“I will send them home to their families,” the woman announces. “All but you, Tiberius. You will stay with me.”
“I cannot leave my people, come with me. Come to Divio.”
There is a moment of silence and I hear Brutus moan, obviously not a fan of my plan, but there is nothing that I can do. Not yet, at least. I don’t know if there ever will be, but I have to try, for my people, for any hope of getting my Drucilla back with me.
“You make a deal with a messenger of Diaboli,” Amare hisses, speaking of the God of the Underworld.
“This I know, this is the only deal I can make that will save my people,” I state.
“Your empress?” she asks. “The prophecy?”
Turning to look at her, I give her my most sorrowful gaze. “I hope that with your help and the help of the other gods, you can spare my people, knowing that I was unable to do anything else. Protect my Drucilla.”
“Do you love her?” Amare asks.
Pressing my lips together, I am unsure how to answer this. “I feel for her something I have never felt before. I do not know what it means or what it stands for.”
“I will try my hardest to plead to the others on behalf of your case. I make no promises,” she finally confesses.
Shaking my head, I finally have the strength to stand. “You will protect her?” I ask.
“With all of the power that I hold.”
“I accept your proposal. I will come to live with you,” the venefica announces. “You will call me by my name, Decima.”
“Decima,” I rasp, hating that it is close to Drucilla, despising even more that it is not indeed my Drucilla.
This is my own hell on earth, my penance for all of the bad deeds that I have done in my lifetime. I just hope that my people do not suffer greatly for their emperor’s mistakes. I hope that my Drucilla, who is no doubt innocent, does not suffer wherever she is.
Chapter Sixteen
DRUCILLA
I blink, looking around and trying to figure out exactly where I am. The room is bright, and I shield my eyes with my hand, trying to take it all in. It takes me a moment for everything to register… I’m home.
The sun shines into my bedroom and I sit straight up. My heart pounds as I look around. I’m alone. Listening to the world around me, I hear things that I never thought I would again. Cars, horns honking, people shouting below—sirens.
“Holy shit,” I breathe.
Then I hear something else, something that I hadn’t even missed, but thought that I could live without. My phone notification goes off. Turning toward the source of the noise, I see my phone plugged into the charger, exactly where I would have put it to go to bed.
“Was it all a dream?” I ask.
I look down and realize I’m still in my gown. Lifting my hand, I touch my head and I feel it. Standing, I rush over to the mirror and there, in front of me, my reflection shows me what I’ve wanted to see since Laurentia put me all together—my makeup, my dress, my ropes, and my crown.
Looking down at my hand, I see my ring, my wedding ring. It wasn’t a dream. It was real. It was real and I’m back here. I don’t know who transported me back, but now I’m worried.
The prophecy, if all of that was real, the world I was in, then that means that the prophecy was real and I remember them saying that bad shit would go down if it wasn’t fulfilled properly. Meaning Tiberius and I weren’t happily in love and creating mini-Tiberius babies.
Rushing back to my phone, I open Safari and search for Savona. The only thing that comes up is a province in Italy. I start to read about it and I’m surprised it has its own president. I didn’t think that was a thing. I immediately find myself sucked into the history of the province, but nothing that I find connects to Tiberius.
Until I look up Emperor Tiberius who according to Google reined in the year fourteen. An image pops up, there is a stone bust of this man, and my heart races as I blow up the image so that I can see it, but I frown at the sight.
It isn’t my Tiberius.
I mean, the bust of the man is nice and all, but he’s not my Tiberius. Not my emperor. My heart sinks down to my stomach at the thought of not seeing my Tiberius again. Then I wonder why I’m so upset? Didn’t I plan on finding my way home anyway?
Shaking my head, I pinch my eyes closed. Not like this. I didn’t want to come home alone, not without my sisters, and honestly, I’m not sure that I wanted to come home at all. I was kind of liking that world, and that man, even if I couldn’t understand a single word he said… what we did together alone was pretty fantastical.
I’m not sure what to do. I feel like I should be doing something, trying to find a way back to Tiberius, trying to do something—anything. Nervous energy fills me so I decide to take a quick shower.
Taking off all of my awesome clothes and then finally my crown makes me feel sad. When I’ve stripped myself of everything, I take a look at my bare body and hair in the mirror and frown. The only thing I’ve kept on is my wedding ring.
I feel—empty.
Once I’ve showered and washed my hair and body with my regular soaps, that emptiness returns. Putting on a pair of shorts and a loose-fitting tank, again, emptiness. Chancing a glance at my reflection again, I can’t do anything but stare.
Suddenly, I don’t feel like myself anymore. I’m not the girl that I was when I wore these things a few weeks ago,
