Los didn't bind my hands or even push me as we walked. I felt a deep sense of relief at my mother's safety and regret for the life we'd never known.
"The lengths the Others are willing to go to disgust me," Los muttered.
"You are arresting a child," I replied indignantly, "I did nothing to you or your people."
Los sighed, "Your imprisonment under us is purely a show of power. We will treat you well."
I stopped in my tracks, "You mean, you're luring the Others here?"
Los nodded, "They only get more powerful the longer we wait."
I stepped in front of him, the images the sky had shown me flooding my mind, "They will slaughter you and your people."
"We cannot allow them to keep spreading and conquering, I rather we fight than flee," Los's staff glowed more brightly as he spoke, "The Licnine are not cowards."
"You're willing to use me as a type of bait?" I asked, feeling hot anger.
"You're the only thing that might have a chance of bringing the king out of hiding," Los replied shortly, "I don't expect you to understand."
"You're making a mistake," I pleaded.
"I have led this war from the time I was a child myself, you are a yearling," He replied and I watched his resolve harden. "The king will be led to believe you are in danger."
"What sort of danger," I practically screamed, "Do I get to say anything about my own future or are you just going to choose how I live my life too."
"It's not like that," Los said, I could see his mind working.
I pushed back, "Yes it is. I was born into ownership and escaped my first owners to be claimed by the king and now you! You aren't any better!"
Los roared, "Those creatures kill us! They stripe us of our resources, I am nothing like them."
"Then let me go," I replied, "Like you promised Qui."
"Don't say her name," He replied I felt the warmth of his breath on my face.
The anger tinted my vision red and I found myself drawing my knife, before I could though Los had swept me off the ground with his staff. I drifted upwards in an uncontrol summersault until I bounced off of a soft ceiling. When I looked down I was hanging upside down in the air in a bubble of green smoke.
I tried to punch my way out, I kicked my feet but hit nothing.
"I will bring you down when you have regained some sense," Los said coolly.
I struggled harder and harder but nothing I did mattered. Finally, the fight went out of me, and without looking at me Los started to walk. The bubble seemed to drain my energy and my eyes grew heavy.
"I hope you know," Los spoke aloud, "If I could we would all be free. None of this is personal Lit."
Then the black claimed me.
In my dreams, I was back at the wedding.
I wore a long white dress speckled with pearls. My hair pulled at my scalp from all the pins, not a strand could come loose. My face had been made up with cakes of makeup.
It was my moment.
I stepped into the sunlight and listened to the admiring coos and awes over my dress. The flower girls came in one step behind me showering all the guests in white roses. I stepped one foot after the other toward the man. He was partly blocked out by the sunlight but I could see his suit. In his lapel, a red rose sat. I thought of tucking it there only hours ago.
Had it really been only hours ago?
He smiled when I reached him.
We joined hands and I saw the whites of his teeth. He was smiling and everyone was sighing and it was so perfect. Except it wasn't.
I drew back and found my knife clutched in my hand. Without thinking I skewered the red rose.
I plunged the knife into his chest again and again. Blood spilled over the roses dying them all red. My skirts become spattered with it. The flower girls screamed and cried. The guests ran.
I was the monster now.
I blinked.
"Izzie?" He whispered.
No one was screaming, no knife, and no blood.
"Earth to Izzie," He touched a finger to my lips playfully, "It's time."
"You may now kiss the bride." I heard a rough official voice say.
His mouth was warm and sour.
I woke up with a start.
I wasn't at a wedding or in the hotel afterward. I wasn't Izzie.
I was Lit again and I wasn't going to any weddings any time soon. I had been deposited on a small bed. If this was a cell it wasn't as bad as the prisoner camp I'd been in with Ny-An.
My bed was covered in furs and I could smell perfumes burning nearby. There weren't windows to the outside but a crude door let me see into an empty interior space. I pressed my face up against it.
"Help! Mother! Ny-An!" I screamed, "I'm here! Help me please!"
I screamed until I thought my throat would collapse from the sheer effort.
Finally, I heard a set of footsteps.
I saw an older woman approaching the cell, when she made eye contact she smiled a wicked smile.
Her dress was similar to Clo's and she held a staff like Los. It glowed a bright, blazing red.
"Yearling bride," She hissed.
I backed away from the door.
"I've seen what you're capable of," She muttered in a strange voice, she shook her head, "I've seen the future and you will not hurt my son."
"I don't want to hurt anyone," I replied shakily.
"He told me, you had that knife," She began to ramble almost to herself.
"Los is your son," I shook out my head.
"Yearling bride," The woman smiled even more broadly, "I will see to it that you die."