( voices and whispers and ghosts, alia says. a scabbard for a knife, alia claims. alina's mind flashes with an image — not of alia, emerging from the lake like a rusalka, drowning lost boys in her murky waters, but of alina. of a city submerged in shadow. of the darkling's poison whispering doubts into her ear, in the dark, growing in the corner of her mind like cobwebs. a filth inside of her head she could never clean. a madness she'd thought her own, until she had learned of the tether that chained them, eternal prisoners of each other. tied together not just by the iron links of fate, but his rare humanity, and her hidden ugliness. )
It's not fair. But I've never fooled myself into expecting fairness.
( a lie, of course. she had wanted more, wanted better — but when does an orphan not want for what they can't have? she's silent, for a stunted moment longer, then: )
I loved someone, once. Or who he fooled me into believing he was. And all he gave me in return was a collar. A leash to hold my power on. He's been punishing me since the day I broke free. Coming to me in dreams. Letting me believe I was calling to him. That I had gone mad.
But it was only ever him, trying to make me doubt myself. Trying to make me a monster, like him. If you're going to call yourself an abomination, you have to call me the same. I dare you.
no subject
It's not fair.
But I've never fooled myself into expecting fairness.
( a lie, of course. she had wanted more, wanted better — but when does an orphan not want for what they can't have? she's silent, for a stunted moment longer, then: )
I loved someone, once. Or who he fooled me into believing he was.
And all he gave me in return was a collar. A leash to hold my power on.
He's been punishing me since the day I broke free. Coming to me in dreams.
Letting me believe I was calling to him. That I had gone mad.
But it was only ever him, trying to make me doubt myself. Trying to make me a monster, like him.
If you're going to call yourself an abomination, you have to call me the same. I dare you.