Page 105 of Antiletum
Her mother shut her eyes. Brought her fingers to her forehead and braced herself on a bookshelf. “Deos,” she murmured.
“Give the guards a description.” Her father’s voice was as stony as his face. “Have him found. Bring him to me.”
Delaney sobbed harder. “He didn’t do anything. It was me. It was all me!”
“Your defiance and behavior has always been alarming. But this time, you’ve gone too far. Information is currency, Delaney. And especially to the poor. Any threats of revelation have to be cut out. With any luck, it isn’t already too late.”
“You can’t kill him!” she yelled. “He didn’t do anything wrong! He won’t tell anyone. Iknowhe won’t.” Hysterics had fully taken her. Delaney ran to her father. Grabbed his hands, tried to pull him closer and make him look into her anguished face.
He responded by ripping them away, swiping the back of his hand across her cheek with a loud, crackingsmack!
Delaney’s head hurled to the side with the force of her father’s backhand, lip split and blood trickling from the corner of her mouth. Her mother said nothing. Didn’t even flinch.
Rainah ran to them, pulling Delaney in her arms. “Stop!”
“Don’t you start too!” he screamed, shaking an accusing finger at Rainah.
“Both of you. Ungrateful to your cores,” their mother finally spoke. Cold, beautiful, and wholly uncaring. The wordmaternalhad never fit to her person.
She strolled towards Delaney, head hung as she held her flaming cheek, sobs cut off at the knees in her numbing shock at being struck. Neither of her parents had ever hit her before.
Rainah still hugged her, crying silently. Pulled Delaney’s head into her chest to shield her from their mother.
“You.” Their mother grabbed Delaney’s chin. Forced her away from the embrace of her elder sister to look into her hazel eyes—so like Delaney’s. “Tomorrow, I am taking you back to the estate. Where you will stay. For good. Before you destroyeverythingthis family has worked for. Do you not care about your sister at all? About us?”
The question stabbed no less than it always did when hurled at her. Of course she cared about all of them. But was she not allowed to care about herself as well?
“Please, Mother. You can’t kill him. I’ll go back. I’ll stay. I’ll be good and listen. I promise.” Delaney sounded small. As she often did in the presence of her parents.
“Today was your test on if we could trust you to do what’s right. To prioritize this family over yourself. You failed. For someone arguingagainst death so fiercely, you certainly don’t mind dabbling in it. His blood is on your hands. And that is yours alone to live with.”
Finally, Delaney began to regret being so open. Sharing herself in a way she had never been allowed. She just wanted to be seen, to be understood and accepted for all that she was.
Delaney sobbed again, harder, over the sounds of Tenna describing in intricate detail the appearance of Sebastian for them to hunt down. Rainah dragged her to a settee while she cried. Held her close and whispered it wasn’t her fault.
No matter her sister’s words, Delaney drowned in guilt over the fact that she hand delivered his execution out of her own selfishness. Didn’t even warn him of what might come. It poured into her lungs, into her chest, owning her entire being.
Every time Delaney had slipped, let another see her using her magic, it was someone on the estate. An employee loyal to the Thornridges. A family member who already knew. Reason enough for her parents to keep her so hidden away within the bubble of their making, knowing no whispers would escape.
She hoped Sebastian wouldn’t be found. That he would be lost in an ocean of faces within a city where most everyone was poor. A city he knew well. Hope clung to her like static all through the long hours of night that she didn’t sleep and no sentinels returned. It stayed alive in her heart when she departed the next day in an unforgiving carriage with her silent mother and Tenna after giving Rainah a tearful, wordless goodbye as they had nothing sufficient to say.
That hope thrived, even as miles from an unsuspecting Delaney the next night, a tall, dark haired boy—tresses slashed unevenly by a blade—fell before her father’s feet. Beaten, bruised, and bloody. Even as their father forced Rainah to watch as he cut that boy’s neck, bleeding him dry. Forced a cup full of moonwater down his daughter’sthroat. Growled in her ear, “You want to protect your sister? Then show her what she’s done.”
Delaney’s hope lived, that Sebastian might get away. Right up until the moment that Rainah’s clairvoyance floated to her in a dream, delivering an image of proof: the consequences of her actions.
And, in a way, she died right along with him while she sobbed alone in the dark in a foreign and empty room, curled into herself. Utterly alone. No one to hold or comfort her through her heartache. Resigning herself to accept the unending lonely life waiting for her at home.
Because in her mind, she deserved nothing more.
Present
Val pulls his gaze from the chipped and fading paintings of owls, foxes, and caracals decorating above our heads in the smallspirlinary, the shadow of cypress trees drawing black pictures on the floor.
He stares at me pointedly. As he has so many times since we wed.
My vision turns hazy, salty fluid burning, spilling down my cheeks. And I’m terrified of what Iknowthat my husband is about to say.
“Delaney. It’s me.Myname was Sebastian.” Val utters that name. Effortlessly. Like it’s been floating around on his tongue for all of his life.
