Scorched Treachery (Imdalind, #3)(49)

“I’m sorry, sir, but what exactly are you saying?” I guess I wasn’t the only one who was confused. My father looked between us as he too tried to fit together the missing pieces.

Edmund, however, seemed to be enjoying keeping more than one person in the dark. He smiled as he turned to face me again.

“You remember that night, don’t you, Timothy?” Edmund taunted, his eyes feeling like warm lasers cutting into my brain.

“Texas, 1867. A simple assignment – kill Thom. After four hundred years of flawlessly killing every person I commanded her to, Wynifred here missteps. She tells me Thom is in Texas and not in Italy as I had already ascertained. So off she goes to Texas, to kill the father of her child. But I see through it, and I follow her…”

My mouth opened automatically, my jaw working in disbelief. Four hundred years of working for Edmund, a child, Thom…none of this was my life.

“That never…”

“That never happened?” Edmund asked, his cynical voice twisting the meaning behind my words. “You don’t remember it? Then tell me what you do remember.”

He arched his eyebrows, his lips curling in a wicked half smile as he waited.

That night. The night when I got the marks, I remembered it perfectly. The flash of light, my brother’s face, the yelling. I remember feeling scared. I remember…I don’t…what was said? My jaw worked its way open and shut like the jaws of a fish as my brain tried to find the words to answer his questions.

“Don’t remember what happened? How about your childhood? What happened then?” He had moved closer, but I barely noticed. My childhood…I couldn’t remember. I could see faces, feel emotions, but exactly what happened…how…there was nothing there.

“Can’t remember can you?”

“What are you saying, Edmund? We’ve always known about her memory loss…”

“Yes, but what if her memory loss, her change in personality, what if it wasn’t a result of Cail’s attempts to bind your curse. What if he did it intentionally, to hide something?” Edmund ran his finger along my jaw, his eyes still boring into me.

I wanted to deny everything he had said. I wanted to tell him the truth. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t say something I couldn’t remember…I couldn’t remember…

What did I know?

I was Wynifred, born in about 1795, exiled in 1867. I had a father, Timothy, and a brother, Cail. Ilyan killed my mother in…. He killed her because…. My father gave me the marks because I was caught giving information to Ilyan…. They caught me in…Texas?

Why couldn’t I remember?

My eyes grew wide, Edmund’s smile following suit.

“What secret did Cail lock in your mind, Wynifred?”

My eyes fluttered around the room, from Talon’s still body, curled on the cold ground, to my father, to Sain, looking for anyone to give me a different explanation. Sain looked at me and nodded once. No, this couldn’t be.

“Time to open the lock, Wynifred.”

Edmund smiled as he placed his hand against my skull, his magic rushing into me. I screamed as the pressure moved into my brain, the heat flooding through me as the force increased. I heard my own scream echo in my ears as Edmund’s powerful magic threatened to rip me apart. It opened up my mind and let everything out.

My head throbbed and pulsed as things I had long since forgotten filled me. Memories that I had wanted to stay locked away came flooding back – the beautiful child’s screams and the Henry the Eighth wanna-be suddenly making sense.

I remembered everything.





Chapter Fifteen





I remembered everything.

“What do you mean, ‘he wants us to have a baby’?” I spat, turning toward Thom.

Thom stood in the middle of my large room, that awful hat twisting through his fingers. Curse the ridiculous British King for such a style. It made Thom look like a peacock.

“Just that, Lady Wynifred. He has commanded it.” I gaped at him, my mind working just enough to let me turn away from him.

I could see him through my mirror, his bright blue eyes boring into me from underneath that curly hair he had inherited from his father, and the sandy color had come from his mother. He narrowed his eyes and went back to twirling the hat. The poor boy looked absolutely traumatized, and I didn’t blame him. What was King Edmund thinking?

“You are sure this message is for me?” I asked, the laugh barely disguised in my voice.

“Yes.” I could see him continually turning that hat in his hands. Round and round it went. I shook my head and looked away, not wanting his stress to leach into me.

“Are we to be bonded then?” My voice was as uninterested as I could make it, my focus more on the ornate hairbrush Cail had given me for my birthday than on the Prince behind me. It wasn’t the first time Edmund had tried to force me into a bonding, but to use his own son this way was a little surprising.

“No.”

“No?” I wasn’t sure if I was more relieved or upset. This was the oddest request his majesty had ever given me. You don’t often send executioners into a wedding bed, especially without a wedding. I guess it was one of the perks of being a woman and under Edmund’s control. He thought he could tell me who to sleep with as well as who to kill.