Page 38 of Of Sockets Of Stitches
Vitale was known as the largest and best protected of all cities, and whether this had to do with its position closest to my tower, I could not say.
Pulses.
Vitals.
Vital.
Vitale.
And my queendom at the exact center of Vitale, exactly where a heart should be.
I slid down to a shocked and numb pool on the ground. My cheek rested against the olden rock, though I detested it for the knowledge just granted.
Kings had held the world together as best as they could until I arrived. They had fumbled as well as possible, with no real knowledge from ancients.
Yet the time of kings was over, and now a queen could see all, and what for?
How I had congratulated myself with the small healing ideas already put in motion for princesses and kings—mediations for the Raises, brutal self-awareness for the princess of change, an inner journey for King Bring, and the hints of emotional diversity for the Takes.
All for naught.
For I had never seen my romance with King See as necessary. And now that I had finally accepted its disrepair while in the haze, I was meant to reverse my thinking somehow to love him again?
Fate was cruel, yes, but that was of no matter. The matter was the utter impossibility of the task.
Yet the sorry romance I shared with See was painfully evident in seven hundred and thirteen weak and sickly pulses,four enormous and frayed arteries, and tens of thousands of veins.
So, then.
The world could not be saved.
Chapter Fourteen
Of fraying unions,
And the like.
As I tuned back into my bodily senses, their whispers were very audible, and I wondered how many whispers I had missed in my deep musings.
“Should we ask her if she is well?”Toil.
“She has done nothing but sit there from dusk to dawn.”Princess Take.
“That grave is no good for her. Less and less good, if you ask me.” Is.
Kings would no doubt overhear their hushed comments, even if they were not eavesdropping. Kings had very good hearing, and one in particular—King Take—liked to know everything about everyone, especially matters of delicacy.
How differently I saw the monsters around me. None of them, even simple monsters and pawns, could have guessed their importance in the saving of the world.
Even King Change, who wished the exact opposite.
In my deep musings, I had confirmed that simple monsters and pawns were represented in the most important veins of the world’s lifeforce. There was an imprint of the circulatory system in my mind’s eye—I would never forget the snaking, broken, and frayed lines of lightning in the haze.
The saving of the world had warranted reflection, and so I had sat in the small lounge that used to be a laundry and stared without seeing at the empty fireplace.
To consider frayed unions that must be healed.
To consider an obliterated heart that must keep pumping—and pump better than ever before.
