Page 72 of Drawn in Blood
“Thank you,” she whispered. The love in the air was palpable—so intense it took her breath away. She watched as Theo and Maeve danced in the grass, the latter holding her little brother’s hand like she was his lifeline. She listened as Odette continued to talk Killian’s and Fen’s ears off and laughed as both boys tried desperately to find a way out of the conversation.
She quietly slipped away, making her way to the edge of the twinkling lights, and leaned against one of the posts as she watched her friends and family dance and laugh.
“Enjoying the festivities?” Eira’s voice cut through the laughter as she walked up beside her, smiling as she hugged a mug of tea close to her chest.
“It’s beautiful,” Ember said. “I can’t believe you all did this for me.”
“Can I tell you a secret?” Eira smiled.
Ember nodded her head.
“I overheard the boys planning to break you out of the house and sneak you to the festival, so I thought maybe this time we would save them the trouble of getting caught.” Eira winked, and Ember laughed. She could almost picture the two whispering together as they played chess. Suddenly, her heart ached for a home that wasn’t hers anymore—a family that wasn’t hers.
“We miss you,” Eira continued, as she watched Maeve try to stuff biscuits into the pockets of her dress. “We were hoping we would see you for your birthday dinner. I hope you know you’re always welcome at the house, whenever you like.”
Ember nodded as she swallowed. “I’m sorry I missed it. I just don’t want my mum to think I’m not thankful that she came back for me. I don’t want her to think that I’ve…”
“Replaced her?” Eira asked, voice filled with sadness.
Ember nodded again—she couldn’t make any of the words come out.
“I never knew your mum well—not as well as I knew your da’. But I know he would be glad you found your way back to your family.” There was no anger in her voice—no jealousy or regret, and something about that made Ember’s heart break further. “But I also know he wouldn’t want you to forget everyone else that loves you too.” She smiled softly. “He wouldn’t want you to hide those parts of yourself away or lock up the past like it never happened. You can have more than one home. And no matter where you go or what you do, or how far you have to travel,” Eirabreathed, as she kissed her on the head, “you can always come home.”
Chapter 22
The Land of Fire and Ice
Ember spent the rest of the weekend at home resting, and by Saturday night, she was feeling completely back to normal. After supper, she curled up with a book in front of the crackling fire and had every intention of doing nothing but reading until she had to go back to school on Monday. Theo peeked his head in the room, a small smile painted across his face.
“What are you up to?”Ember signed, cocking her brow.
“Come with me,”he signed back and disappeared back through the door.
Ember laughed as she set her book down, following Theo through the maze of hallways to the back door in the kitchen. The sun was just beginning to set, and the sky was a beautiful mixture of pinks and blues. She followed Theo through the giant field, past the stables, and through a small, wooded section at the back of the property. He nimbly hopped over a creek and then disappeared on the other side of the tree line. Ember took off after him, and when she exited the trees, the sight took her breath away.
She stepped out of the tree line completely and up to the edge of a cliff that plummeted almost a thousand feet directly into theocean. She sucked in a breath as she looked below her. Jagged rocks cut through the icy water as waves crashed against the side of the cliff. The sun was setting quickly against the horizon, bathing the sky in magenta and peach. Theo squeezed Ember’s hand, nodding toward a small treehouse sitting on the outskirts of the forest. They climbed to the top, hanging their legs off the edge as they watched the sun set over the water.
“This is my favorite place,”Theo signed.“I come here to think.”
Ember smiled with a nod.“What do you think about out here?”
“Dad,”he signed, flexing his fingers a bit at his side. “Can you tell me about him?”
Ember took a shuddering breath as she bit her lip. Did her mum never mention him? The way he had their father’s eyes or how their smile was almost identical? Did she not tell him stories? Replay all their best memories as a family?
Ember looked Theo over and thought about the way her dad used to munch on apples as he told her stories or the way he hoisted her onto his shoulders when they went stargazing. She had memories of boat rides and days at the beach, of learning to ride her bike through their neighborhood, and family dinners around a warm table filled with love.
Theo didn’t have any of that. To him, an apple was just an apple and not a portal back to another time. He didn’t have the memories to anchor him when the waves became too much.
And that realization made her heart shatter.
“He was funny,”she signed, trying to come up with the right words to accurately describe the man who had given her life and given her life purpose,“and he was kind. He loved the stars and fully believed if you connected them in the right way, you could see directly into the heavens, into some magical land beyond ours.”
They talked for the next hour about their dad, and Ember relived every memory she could think of, reaching into the very back of her mind and grabbing onto things she was sure she had forgotten. After the sun had almost fully set, they made their way back to the house, curling up on the couch in front of the crackling fire. Ember reached into her bag that she had haphazardly tossed on the floor and pulled out her dad’s journal, rubbing her fingers along the spine and breathing in the smell of weathered paper and old magic. Theo’s face lit up when he saw the inscription on the inside and nodded eagerly, a silent plea to continue where they had left off in the woods.
He needed to know everything about who he was, the part that had been missing his entire life, and Ember was all too familiar with that specific brand of aching.
He sat up eagerly as Ember translated the pages, hanging on her every word as they started from the beginning. Soon, his eyes were growing heavy, and before Ember realized what had happened, he was leaning on her shoulder fast asleep. She closed the journal gently, slipping a spare piece of paper in as a bookmark, and tucked it under her arm. She tucked him into the couch, still not sure her shoulder was healed enough to try to carry him to his room, even with a weightless charm.
