I walk back into the house with a sinking feeling in my chest.
Everyone's standing in circles and whispering about what happened. Cyran? I don't know where he is. I feel like throwing up whenever I think about him.
Whatever he gave me to drink made me feel a lot stronger. I don't feel faint anymore and I'm not nauseated. I ignore all the stares and make my way toward the staircase. I need to go up to my room and think about all of this carefully. That thing—I refuse to call him Cyran anymore—doesn't care about being kind and attentive anymore. That was all an act to trap me, I think. Now that I'm bonded to him and have nowhere to go, he doesn't care about showing his true colors.
In other words, I'm screwed.
I reach the landing and I'm about to take another step when I come across Emilia. She smiles when she sees me. It's that weird smile that makes her look dead. She's getting paler by the hour. Maybe she is dying.
I banish the thought from my head.
