Total pages in book: 182
Estimated words: 171176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 856(@200wpm)___ 685(@250wpm)___ 571(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 171176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 856(@200wpm)___ 685(@250wpm)___ 571(@300wpm)
She held out her hand so I could easily grab the note.
I stalled in the middle of my walk back to the table and instead headed to the small, ineffective window. Fuck this elixir. It wasn’t half as good as Finley’s other medicinal stuff was. This was a joke of some sort, and I was certainly the punch line.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“Seasick.” I burped and thought about visiting the toilet.
“They have medicine for that.”
“Oh really? I live in a hole, I hadn’t known,” I said sarcastically. It was possible I might not be the best one to support her in her time of need.
Thankfully, she chuckled, not at all offended. “I think you mean that you live in a cave. Or maybe a small village cut off from larger society and the world as a whole, with no new ideas and no real way to get out.”
When I glanced back, another tear was falling.
I steeled myself against reading on a moving ship and scanned the page, reading as quickly as possible. I didn’t know if the resulting nausea was because of the moving ship or the fucking letter.
A hard knot formed in my chest. What a fucking message. Only a miserable dickhole would write something like that.
I toiled in finding your strengths and, once I did, built an empire around the only thing you were good at.
The only thing she was good at? That was rich. Had that fuckstain never tasted Aurelia’s cooking? Or realized the intelligence it took for her to reverse-engineer those drugs already being sold? She could have done that with medicine, or any other fucking thing. But no, Granny chose drugs—because there was a big profit without any real risk of blowback. Someone dies or gets sick from drugs they got at the shadow market? Big deal, they shouldn’t have been in those markets in the first place, because everyone knows that stuff is sketchy.
And why did Aurelia have to be good at anything, anyway? She’d been a child. Protecting her and making a home for her wasn’t supposed to be dependent on what that child could bring to the table. Not in a real, loving situation, at least.
“I’m actually a little pissed,” I said in an even tone, continuing to read. I didn’t think the alpha would want me to yell and curse when trying to be supportive. “Oh, look. Fabulous, she’s blaming a bunch of shit on you. Fantastic.”
I’d be a sobbing mess if I got a note like this from Finley or Leala or Vemar back at the castle. Like with Aurelia and Granny, they were my family, though none of them were my blood. But none of those people had ever been a parent figure, either. None had ever had this sort of control over me.
“Why wouldn’t she blame me?” Another tear fell down the side of Aurelia’s face. “She’s right. We worked to find something I could do within the village, and once we did, I labored to excel at it so that she wouldn’t be able to get rid of me. I had no reservations about my work. I didn’t care that they were drugs. I stood by my product.”
“I know. We agreed to disagree about it in the beginning, remember? But that product isn’t what is hurting people. Didn’t you discover that yourself?”
“She applied the coating to keep the business thriving, which in turn kept me with a safe home. I didn’t create it, but I am the motivation behind it. It’s in the letter.”
I huffed. “Bullshit! Aurelia, that is utter bullshit and you know—” I hesitated. “No, maybe you don’t know it. All you saw was her tiny cottage. You didn’t see her massive, sprawling estate near the castle and all her servants and the vast network she is bribing to sell her product, including the king and queen. If you were the motivation, she would be pouring gold into your pockets. She’d be setting you up for life. Instead, she’s deprived you of almost everything, and given you small gifts to keep you happy and on the hook while she spends the bulk of the fortune on herself. With just your product and no coating, it’s true she would make less. But it’s only been in the last three years that the product has become so addictive and dangerous. In those three years, the business has soared. Have you seen any extra?”
She hesitated, turning her head to look at me, her gaze troubled. “A lot of extra work. Nothing extra for the village.”
“Exactly,” I said softly. “She—and you, and the rest of the village—were kept just fine with the nonlethal product you were making. It wasn’t because of you that she took it to the next level. If you want to blame yourself for your product as you made it, fine. But do not blame yourself for the coating that almost killed you. Okay? It’s fucking ridiculous. She stole your design because it’s eye-catching and artistic and she clearly lacks the talent—look, there’s another thing you’re good at! Art. She changed that design because you can’t have a fairy on it and have it sold by a wolf. She used your situation to get cheap labor. That’s it. Romanticize her gifts, but do not romanticize the organization.”