Pitchers are tipped over; soldiers try to gag themselves in fear they have been drinking poison. The lie spreads like salt, drying up the truth and making every thought tainted and vengeful.
News of this will spread to the king, but with so many soldiers claiming the blood tasted off, I should be safe. For now…
Chapter
Thirty-Two
Selene
Idon’t know how I got here, but broken things tend to scatter as they crumble.
I left a part of me at the entrance to Blackthorn, a few more pieces as I forced my legs to walk up the long entrance, through the markets, and then the houses until I reached the castle itself.
More of me was left behind as I walked to my training field; some parts I didn’t need, others I don’t know how I would survive without.
The sun hits my face like a mother’s hand cupping my cheek, forcing my eyes up to look upon it. My knees sink into the fresh grass. The scent of soil and wildflowers fills my nose. It brings no peace. This feels like the end, a final goodbye to everything I once knew.
I fear I will soon know the true meaning of sacrifice; Everett always hinted he and I would find out. He paid with his life.
What shall I pay with?
“Selene!” Titus shouts as he sprints through the path that leads to my field.
“Slow down!” Tristen barks.
“Selene.” His voice is calmer now that he’s spotted me. His relief is a gust of wind onto a flame; at first, you think it silences the fire that is burning you. Then you realize relief is a trick. The wind actually provided the fire fuel.
Titus, Tristen, and I are trapped like lambs sentenced to slaughter.
I sink into the ground, finally shattering. Now I can pretend.
Pretending is an ability that has helped women survive their lives. Pretending to be somewhere else, with someone else. The world can take everything from us: our freedom, youth, material items, even those we love, but our ability to daydream is the most precious.
Pretending allows us to see those we lost, live a life that we will never be born into, plot out escapes that will never happen.
Dreams.
When we lose that, all hope turns white, not black. You see, darkness is consuming, but in those shaded layers, you still have your senses. As a matter of fact, everything is heightened; you hear more and sense greater depths. You still have hope you will find your way out.
Light is blinding, deafening. It doesn’t consume; it eradicates and strips every sense. In light, you see and sense no depths, only more light.
You are its prey.
You hear nothing, because light is faster. It’s the enemy that will always outrun you. It travels faster than darkness, faster than everything. Therefore, it will always arrive first, and those who stake their claim first have the higher ground.
Light is a warrior we can not best.
So, yes, in the darkness of my life, I can still daydream, but I fear that soon there will be no more questions, no darkness, only answers and light. No more dreams, just reality about what Galen and Sable have done.
And yes, what Everett has done, too.
“Selene! What’s happened?” Titus shadows me like a cloud, his face etched with a worry that feels like thunder. “Tristen, go get a healer,” he orders. His jaw sets into a state of firmness that rivals a diamond’s strength.
“If you find a healer who can repair time, then so be it, but if not, then stay,” I reply in a tone that resembles bones. Nothingness.
Titus drops to his knees. His brown eyes push into my green ones, like the earth trying to tell a dying tree, ‘It’s okay; I’m here to cradle you until you find your roots again.’
Yet every part of me has been sawed off, branches slowly ripped away, used as someone else’s wood to warm them as they survive.
