Killian smiles and takes my hand when I return to his side, and a woman in pristine white robes approaches the casket.
The priestess of the Faceless Goddess begins religious burial rites with a poetic incantation, calling upon the goddess to escort my mother’s soul into the afterlife and protect her eternal rest.
I watch with tear-blurred eyes as the casket is lowered into the ground. The priestess scatters soil and herbs of blessing over the grave, invoking the goddess and our ancestors to watch over my mother’s surviving loved ones and soothe our grief.
It’s a contrast to my father’s funeral—a memory I’ve rarely revisited. We didn’t have a body to bury; his platoon had been attacked by Siphons and he and the other soldiers were ripped to shreds. The only thing that they recovered from him was a finger. He was given a nondescript headstone in the soldier’s cemetery, marking an empty grave.
I add my own silent prayer to those of the priestess, wondering if our ancestors hear. If the Faceless Goddess hears.
Please, watch over Saela. Keep her safe. Help me bring her home as Mother wanted.
With that, the ceremony ends. The crowd begins to disperse, but I find myself rooted in place, unable to walk away from the grave.
Beside me, Killian squeezes my hand.
“Let’s go to your mother’s house,” he murmurs. “There are things that need to be sorted through, and you shouldn’t do it alone.”
Back in the neighborhood,the house seems smaller and emptier than I remember.
And… darker.
Like a lamp without a wick, never to be lit again.
I guess I never realized how much light my mother brought to this place. She was the one who made it a home—the one who filled it with life—even in the depths of her illness.
I stand in her empty bedroom and cry while Killian is outside speaking with the landlord about the outstanding rent.
Now, I have to sort through Mother’s belongings. Get them out. I won’t be returning to this place again, and neither will Saela. Soon, some other poverty-stricken family will live here. When Saela comes back, we’ll have to make a new home somewhere else. After I graduate from the Trials, I’ll be given a home in the Bonded City.
But… I might be queen by then, as unreal as that sounds, even in my head. We’ll live in the castle, I guess. Saela will have everything she ever needed and more.
That ought to be a dream come true, and yet…
My heart breaks, knowing we have to leave this dingy little hovel behind—and all the memories with it.
We’ll make new memories, I tell myself.
But it’s not the same. Mother won’t be there. Her presence in this place is like an imprint, memories embedded in every floorboard, every piece of furniture, every scrape and scuff.
The castle has its own ghosts—no room for my mother.
At least I have her things. I can take a few little pieces of her with me. Save a few fragments of her memory to share with Saela if—when—I bring my sister home.
I collect my mother’s favorite scarf from the closet. It was a gift from our father back when they were courting. It’s faded and frayed with age, but the woolen pattern of vines and roses still holds a whiff of her scent.
On a whim, I take a pair of her shoes, too; the carefully polished heels she wore only on very special occasions. They won’t fit me, but maybe when Saela’s older…
And then I remember the floorboard where mother kept her most prized possessions hidden, including the opal necklace.
Inside, I find a stack of leather-bound journals, their pages worn soft from frequent handling. They’re full of writings and drawings done in my mother’s elegant hand. I’m surprised.
And, for a moment, thrilled by the discovery.
She must have spent many hours filling these pages, yet I never saw her with the journals. To have such a record of my mother’s thoughts and feelings…
But when I look closer at the pages, I realize I’m holding a record of her madness.
The drawings are extraordinarily detailed and unnervingly repetitive. Most depict a crown in intricate detail: two wolves leaping at each other over a delicate circlet laden with jewels.
