“Definitely not.”
“You could have lied!” she scolds, as we step into the sitting room.
“I’m not a liar,” I whisper calmly.
“Nah, dawg, nah….”
“Nate!” I whisper to Tatum. We turn and follow a door that’s cranked open under the double stairwell.
“Madi, I don’t know about this.”
“Okay, you stay here.”
“I can’t let you go down there on your own!”
“Well then, come. Either way, I’m going.” I walk to the door, pulling it open to voices that are louder.
“Don’t fucking care,” Bishop replies, his tone dark, tormented, and almost unrecognizable.
“You stepped out of the rules. She’s a civilian!” Brantley roars.
I flinch at his tone and sounds of a scuffle from all the glass smashing and someone shoving someone else.
“You and I both know she ain’t no civilian, Brantley.” I clutch the book close to my chest and take the final step down. My eyes find Brantley’s instantly, and he grins. “Well, looks like you got some explaining to do, B.” He smirks at me with a snarl. I can see the rest of the Kings in the room in my peripheral vision, but everything blurs when my eyes land on Ally, who is lying in a pool of her own blood, her neck sliced open, with a dark red gash splitting her throat, blood still pulsing out of it. My hand flies up to my mouth as an earth-shattering scream ripples out of me. In a flash, Bishop is flying toward me.
“Madi!”
I shove him away and turn, running up the stairs.
“Fuck!” Nate barks, and I can hear Bishop’s footsteps chasing me up the stairs. My heart pounds in my chest vigorously. He killed someone. He killed someone. He killed Ally. Tears stream down my face as prickles of fear ripple all over my body. He’s a killer. Bishop is killer. He killed someone. I push open the door just as vomit threatens to surface on the back of my throat. My eyes blur from the river of tears that are pouring out of my eyes, and when they land on Tatum, who is standing there waiting for me, my face pales. I run toward her, only to end up colliding with another body. Falling on my ass with a thud, the book flies through the air and lands on the floor. I can feel all the Kings behind me, watching me, all coming up from the basement.
I rub my hand over my forehead and slowly bring my eyes up to who I just collided with, guessing Bishop’s dad is home. Swallowing through the bile of everything I’ve just witnessed, my vision reaches the owner of the body, and I gasp, shock spreading over every inch of me.
“Dad?”
“Madison!” my dad snaps at me in surprise. “What are you doing here?”
“No.” I shake my head. “What are you doing here?”
Dad looks down to the book that’s spread open as Bishop steps up beside me, looking down to it too. There’s an audible gasp that sounds through the air, and I turn to Bishop, my eyes heavy and weak from all the tears. His hand covers his mouth in shock, his eyes wide as he gazes at the book. He tugs at his hair, and I look down to the book, confusion clouding me everywhere. Shuffling over the floor on my hands and knees, I reach it, the next chapter open and ready.
9.
The Silver Swan
The truth is I don’t know what my husband did to my daughter. He said girls are tainted. There is no room for girls in his master plan, and that’s how it always will be. He said they would sell the girls, but something dark and doubtful always tickled the back of my mind. My husband was a liar, a cheat, and a manipulator. There’s absolutely not one part of his body that is truthful or redeemable.
Later that night, after my maid had cleaned me up, Humphrey came back into the cave, sat down beside me, and said, “Girls cannot be born into our covenant, wife. They’re weak by human nature. They must be taken care of at their birth.”
“You’re not God, Humphrey. You cannot deem who bears what when pregnant.”
“No,” he replied simply. “But I can take care of it.”
I shook my head, my heart in tatters, and my life turning bleak, dark, finished. “There will be no Silver Swans born into this family or any of the first nine. They will be demolished.”
“Silver Swans?” I asked, clipped and annoyed.
“The Silver Swan is, in old times, what they would call a tarnished being. Every girl that would be born into the first nine is a tarnished being. It’s no place for a her.”
“Humphrey Hay—”
I swipe the tears from my eyes, not wanting to read anymore. “Dad?” I tilt my head at my father. “Why are you here?”
He swallows roughly. “I was just sorting out a business deal.” His eyes pinch, worried. “Just some business I had with Mr.—”