Luna Forsaken (Arya and James) novel Chapter 142

142 What Blood Debt Sounds Like

Arya’s POV

Lisa was quieter.

Of course she was.

When I entered, she was sitting against the wall with her wrists chained in front of her, eyes swollen.

but more alert than Margaret’s, mouth set in the trembling line of someone trying to think her way

through terror.

She had always been like that.

Even when I found her, thin, hungry, frightened at Nightwind’s gate, Lisa’s fear had sat behind her eyes

differently. She watched before she spoke. Measured before

but also calculating in the way the deeply desperate often are moved. She had looked grateful, yes,

I had seen that and taken her in anyway.

Because people in need should not have to perform innocence before being fed.

Because I knew what it was to be looked at like a problem.

Because I thought kindness returned changed men and women.

I closed the door behind me myself this time.

Lisa flinched at the sound.

“Arya…”

No title. Smart.

My gaze moved over her face, her wrists, the chain, then back to her eyes.

“You’re a midwife.”

Her lower lip trembled. “Yes.”

“You helped women bring life into this world.”

Tears spilled faster. “Yes.”

“And then you helped kill mine.”

She made a broken sound. “I didn’t touch you, I swear I didn’t touch you, I only,”

€ 142 What Blood Debt Sounds Like

I crossed the room and kicked the stool beside her so it clattered into the wall.

She jerked so hard she nearly choked on her own breath.

“Only what?”

Her chest heaved. “Only gave Leah what she asked for!”

The words burst out of her and hung there.

For a second, silence swallowed everything.

My blood turned cold and hot at the same time.

Not because it was new.

I already knew from Margaret’s confession.

Because hearing it here, from Lisa’s mouth, in a stone room under Dragonclaw, without Rebecca to direct her and without a crowd to perform for, made it settle deeper.

Leah.

Abortifacient.

Planned.

An hour before the banquet.

And me, tried, flogged, broken, blamed.

I crouched slowly in front of Lisa.

“Say it again.”

She sobbed. “Please, ”

“Say it.”

Her eyes squeezed shut. “Leah asked for it,” she whispered. “She said she couldn’t carry it. She said she needed it gone before the banquet. She said when the bleeding started we should blame you because everyone already hated you enough to believe it.”

My throat burned so violently I tasted metal.

I grabbed her jaw, hard enough to make her gasp, and forced her eyes open.

“And Rebecca?”

< 142 What Blood Debt Sounds Like

“She promised us protection,” Lisa cried. “Silverfang membership. Full rights. Union protection. She said Nightwind would fall and we should choose the winning side. She said you were finished anyway,

I shoved her away so hard her head struck the wall with a dull thud.

She screamed.

Something in me wanted to keep going.

Wanted to make every sentence cost teeth.

Wanted to wrap both hands around her throat and ask, while she choked, whether she remembered the night she arrived starving and shivering and I had smuggled extra broth to her because James said

rations were low.

Wanted to ask whether she remembered my child.

Whether she remembered my blood in the yard.

Whether she remembered my face when she lied.

Instead, I stood over her shaking, my hands opening and closing uselessly.

“You looked at me while I begged,” I said, and my voice came out so low it scared even me. “You watched me ask for proof. You watched me bleed for a lie you built with your own mouth.”

Lisa was sobbing openly now, snot and tears and panic stripping whatever dignity fear had left her.

“We thought,” she choked. “We thought they would kill us if we refused. Rebecca said Marcel would. hand us over. She said you were losing. She said James wouldn’t protect us. She said, ”

“She was right about one thing.”

Lisa stared at me, horrified.

I smiled.

It felt wrong on my face.

“James did not protect anyone worth protecting.”

The words left me hollow and burning.

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