Total pages in book: 146
Estimated words: 144277 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 721(@200wpm)___ 577(@250wpm)___ 481(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 144277 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 721(@200wpm)___ 577(@250wpm)___ 481(@300wpm)
It’s just…
“Why are you smiling like that?” Finn asks.
Which only makes me giggle. If he only knew. His dick would be hard immediately, I just know it. And now that I’m up, I’m very hungry and eager to go explore that Matron Tower while I have the chance. So I say, “Can you help me with my boots, too?”
I get a smirky side-eye, like he totally knows what I’ve been thinking, before he grabs them and bends down to put them on my feet.
While he’s lacing the first one, he shoots me a smile, meeting my gaze. “You know what this means, right?’
“What what means?”
“You. And me. There’s no way we’re the Godslayer and his Courtesan. They don’t have a family.”
“Yeah. I’ve thought of that.”
“Is it disappointing?”
I shake my head. Then smile. It’s a really big real smile. “No. I think I’d much rather be the one reading those stories to a small child than be in the story myself.”
“Are you just saying that? Or do you mean it?”
I don’t answer right away because I feel like he’s looking for honesty. So I take a few seconds, then say, “This is the start of something new, Finn.” I point to my belly. “Something all us. We’re going to be the main characters in our own story, not pretend to be them in someone else’s.”
He leans forward, both hands on my knees, and kisses me on the lips. Whispering, “I can’t wait.”
After finding bathrooms and pulling ourselves together, Finn and I start weaving our way through the maze-like interior of the Little Sister dorm.
Finn pauses to stare into one of the cozy bedroom nooks. “They all look like this?” He turns to see my reaction.
I shrug, nodding. “This is exactly what ours looked like.”
“But… I don’t understand. Why does it look so lived in if no one’s here?”
Again, my answer is mostly a shrug. “It’s a perk?”
He smiles, then huffs out a laugh. “I guess. But the lights are on, Jasina.” He points to a bedside table beside the immaculately made bed, complete with several decorative pillows and a fuzzy throw artistically positioned at the foot of the bed. The light emits a soft glow.
“Well, if it makes you feel any better,” I say, “I found the whole thing weird as well. Like I was saying earlier, this place is huge. It holds…” I don’t have a guess ready. “Lots of people. More people than we ever had in the Choosing. Thousands, maybe?”
His eyebrows furrow, almost knitting together as he thinks about this. “Weird.”
I nod. “Very. But should we keep going? All I really wanna see is the Matron Tower.”
He gives my hand a squeeze and we continue through the passageway. “Why do you wanna see that place so bad anyway? I’m sure it looks just like this.”
“I want to see their Looking Glass. Don’t you?”
He never gets the chance to answer me because just as these words come out of my mouth, we round a corner and suddenly, the main hall of the dorm is directly in front of us.
“Holy shit,” Finn says, picking up our pace a little as he heads towards the canal that runs down the middle of the room. The floors beneath our feet go from stone to thick carpet the color of sand. It takes a moment, but he figures it out and begins to smile. “It’s a beach.”
“Yes,” I say. Remembering the first time I saw this room. “And that’s a canal made out of polished blue stone.” I point to the simulated water that cuts the long, colossal room in half. Just like the real one outside cuts the city down the middle like a bright, blue line.
Finn tips his head up, eyes wandering to the ceiling. Taking in the curved, rounded walls that make the entire massive room look like the inside of a sandstone cave, the mature trees growing out of cracks in the plaster, and thick, woody roots climbing all over the place.
There are balconies, and stairwells, and nooks to look at too.
It’s a lot.
“Wow,” he finally says, looking at me. “This is incredible. I had no idea the Little Sisters lived like this. I pictured… I dunno. Bunk beds.”
My laugh comes out automatically. “I did too. Trust me, everyone’s mouth dropped open when we got our first look at the dorm. I guess it’s some kind of… rite of passage? It’s all very secret. We were practically threatened with death if we ever told anyone about the dorm.”
“Why?”
I shrug. “It makes no sense, right? Who cares? I mean, it’s nice. But who cares?”
Again, Finn’s eyebrows knit together. He knows something is wrong here just as well as I do. But his answer is the same as mine. A shrug. “How do we get out?”
“That way,” I say, pointing down the canal where the giant double doors are.