even though Anya couldn't see it, and I took the cup from his hand. Then I brought it to her lips real gently and tipped it slowly so she wouldn't choke. Her head was raised up a little against my arm.

Anya drank, and then she coughed, and then she drank some more. After a few sips she looked around the room at all of us, at the fire burning in the hearth, at the window with the dark outside.

"Where are we?" Her voice came out wrecked, barely there at all.

"We're in a cabin in the woods." I squeezed her hand again. "We're safe here."

"How?" She looked at me like she needed me to explain everything right now, because none of this made any sense to her.

I pointed toward the door where Atlas was standing. "He saved us. Him and his friends."

The bulky one, the one they called Boar, gave me this big full grin and bumped his shoulder against Atlas. Atlas gave him the stink eyes full of annoyance.

But that didn't clear the doubt from Anya's eyes. Not even a little. She was looking at them all suspicious like she expected them to turn on us any second, and her hand started squeezing mine harder and harder.

"Are you okay?" I asked her, running my eyes over her face and her body to see if there was something hurting her that I couldn't see. "Are you in pain anywhere?"

She leaned in close and whispered, "Let's go away. Right now. Let's just leave."

But the cabin was quiet, the kind of quiet where you can hear everyone breathing, and her whisper carried. Everyone heard it.

Atlas didn't move or react. He just stood there with that same blank expression he always wore, nothing anyone said could touch him. I didn't know how he felt about what Anya said, whether he was hurt or angry or just didn't care.

So I sent him a pleading stare, trying to tell him with my eyes that I would explain things to her, that she didn't mean it like it sounded.

He tilted his head toward Boar and Raven, they both understood. Boar went back to tending the rabbit he'd caught, turning it over the fire, keeping himself busy away from us. Raven walked out of the cabin without a word and closed the door behind him, but the way he slammed it, I would say he was angry. Angry at us and the situation.

It wasn't a hidden fact that he hated this whole thing. Hated that Atlas came to save me, Hated that it could put Atlas in some kind of trouble with the palace, with the Queen, with everyone.

Speaking of Atlas, he dragged this old rocking chair over close to the chimney where the fire was burning. He sat down in it, and even sitting in a rocking chair, even with the firelight making everything soft and warm, he looked mysterious. Dangerous even. The flames were casting shadows across his face, highlighting the sharp lines of his jaw and the way his cheekbones caught the light. His dark hair fell across his forehead a little and his eyes were so deep and intense, staring into the fire like it held all the answers to questions nobody had asked yet.

And the way he was staring at that fire, that intense focused way, that was exactly how he stared at me when he thought I wasn't looking.

"Princess!" Anya tapped my arm, not gently at all. "We need to go. Right now. We can't stay here."

I pulled my hand away from hers and placed it on her shoulder instead. She had already sat up while I was distracted, pushing herself upright against the wall.

"You don't need to be afraid, Anya." I kept my voice soft and calm, trying to soothe her. "Prince Atlas saved us. Him and his men. We're safe because of them."

I smiled at her, hoping she would see it, and would understand.

But she didn't."You can't trust anybody." Her voice was low and urgent, her eyes darting toward where Atlas sat by the fire. "Especially not him. That's Prince Atlas. He's bad news, Lily. He's a murderer."

Her face twisted into something ugly, disgust mixed with fear. And I told myself it was the fear talking, that she didn't mean it, that she was just scared and saying things.

"He saved our lives, Anya." I shrugged, helpless. "We should be grateful."

She slapped my hands away from her shoulder. The sound was sharp in the quiet cabin.

"Have you even thought about it?" she hissed. "Have you thought that maybe he got you kidnapped in the first place?"

My mouth fell open. I just stared at her.

"Why would he do that?" I asked, and my voice came out all high and confused. "Why would he save my life if he was the one who took me? That doesn't make any sense, Anya."

She glared at me and pulled away from my touch, putting space between us on the bunk.

"You're too trusting, Princess." She said it like it was an insult. "And that is so stupid of you. You don't think. You just feel."

"You're crossing the line." I cut her off, my voice going higher than I meant it to. "You don't get to talk to me like that."

"I'm not crossing anything." She shook her head, and her eyes were hard. "We're not in the palace anymore. I don't have to stick to rules and call you Princess and pretend. I'm going to tell you when you're not using your head. And you're not using it right now."

I opened my mouth to argue but she kept going.

"Do you want to know why you're not thinking straight? Because you're admiring him. I saw you, Lily. Staring at him like he's something special. Like he's not the most dangerous person in this room."

Something hot and sharp shot through my chest. I could feel my face getting warm, my hands starting to shake.

"I am not admiring him." I said it through my teeth, each word clipped. "What do you take me for, Anya? I'm a married woman. Why would I be lusting after some man I barely know?"

She scoffed, this ugly little sound. "Married? You haven't even slept with your husband. That's not a real marriage. And lusting?" She laughed but it wasn't funny. "You were just now staring at him with light and glitter in your eyes like he hung the moon. Set your priority straight, Lily. Before you do something stupid."

I couldn't believe my ears. I just sat there staring at her, my best friend, the person who was supposed to be on my side. She was looking at me like I was something pathetic. Like I was dirt.

My eyes started to sting but I blinked hard and pushed it down.

"You're basically saying I'm like my mother." My voice came out quiet and tight. "Having the blood of a whore makes me a whore too, right? Like mother, like daughter."

I gave her this tight little smile even though my eyes were burning.

"That's not what I'm saying." She shook her head but she wouldn't look at me.

"No, Anya." I cut her off. "At least do me the favor of not lying to my face right now. I might be stupid but I'm not that stupid.”