Put Up This Façade

"Emma!" he rasped and pulled the reins of the horse. Titan came to a stop. Lazarus curled his fingers beneath her chin and lifted her face. He tilted his head to see her. "Don't cry." He hated to see tears in her eyes. "That man did a terrible thing. He drugged you. It could have been dangerous. The drug that was used wasn't an ordinary one."

"But why…?" she whined. "I didn't even know him." 

"You know me," he said. "And that is more than enough for my enemies to target you. With that drug, you would have stayed drugged for a few days and then some more. If I hadn't eaten the food as well, I would have never come to know. It was possible that you would have died. And that was what some people wanted — to push you to the brink of death just before the soul casting ritual." 

She gasped when she heard the extent of the plan, horror coiling in her chest.