Let the Storm Break

CHAPTER 11 VANE

This place is messing with my head.

I’m so fre’aking tired, but every time I close my eyes, my mind floods with all the doubts I’ve been trying to deny. All the questions I’ve been trying not to ask.

I never realized how much the pain of my bond calmed me. Gave me something to hold on to—something to prove that my connection to Audra is real. Now that it’s gone, it’s like all my pathetic insecurities are feeding off one another, leaving me needy and desperate and tempted to do something really stupid, like wake Arella up and ask her if she thinks her daughter loves me.

I know I’m being crazy. Audra told me she loved me before we kissed—and I made sure the whole thing was her choice.

But she’s been gone so long.

Twenty-four days may not sound like a lot. But considering we were only together for five days—and most of the time she spent fighting with me or accidentally almost killing me—it’s a long time. Enough to make me seriously wonder if she’s really coming back.

I hold my right arm up to the dim candlelight and focus on the braided copper bracelet Audra gave me.

I can almost feel the sparks of her touch from when she latched the band around my wrist. She found it in the ruins of the storm that killed my parents and held on to it for ten years so that I’d have something that belonged to them.

She wouldn’t do something like that if she didn’t care about me, would she?

Then again, she did give it to me after she told me that loving me would be a permanent mistake . . .

She changed her mind after that, though.

But . . . couldn’t she change her mind again?

Stop it!

I’m tempted to say the words out loud so that maybe I’ll actually listen to them. It’s just this place making me crazy.

When I get back to the winds and find Audra’s trace, the rushing heat will blast away these stupid worries—though I have no idea how I’m going to pull that off. I’m sure the Gales will be watching me even closer now, which makes me want to bury my face in these pillowy things and scream until I have no voice left.

Instead I stare at the silver compass set into the center of my bracelet. It usually channels my heritage somehow and points to the west.

Right now it’s just spinning and spinning. Like it’s feeling as lost as me.

“I wish Liam were here,” Arella whispers, making me jump. I didn’t realize she was awake.

I roll over and find her sitting in the center of her floor, staring at the ceiling.

“Liam?”

“Audra’s father. He knew how to weave the winds into lullabies, and they always gave me the sweetest dreams.”

I really shouldn’t be encouraging her, but I can’t stop myself from saying, “He sounds like his daughter.”

Audra used to send winds to my room every night. It’s how I dreamed about her for ten years, watching her grow up along with me. How I fell in love with her before I even knew if she was real.

“He was,” Arella agrees. “That was the hardest part, after . . .”

Her voice cracks and she turns away, but through the chains I can still see the tears that streak down her cheeks, leaving shiny trails on her gray, dirty skin. It almost makes me feel sorry for her.

Almost.

“You get that it’s your fault, right?”

She opens her mouth and I expect her to blame Audra, me, anyone she can think of—like she did the first time I confronted her about this.

All she says is “I know.”

She walks to the farthest part of her cell, keeping her back to me. I watch her shoulders shake with quiet sobs, trying to understand how the frail, broken woman I’m looking at could be the same person who murdered my parents and tried to kill Audra right in front of me.

She really does seem different now.

Which is the most dangerous thought I can have.

Arella’s smart—and patient. Odds are this is just another part of her game.

“How are your memories, by the way?” she asks, smearing away her tears with shaky hands.

“Why? Did you commit any other murders you don’t want me to remember?”

“Of course not, Vane.” She rubs the skin on her wrist, which I notice is bare now. The gold cuff that she used to wear is gone. “I only ask because I’ve been worried things might be a bit . . . jumbled.”

I glare at her, hating that she’s right.

She knows it too.

“That’s what I was afraid of. Releasing memories is a very tricky thing. I had a feeling Audra didn’t do it properly.”

“She did it just fine.”

But she didn’t—and the chaos is almost more frustrating than the blank slate I used to deal with. It’s like my past is a jigsaw puzzle where all the pieces look the same, and no matter how much I try to sort through them, I can never figure out how any of them fit back together. Not without a bigger picture to guide me.

“Well, if there were a problem,” Arella says quietly. “I do know how to fix it.”

And there it is. Right there. The play she’s been building toward.

“Let me guess, you need me to take you aboveground, to the winds?”

“I would need a few Southerlies, yes.”

“Wow, do you really think I’m that stupid?”

“Of course not. Have as many guards with us as you want. Have the whole Gale Force. Do you honestly think I’d be able to overpower them all?”

I want to believe that she couldn’t, especially with how scrawny she looks now. But I’ve seen her in action. She moves like a blur—and she’s ruthless. She didn’t even blink before launching deadly attacks at her own daughter.

Plus, she wouldn’t have to take out the whole force. Just a few key people so she could get away.

“Thanks, I’ll figure it out on my own.”

“You won’t though, Vane. That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”

I ignore her, flopping back on my pillows.

They’re my memories. If anyone can sort them back into place it’s me.

“Well, if you change your mind, you know where to find me. For a little while longer at least.”

I hate myself for letting her suck me back in. But I have to ask. “Why only for a little longer?”

“You really can’t guess?” She runs her hands over the walls, letting the grains of sand shower her feet. “There’s a reason this place is so secret, Vane. Os crossed a line that shouldn’t be crossed. But I guess he figures one crime deserves another. I did do . . . terrible things.”

“You did,” I agree, trying to snuff out the sympathy I’m starting to feel for her.

It’s not easy.

Especially when she wraps her arms around herself, looking like a small, frightened bird as she whispers, “But this place, this Maelstrom, as he calls it. It doesn’t just contain me. It consumes me.”