Page 88 of Light Locked
How could she even consider turning to such a life?
It was one of a thousand questions, but the more she replayed them without answers, one resounding truth was clear.
She was a stranger to the forest and a stranger to her people.
She was an alien.
She was alone.
The wall was less than a hundred meters away. She could hear branches breaking in the distance on either side as soldiers closed in to intercept her.
She ran harder. Her entire body ached.
The stone was so bright against the sunrise that it glowed. She ached to touch it like it might heal her torment. She had to.
Her illness had crippled her judgment, made her vulnerable, and she’d exchanged the mercy of her death sentence for the punishing sensation of Ryson’s hands, worsened only by the bond of his honesty.
By cien, how she missed him. She so desperately missed him.
With all of the force in her body, she slammed into the white walls. Her hands flattened against them, breath leaving her in a single struggling gasp and the touch of those walls vanquished any thoughts of the forest from her mind.
She pressed her body to the warm stones and collapsed with all of the weakness she’d fought back in the final days of her journey.
She was many things, but at last now she was home.
She determined that she could leave all of her troubling thoughts on this side of the wall. Once she crossed the gates, the version of her from the forest would remain there, a helpless, wandering girl, who learned too much too late.
Once she crossed the gates, she’d be royalty, and no matter what discipline, pain or hardship it took, she would never let herself be helpless again.
†††
Her journey was over. Her return into the city was a blur of explanations and awe as soldiers verified her identity. The world was a rush of whispers that Clea floated through in a silent haze. Time slipped by, stopping only once when she was offered a blessed box.
She realized she was standing in a familiar waiting room, adorned with Loda’s colors of sky blue, white and gold, with wide windows created to invite the light. The entire castle was like this, the architecture worshiping the sky.
“Your highness,” the soldier prompted again as she stared at the box, wondering for a moment what it was for and then remembering as she recalled the reason for her journey in the first place.
She lifted her dirtied fingers to the back of her neck and undid the silver clasp of the medallion. She watched it dangle and spin in the light before lowering it slowly in the box, chain and all. The crack across the front still seethed ominously.
She eyed it now in the trappings of its prison.
“Destroy it,” she said, not knowing to whom she spoke as she watched the black gem which was soon eclipsed in the shadow of the box lid and then gone altogether. After that, the world ran normally again, giving her enough time to collect herself before she was led to two double doors and left there at last.
Clea opened the doors and stepped into a dimly lit room, an open window in the corner allowing natural light to filter in and spill over the bed. Everything had been moved and rearranged, perhaps a reflection of her father’s own restless habits. She’d inherited those from him. Now a lot of thefurniture was pushed and piled in the corner of the room. Clea recognized several pieces of her mother’s, as if her father had pushed them out of sight but couldn’t get rid of them.
Her father was sitting up in bed, mostly covered by blankets and in a long green robe. His green eyes had taken on a grayish hue, but had lost none of their sharp, speculative gleam. He had a personal policy against lying down in the presence of anyone but her mother. He always said it gave anyone an advantage in case of an attack. Clea and her siblings, and even her mother, had sometimes laughed at the depth of this paranoia, but now his concerns seemed more real. His gray beard hid all but the tightness of his mouth, and the headboard and pillows propped up his weakened body. Hands that looked naked without their metal rings lay on his lap, and his eyes remained unreadable as they watched her circle the bed and sink down into a chair near his bedside.
They waited for a moment in silence, taking each other in. As she examined his weakness, she wondered now how he perceived hers. She’d lost so much weight, her body was drained and sickly, her clothes covered in dirt and ash, her skin laden in sweat, her hair in complete disarray. She expected him to point out or criticize any of these things, but instead he said what she least expected.
“You now watch me brazenly like your mother did,” he said, his voice gruff, the words his version of warmth in that they hid a nested compliment.
“I’m stronger now,” she said, and though she didn’t feel it, she knew it was true. The sight of her father now shrunk the manin her memories. In three years, neither of them had changed so drastically, but she felt bigger beside him rather than a figure in his shadow. Somewhere along the way, a servant, guard or advisor had informed her of her fathers contraction of their family's illness. She hadn’t paid attention to the who, only the what behind the message.
“I see,” he replied. “You come now with the intention of taking the throne?”
Clea shook her head. “I wouldn’t—”
“You should.” In the hardness of his voice, she understood now that the question had not been an accusation but a suggestion. “The Decline closes in and people need their light more than ever.”
