It’s the smell of herbs tainted with the memory of metallic blood.
It’s the dipping of his water mixture wrung out in the bowl that’s morphed into the sound of blood dripping into a puddle.
It’s the swipe of his motions merged with the swipe of the sword.
It’s Digby watching me now, just as he was then.
But it’s the window that really does me in. The dark glass may as well be a mirror for how well it reflects. And with my face turned toward it, there’s no hiding away from the sight of my exposed back.
It looks soempty.Devoid. When I see it like this, the true reality of my loss slams into me full-force in a way it hasn’t before. Because I wouldn’t let myself think of it. But now, I can’t ignore it. Because there it is, like scalloped edges jutting from my back that I can no longer cling to.
They’re gone.
I don’t have their comforting hug around my middle or their graceful twirls along the floor. I don’t have the satiny brushes against my skin or the steadying weight at my back. They’ve been taken away, hacked away like a length of hair, leaving me to ache with the loss. All that’s left are two rows of jagged, throbbing stubs that bleed and fray in the wake of what they once were.
And it’s right here, right in this moment, that the pent-up sob finally tears past my lips. My stopper is yanked out, and there are no denials, noI’m fines. There isn’t a cave in the world that’s deep enough for me to hide away from this.
Because I’ve passed the point of no return now, and it’s not just that there’s no going back—it’s that my back doesn’t evenexistanymore.
Eruptive emotion pushes out of me, so loud I feel it must burst from the house and echo through the cave. As if it cries with me.
And everything,everything,comes spilling out. Like a broken bottle, its contents leaked past the cracks.
Truth be told, I don’t know if I’ll ever feel full again.
I sob and I grieve, and it’s not subtle or quiet, but a violent wracking of mourning that digs itself out of me and lands in a messy, hurtful heap. But all the while, Slade squeezes my hand and Digby stands watch.
I may be empty, but I am not alone.
And that, at least, is something.
CHAPTER 18
AUREN
When you hit rock bottom,you feel it.
You break down, walls crumbling until you’re free-falling. The feelings that you tried to run from suddenly rush up around you in an unstoppable force, the gravity of your thoughts now nothing but a punishing plunge.
When you slam into the bottom, that landing jolts you all the way to your very soul. You hit hard, and it cracks the very foundation of the world. The ground fragments beneath you, lines stretching far and wide.
And then you’re left, a pile of rubble.
But I realize something as I lie here, surrounded by the destruction of my plummet. These cracks that have spread out from my caustic landing, they’re not evidence of my ruination.
They’re paths.
Each jagged line leads from me and then diverts away, showing me all the different ways I could go from here.
I lie on the bed with Hojat’s hands tending to my hacked back, with tears streaking down my face, where even breathing hurts. But I’m also in my mind, staring at the fissures around me, seeing where each one leads. Because now that I’m forced to feel what I didn’t want to, I have a decision to make.
I can choose to stay stagnant here, at the bottom of the cliff, broken and unmoving. I can rage, I can wallow, I can blame, I can hide. I can let the severed parts of me sever all the rest.
Or I can get up, dust myself off, and look back up. I can find a path that ensures I’ll never fall again, ensures that I don’t lose any more parts of myself. All I have to do is turn and follow my feet, one step at a time.
So that’s what I’ll do.
I let myself cry until all my tears dry up. It’s not ragged or turbulent anymore. Instead, it’s quiet. Slow. The kind of tears your expression lets fall without fanfare. There is no choked breathing or scrunched up nose. No pulled lips or furrowed brow. This is the suffering of the silent. A hurt so deep it doesn’t show itself on a face. The tears fall down my wooden expression, leaking from slowly blinking eyes while I stare at my reflection through the window. While I grieve for twenty-four strands of me that have been plucked away like petals from a flower.
