Fury and Flame | 3

3 | 0

D E L P H I N I U M

Arriving at my grandmother's house was like stepping back into a whole different life. I wasn't the powerful, fearless warrior I'd once been. Now I was the same person I'd been when I was first taken from this place by the ONNT. It was almost as if nothing had changed. I'd come full circle and this time, I was even more aware of what I'd lost.

As the sun set behind us, the front gates slowly opened before us, revealing the mansion inside—a place so large it shouldn't only house one woman. I'd used to hate it here when I came back the first time, had despised the beauty and the extravagance and the wealth it oozed. Because it meant nothing. We'd had everything we ever could have wanted and on that night when it was all taken away, it made a gaping hole in my soul. And that hole could not be filled with things like cars and pearls, like my grandmother seemed to think.

This felt eerily similar to the day I'd come back from the ONNT after the first questioning—alone, paranoid, and so devastatingly empty. After everything that had happened between then and now, despite every precaution I'd taken, I was in this place again.

No one spoke as we walked up the perfectly-gardened front yard. They knew how I hated this place. And they weren't sure what to expect once we got inside and confronted my grandmother. I wasn't either.

Feeling as if my limbs were made of lead, I knocked on the door. Once. Twice. I half-wished it would remain closed. I wouldn't have to relive everything I'd lost if I didn't go inside.

But then the door opened and I was shocked to see Vladlena Tesla herself standing in the doorway. That was strange—we'd used to have a butler when I was younger, a man who was close enough to the family that we regarded him as one of our own. But she must have dismissed him after I left for the ONNT. So she truly was alone in this castle of a house.

She hadn't changed—still wearing the an elegant shawl, her hair swept up in a hairstyle that somehow made her seem younger than she was. There were still no smile lines on her face, just the flat, businesslike gaze. Like everyone else was a client of hers that she had to figure out.

"I take it your flight was satisfactory," she said, not one to mince words. She'd sent a private plane to bring us all the way across the country. It had been a throwback to the few times my father had taken us on business trips as children. I'd felt sick with the memory the entire flight.

She swept a jewelry-laden hand behind her to gesture to the rest of the house. "Come in." No warmth, no inviting smile. But still, she'd opened her home to us. And I couldn't figure out why.

As the eight of us filed in, I was hit in the chest with the familiarity of the place. The same airy windows, the same marble floor, the same wide, open rooms filled with too much expensive furniture to count. To my right was a sitting room with a window seat my brother Toby and I would sit at, waiting for my father's car to roll up the driveway after a long day at work. I looked the other way—a glimpse down the hallway we'd run up and down in our socks. I had to look away.

We'd been normal. Painfully normal. And this house was a reminder of what I'd once been in another sense. What I could have had. A family. A home. I wouldn't have to be a warrior, a killer.

As soon as I had that thought, I knew I wasn't sure what I wanted anymore. If I even wanted anything.

In the foyer, my grandmother turned back to us. "I understand you're being followed by government officials. They were already here to assure I wasn't hiding you. But they will not come back again." I wondered if she'd done something to make them stay away. "You may stay as long as you wish—given you leave everything as you found it."