She glances up from her book at Lady Bethany, then lowers her head again, catching onto my implications. “Then where?”
“Tonight. Your room.”
She frowns at my self-invitation, but neither of us has long to argue because Lady Bethany strolls toward us with a smile on her face, now within hearing distance.
“Girls,” she chimes and tilts her head to try and read Lyra’s book. “Lyra, I’m so elated to see you’re feeling better. What is it you’re reading?”
Lyra lifts the book to show her the cover, and I try not to laugh. ‘The Art of Warfare’. I should have switched our books; it would have made far more sense.
Lady Bethany’s eyebrows lift in surprise. “An…interesting choice of read, my dear. Why ever would you be intrigued to pull that one from the shelves?”
“B-because I…” the delicate curve of her throat bobs as she works to blurt out an answer, “was curious to see if there was any mention of Kilamber in here. Our town was known for creating dragonblades, and so I thought my family name might be in here.”
If I could clap for her quick wit, I would.
Lady Bethany looks to me next, and I lift the book to show her my title. “‘Poets and Poems’, Marcella?” she asks, then looks me up and down.
“Is that a surprise to you, Lady Bethany?” I challenge with a smile.
“No, of course not. Nothing surprises me about you.” But that smile on her face is anything but warm. She pats my knee, then leans in and whispers into my ear, “I know more about you than you do of me.”
As I turn to face her with a thundering heart, she’s already walking away.
“What? What did she say to you?” Lyra whispers behind me.
I shake my head, staring at the back of Lady Bethany as she stops in the center of the room and announces loudly, “Girls, this concludes our time in the library. You will return to your rooms and refresh yourselves for dinner tonight. Tomorrow, we shall resume our lessons.”
Twenty-Nine
- LYRA -
Dinner comes and goes. One of the women is swept away for a private dinner with Cyrus. Part of me is jealous, as I’m reminiscing about the way he swept the sugar off my cheek. How his gaze floated from my mouth to my eyes. That in the moment, it felt sacred. Like time had stopped—as if I were meant to be there. I keep replaying it over and over, wondering if I should have done something. If I should have leaned in a bit farther, settling in on the curve of his mouth for a silent invitation. Even though I don’t know much about him, our conversation about character sticks in my brain.
I can only wonder if the other women feel the same draw as I do. If they have moments just as special as the one we had. I cling to the hope that they don’t. Even if part of that makes me selfish.
As we are led back to our rooms, Marcella tosses me a quick look. Reminding me about tonight.
After I’ve shut my door and slipped my shoes off, I pull the pins out of my hair, letting it fall in long waves down to the middle of my back. As I pull my fingers through it, I avoid my reflection in the mirror, stride over to the window, and stare out at the mountain range drenched in shadow. The starry sky beyond it is dazzling, with starlight peeking out through the dark clouds scuttling along the expanse.
I shift my focus back to that single paver I swore had been imperfect along the patterned walkway. Waiting for the truth to emerge like the fog from a forest. I don’t dare look away from it. I try not to blink and miss it. The longer I sit and stare, the more I wonder if my mind is becoming jumbled. Perhaps whatever they used to wipe our memories did more than just that? What if it altered my consciousness?
Or…perhaps my disease is overtaking me. Whatever it is.
My mother’s warning echoes in my head.“I am so sorry you’ve beentrapped with this illness. As much as it pains me to say, you must not share this with anyone else. You cannot marry, and you cannot have children. Do you understand?”
I sag back against the windowsill, leaning my head against the windowpane still staring at that single paver as I absentmindedly trace circles against the glass.
“I understand,”I had replied as a child, my voice small and timid.
But I’m here. Competing for the hand of King Cyrus. What does she think of me now? Is she angry I didn’t heed her warning?
No. I slipped off into the night once I had the opportunity, only leaving behind a note. That I was pursuing a path that might lead to a cure, and relieve the financial burden I had bestowed upon our family. That maybe it was our best chance of happiness—for all of us.
It was my fault we were penniless. I never could stop myself from blaming my birth. I had no siblings—it was only me. When my parents discovered my illness as a toddler, they knew better than to have more. It had been a challenge just to keep me alive. The older my parents got, the harder it got for them to keep up on the family business. My father developed a severe case of arthritis, to the point it pained him to move.
My mother, on the other hand, had her sanity begin to slip as I became a teenager. The first time it happened was a surprise for us all. She had gone missing one night. Vanished sometime after dinner. My father and I were not worried until a few hours later, when we noticed she never returned. We scoured the town for hours in the dark, and the more time that went on, the more we were convinced something awful had happened to her. Perhaps she was taken. Murdered. As dawn began to break, we checked the western outskirts of Kilamber in the barren hills.
And there she was. The sky melting from black to orange with the sunrise as she turned to face us when we called her name. She looked the same—and yet, her eyes were distant. Glazed over in white. My father brushed me behind him as he tried to coax her to us. Like she was an animal. Like she was wild. Foreign words upon her lips that none of us had ever heard before.
