A shadow flickers across the fogged windows. Before I can make the decision to run, the door creaks open.
“We’re clo—Nox.”
My father’s voice trembles on my name, wiping away any question I had of whether he would recognize me. Before I can respond, he’s practically ripped the door off its hinges, wrapping his arms around me, his strong, calloused hands grasping at the nape of my neck.
“My son. Oh, my son…”
Panic stirs through me, but it’s an old reaction. Though I’m still cursed with vampirism in this body, my connection with Farin has been severed, so while the cravings for blood haven’t vanished completely, they’re considerably more manageable. Especially since I fed on the way.
Still, I try not to breathe too deeply as my father weeps on my shoulder.
It’s a more anxiety-inducing encounter than I imagined. Mostly because I keep waiting for my father to ask about Zora, but he doesn’t. I recognize soon that he’s also waiting for me to ask about my mother, and my stomach plummets.
Dead. My mother is dead. She must be.
But then my father pulls away, wiping his tears from his crystal-blue eyes, and I finally get a good look at him.
He’s fae, meaning he’s hardly aged since I last saw him, though I suppose the same can’t be said for me, since I was only a child when I was taken.
His midnight hair has grown out, and he looks less like the clean, orderly father I remember and more like a male struggling to survive alone in the wilderness.
“Your sister?” he finally asks.
I swallow, then shake my head slowly, unable to face the lingering hope in his gaze.
“Ah.” It seems that’s all he’s able to choke out for a moment as he presses his fist to his lips and squeezes his eyes shut.
It’s all my fault, I should add. I didn’t save her, I should admit, but I don’t. Can’t.
“Well, we’ll have to be gentle with how we tell your mother,” he finally says, straightening his back, though his shoulders still droop with weariness. “She’s…. Well, I suppose you’ll see soon enough.”
The brief relief that swarmed my chest at the news my mother still lives is replaced by an innate dread, but I’ve no time to ask what he means as he leads me to the back room.
I try not to, but I can’t help but note the mess that’s accumulated after all these years.
My parents were always the cluttered sort, mostly because they were always trading wares with the passersby that frequented the Serpentine right off of my parents’ property.
This is not clutter.
It’s filth.
My stomach twists at the sight, not out of disgust, but because of what I’m afraid it means.
When my father leads me to the back room, my fears are realized.
There’s a lump in the bed, though I recognize immediately by her breathing patterns that my mother is not asleep. Far from it. The sun has only just set, an abnormal time for anyone to be in bed, but something about the way the closed curtains collect dust tells me this isn’t an unusual occurrence.
“Merida,” my father calls, and my chest constricts again at hearing my mother’s name on my father’s lips. I don’t think I expected to hear that again. “Merida. We have a visitor.”
No one answers, though I can’t help but notice my mother halts her breathing. As if she can make herself unnoticeable if only she goes completely still.
“Merida.” My father takes a deep breath, biting the inside of his cheek like he’s afraid of telling her the truth. Not the truth that I’m alive, but of the inevitable question that will follow.
“Maybe I should just go.” I’m panicking now, realizing what our loss has done to our mother. Our mother, who used to tend to the wounded who’d been robbed on the Serpentine. Our mother, who used to give too many wares for free to those upon whom she took pity.
I destroyed her by leaving, and then I took Zora away from her too. Not that I knew the consequences of my actions at the time.
You did this, a voice whispers to me in the back of my mind.
It’s strange. I would have thought I blamed Abra for this. I suppose now that she’s dead, there’s no one left to blame but me.
The hurt in Blaise’s eyes when I betrayed her flashes across my memory. At the time, I didn’t think I had a choice. I entered into a fae bargain with Abra the night Blaise Turned. Vowed to be her servant eternally if she would do what she could to bring Blaise back. I’d felt good about that not being a problem as soon as I realized the parasite was the one in control, not Abra.
But then Abra had pushed through.
She was so distraught over Farin, but I knew if I didn’t take my chance then, it wouldn’t be long before she remembered her command over me.
I couldn’t be a slave to Abra. Not again.
Still.
The hurt in Blaise’s eyes scalds my soul, even if it’s true that I don’t love her anymore.
Blaise has haunted me since the day I left her. It doesn’t seem love is a requirement for her to have burrowed inside my soul.
Because I remember loving her. Not how it felt—at least, I can’t feel it in real time. But I remember there was a time when I would have clawed through heaven and earth to get to her. I remember cradling her dead body and being willing to give all of myself away just to get her back.
I push the thought of Blaise away.
