What if I never did?
Lucien and Arthur had been hard at work searching for the location of the Unseelie stone, with Finlay’s help. Though Finlay was certain the stone was still in Scotland, he wasn’t sure where it’d been taken, or by who, and that led to nothing but frustration for everyone.
The days passed slowly here at the estate. Everyone helped with the farm work, save for me, who couldn’t do more than pet the animals. Kiara and Alexei busied themselves in the library, researching Droga and doing their best to learn how to defeat him. Delmare and Stefan were busy preparing as much as they could for the arrival of their baby, who was due next month, while Amantha had found a local rink close by. She snuck off at night to practice after all the other skaters had gone home. I longed to join her, but I knew that’d be stupid, in my condition.
Ethan helped me. Whenever he wasn’t at my side, he was lurking in the nearby woods. He said he was going hunting, trying to keep his mind off things, but to be honest, I didn’t knowwhathe was doing out there. He spent nearly all his time in the forest, and we were running out of room to put the game he caught each night.
I was starting to wonder if he was killing for sport instead of survival. I felt the rage inside of him quivering against our bond. The man became more like an animal every time he shifted to head into the wilderness, irrational and hard to reach.
Odette and Theo practiced ballet, as if they were still holding onto their dream of opening up a dance studio, and vanished for long periods of time. Odette and I had made up after our little argument, though things still felt complicated between us. We weren’t as close as we’d been before. It was clear she still held resentment against me for running away, and I was upset she couldn’t find it in her heart to forgive me for what happened, though I certainly deserved her anger. I didn’t know what to do about it.
Babcia and Bapa kept the estate running. They’d offered to keep teaching me Unseelie magic, but I’d turned them down… I wasn’t ready right now. My mother did gods only knew what whenever she couldn’t harass my father, and sneered at my grandparents each time they walked past. In kind, they ignored her.
They really needed to figure their shit out. The house was huge, so they could avoid each other, but I was tired of the tension whenever they crossed paths. I was aware they hated each other, but they needed to put their differences aside, if only for me and Arthur’s sake.
Vara spent a lot of time in her room, like I did. Her recovery after her rescue from Dolinska had been slow. Her children were due very soon. Miroslava had prepared for the labor as best she could, and yet, there was a sickening feeling in my gut that told me this birth was about to go very wrong.
I put it off to my horrible nerves.Everythingwas a threat in my mind, these days.
Jasper and Ozzie mostly kept to themselves and did their own thing. They rarely came out of their room. Jasper didn’t even venture out for ice practice with Amantha, and it was really weird. It was like both of them were too scared to leave the grounds.
Everything was so gray and dull. It felt like we were waiting around for something to happen. I would’ve said it was boring, if our impending doom wasn’t pressing down upon us.
Ireland rarely got snow, so I considered it a treat when there was a light snowfall over the estate at the end of February. It made me miss Malovia, where it snowed nearly every day. I sat in the foyer by a window, resting in an armchair with a journal of poetry opened up in front of me, a quill resting upon the page.
I’d come down here to write, but it seemed I had to force the words to come out these days. I hadn’t managed to compose a single line of a sonnet, and I’d been here for at least two hours. I stared out the window, watching the gentle snowflakes coat the endless green.
The sound of my brother’s footsteps approached. He placed a massive leather-bound book on the table in front of me— one that I considered a murder weapon more than a tome.
“Weather’s odd for this time of year,” Arthur said, casting a glance out the window.
Maybe everything in the world was changing now that Droga was back. He sat down on the other side of the table, and handed me a hot chocolate.
I took it kindly. I couldn’t drink coffee anymore, though I really missed it. The caffeine messed with my system, when it hadn’t before. It sent me spiraling into panic attacks and made me nervous and jittery.
It was such a small thing, but it crushed me. I couldn’t even have my favorite drink. Nothing about the world made sense anymore.
“How are you feeling, Em?” Arthur’s words were cautious, but I didn’t wish him to coddle me… though I felt more fragile than a china doll at the moment.
I shrugged as a response, and he frowned. I could focus on two things at a time right now; breathing, and whatever was in front of me. Putting my attention on more than one task sent me spiraling into hyperventilations. At the moment, this conversation was taking all of my energy.
“You can talk to me, you know that, right?” Arthur prompted.
“I know,” I responded, but he wasn’t the one I wanted to talk to. I hated to say it, but there was only one person I thought could help me through this, and she was dead.
I wish Lady Magdalina was here. She’d help me get over this. She wouldn’t let me mope around— she’d whip me into shape, tell me to keep my chin up and soldier onward, because come hell or high water, we’d have victory.
But she wasn’t here. I was at my weakest point when the world needed me most. There had never been a more important time for me to be at the top of my game, and here I was, unable to even have a sip of coffee.
I was aware of Arthur keenly studying me, and I couldn’t stand it, so I changed the subject.
“Did you find anything that could be useful to us?” I asked. I’d tried to help Arthur research, but whenever I came across anything that mentioned the Crystals of Harmony, Droga, or something relating to our fate, the words became blurry on the page, and I nearly passed out.
I felt so weak.
“I went off on a bit of a tangent, actually,” Arthur confessed, sounding guilty. “You wanted me to research CVID in our family line, but I never got the time. With the babies coming, and us having so much trouble with the Unseelie stone, well… I thought now would be appropriate.”
“Did you find out anything?” I asked. I was interested to discover our heritage in regards to our genetics.
