Page 123 of Of Sockets Of Stitches
Every monster in the world was lost or gone except me, and the monster who hated me.
I inhaled, then pushed to stand. “If this is how matters are, then this is how matters are meant to be. You surely knew of what must occur. You who whispered encouragement in my ears for any solution to the problem of King Change that did not include harming him. You who begged for a conversation with your brother to change his mind. You who joined monsters tonight to help me escape but also attempted to destroy them.” I walked up to him. “Destroymonsters, See.”
He turned away. “That was not a surety.”
My voice boomed. “That was surely a surety. You fool yourself truly. You saw the evil claiming Cassandra. You saw that we could not win. The unchanging king was a poison to her—an entry point for ruin. As he would have continued to be for monsters always.”
“No!” See roared. He whirled to face me. “There was a way. You killed him for nothing. A monster who you claimed to love despite his faults. Monsters are your reason for being, Perantiqua, your very soul, and youmurderedone in cold blood. He was defenseless to protect himself. His princess was forced to watch him die. I was so sure that you would not do it. That you would search for another way where all monsters were well, as you always do. But at last I see that no one is allowed to stand in the way of the mighty queen’s ambition. I have never known you until now.”
See stormed away to the tower.
To be with our olden rock, and to see the black swirling there.
The black that existed because See had still been intending to betray me again, and he had seen that I would betray him by killing his brother. So we had both betrayed each other. But how, then, could we ever be more healed than we were? I would need to make queenly choices without regard for our romance, and he would feel compelled to interfere in matters regarding his brothers—clearly. We would nevernotneed to do this.
So how could a romance between queen and prince consort ever be better than it was?
How could the heart of monsters and the world heal?
I sat where my mother had sat for so long beside her hellebore grave. How long ago it seemed when I was digging her grave in the courtyard of Hotel Vitale. I had rested her in the hole and had felt so averse to covering her face with dirt. I had laid next to the grave to stare at the night sky, and then had a visit from Is.
That was the first night I had transformed into a monster of stitch and patch. And now the night no longer existed, and only a single stitch remained on me.
Mother’s stitch remained, attaching my pelvis to legs and torso at the front and back.
Now I was a queen and one of two monsters left in the world.
My focus lifted to the top of the tower where See paced. I had hurt him greatly. If I had not killed King Change, then we would not be here now to hopefully go on. But I had hurt him. Someone that he had loved was no longer here because of me.
Though knowing that my own mother must depart, how would I feel if See’s hands ended her undead existence?
How would I wash that from my mind to keep loving him?
I sighed, and settled to watch See. The air crackled with his rage and upset, and his pacing did not relent for an age.
The hellebores beside me rustled in warning of the foe they were fighting on the other side. We could not sit here endlessly.
See’s pacing abated, and I lost sight of him when he sat. Tension remained in the air, but the crackling subsided.
I stood and walked to the tower. I climbed and climbed, and exited through the trapdoor. See sat staring out at the haze so filled with the map of our success, his back leaning against our olden rock.
I leaned my back against the other side of it. The blackwithin was bizarrely weaker—ironic considering the state of us. There only remained a gray swirl.
There was hope.
“For so long there were only your brothers to understand you. See, I am sorry that saving the world demanded the immortality of King Change. I am very sorry.”
He did not answer.
So I kept going. “I have sat beside my mother’s grave and thought about my first night as a monster. I have contemplated how often in monsterdom, I have felt as if I am simply running on a hamster wheel—a rat in a maze with set paths that I might only choose the best of. Just now, I have reflected on what you said about there being another way. I feel firmly that there was not. For if there was not, then you are right, my soul would have demanded that I take that path. I hear the pain in the words you uttered to me. I hear your loss. I hear that you feel I have betrayed you, and I have. I betrayed the love you felt for another.”
See dragged in a painful inhale, as though his agony had no escape.
I walked around the olden rock. His head was in his hands.
“Why do you plague me?” he said in a guttural voice.
I lowered onto his lap and looked into the milky gaze that detested me in this moment. But I had forgiven him—trusted in him. I had set the tone for our future.
