Page 48 of Fated or Knot

“What is it, dearest?”

I kept folding and stacking, ears perked with hope.

“I want her earrings. They’d compliment me quite nicely, don’t you think?”

For a moment, I shut my eyes and set my teeth. Maybe I deserved exactly this for stealing and selling her spare pair of amethysts.

Cymora barely missed a beat. “Give her your earrings, Lark.”

My fingers jolted toward my ears, quite literally jumping at her command while I murmured my agreement. I removed the little hoops with their tiny white gems and handed them to Laurel, who put them in the second section of her finned ears with a giddy giggle.

She pushed the fins forward with her fingertips for Cymora to admire. “You make them sparkle,” my stepmother said in approval.

Then her gaze landed on me kneeling by the neat stack of bedding I’d made. “Bring all that. Let’s go,” she stated.

“Yes, Stepmother.” I didn’t hold in my resigned sigh, and in response, she kicked out and tripped my bad foot, sending me in a sprawl with a choked scream as agony coursed up my leg.

“Smile,” she barked. “Be happy. You did this to yourself, so you have no reason to act moody.”

“Y-yes,” I managed through a grimace forced upon my face. She hadn’t quite realized that she couldn’t order me to feel differently about a situation than I already did, but I could be made to look happy through most pains. I gathered up the items that’d scattered when I fell and limped after her and Laurel.

They looked both ways up and down the hall before gesturing me onward. We went through the bathing car, and Cymora tried the door leading to the last car at the back of the train. It opened and a breeze blew in from outside, teasing the strands of my stepmother’s hair.

We stood on the last observation platform easily accessible without an attendant’s help. The door into the storage car wasusually locked, requiring a staff member to be present to deter thievery. Wind shrieked beyond the platform, as we stood under an arc of metal that protected us from the worst of it.

I gulped a swallow even while wearing a forced smile. The sweat on my palms soaked into the fleece blanket at the bottom of the pile I held.

“Layer an illusion over the window to make it look like no one is out here,” Cymora ordered.

I turned toward the door leading back into the bathing car and considered the window. They were almost as tricky as mirrors, reflecting light at odd angles depending on the time of day and the cleanliness of the glass. To use the least amount of essence possible, I frosted the window with a layer of icy mist.

“Good enough. Now stand right here.” Cymora indicated the middle of the platform.

I went to where she’d pointed, looking out over the sea. It was a dizzying distance below, any waves or disturbances on its surface smoothed to a glasslike finish from up here. “Yes, Stepmother…please.” I felt like I was a teenager again, hopeful that she would simply stop if I was contrite enough. “Please, don’t do this. Let me show my regret. I can make things right.”

Ignoring me, Cymora lifted most of the stacked items from my hands, leaving the fleece blanket on the bottom resting on my palms. “Tell me what this means to you.”

“It was a gift from Prince Kauzden,” I answered. New tears sprung to my eyes. “He saw that I loved how it felt and bought it for me to nest with.”

“Oh,verysweet,” she said in a cloying tone.

I turned toward her, but the plea on my tongue shriveled to nothing at the malice I saw reflecting back at me. Nothing I could say would deter her from the next order. Like every other punishment, it was as inevitable as my next breath. I could either let it happen or have it shoved down my throat.

With a grin of pure glee, Cymora ordered, “Drop it into the sea.”

For a moment, my fingers tightened around the soft fabric. I wanted to scream, to wail.No, it’s mine!But all that’d accomplish would be her further satisfaction. I was always going to lose this blanket. If not now, then tomorrow or later, whenever Cymora decided I needed to be put in my place. Fighting only made it worse.

I lifted the blanket past the safety rail and let go of it, watching it unfurl like a multi-colored sail on its way down, pinwheeling to its inevitable saltwater demise. A single droplet fell from my cheek to join it down below.

The train-assigned blanket and pillow followed it. “Don’t need this or this…” Cymora muttered. She handed me the fuzzy pillow, and we restarted the process. I told her about the gift and where it came from and was forced to release it off the side of the railing.

“Prince Kauzden is going to be so disappointed you threw his gifts in the sea,” Laurel laughed as it became a speck behind us.

Cymora smirked as she said, “Like he’s even going to notice.”

My belly hollowed out. The princes had no reason to look at my nest, so it probably would go overlooked once she ordered me to keep this punishment a secret. All I had to look forward to for the next couple nights was a bare mattress.

“All right, what’s all this?” With my cloak thrown over one of her arms, she was inspecting the three tokens I’d collected.

---