Chapter Thirty-Eight #2
The man hums, head tilting slightly, waves of snow and auburn just barely brushing the top of his shoulder.
“It was long ago, when the village was still relatively new. I was actually here to explore the forest it sat in, le bois égaré—the Lost Wood. It is said there are creatures in the trees that reveal the heart’s deepest secrets or desires, depending on who you speak to. ”
Fascinating. I’d never heard such a thing, nor has Theodore ever mentioned it.
I suppose it makes a strange bit of sense, however.
Sainte-Falaise is such an odd little town, filled with odd little people.
Perhaps it draws things in, things that are other—like the woman I’d met at the festival with the magic eyes, or the boy I hired with a starving and ravaging hunger, or the spirit of Death’s daughter who haunts the halls of my new home.
Like myself.
“That is why it’s called the Lost Wood, you know,” he continues, finally looking at me with a secretive little smile. “It is said le bois égaré calls to those who are lost and shows them the path to their truest heart.”
I do not require air in the way Theodore does, but I find my lungs seizing with the lack of it anyway when my father turns to face me completely. His hands are warm where they cradle my cheeks, and I shutter my eyes closed to avoid him seeing the anguish that no doubt pools inside them.
“My dearest treasure, I fear I have done you a great disservice, and I am uncertain as to how I can fix it.”
Confusion echoes through my bones and my eyes fly open to meet his, shocked to see that same emotion I wished to hide from him staring back at me.
“Babbo? You haven't—”
He clucks his tongue to silence me, his thumb tracing the sharp curve of my cheekbone.
“When I welcomed you into my family, it was under the condition that you find happiness with us. That you would flourish and bloom with the proper acceptance and encouragement. And you have,” he says quickly when I begin to frown.
“You have grown into a devastatingly talented creature who brings life and beauty and meaning into a dull world. And yet, I have made you unhappy somehow, and that is an offense I cannot abide by.”
“Babbo, you have never made me unhappy,” I try to assure him, but he only gives me a knowing look, one that he often sent our way when Jonas and I were troublesome children.
I shrink beneath it, my cheeks heating with embarrassment, but I do not back down, because my words are true, whether he believes them or not.
“You have not made me unhappy. It is only that… I fear my disgraceful showing has disappointed you. My siblings have done so well in their fields—I was doing so well—and then I ruined it. I ruined our name with my ignorance and pride. You should be disappointed in me.”
“Names, what temporary things.” My father shakes his head, that anguish in his eyes melting into something fonder, softer. He takes a seat on the stool I vacated what felt like hours ago and takes my hands in his. “Do you know why I offer my children new names when they join my family?”
I consider the question for a moment, wracking my brain for any memory where he might have told me before. I hardly even remember the name I had before, it was so long ago. And even then, my surname had been given to me by the parish. I’ve no memory of what it might have been before that.
“No, babbo.”
He nods, as if he expected as much. “Because the names we are given at birth are choices made by those who do not know us yet. They are the beginning of a life we did not ask for and a symbol of the things we cannot change.” Turning my hand over in his, he brushes his fingers over the two circles forever scarred on the inside of my wrist. “When I offer my gift, I am offering a choice. A new life to do with as you please, a new path for you to carve. I offer you a new name based on the person I have grown to know, a name which you can accept or deny, so that you may decide who you wish to be.”
“I wish to be someone who makes you proud.” The words escape me before I even know they are forming, and I snap my mouth shut to keep any other embarrassing secrets trapped within.
He squeezes my hands again, his smile growing wide enough to catch a glimpse of his teeth. “You have, mia preziosa cara. You make me proud every day, and I treasure every smile and laugh, every letter and visit. Should you choose never to paint again, I will still be proud of you.”
“Yes, but—”
“You think your siblings have not made mistakes in the past?” he interrupts, raising an eyebrow in question.
“You think Dorian, old as he is, has not done something egregious that left people scandalized and talking for years on end? You think Carmilla has not had her own fair share of losses and embarrassments in her field?”
He has a point, I suppose. Dorian may be the picture of polite and poised company now, but my eldest sister has told stories of his wild youth, long before Jonas and I joined the family.
And Carmilla herself has had to fight her way tooth and nail to where she is now.
No doubt she has had a slew of failures behind her.
A woman in business, no matter how successful that business has become, is still a woman in the end.
Yet it feels different, somehow. A comparison that does not feel justified.
“You are still young, my Azizi,” my father continues, drawing my attention back to his steady grip on my hands.
“You will have as many failures as you have successes. You will make mistakes, but mortal memories are short and fragile, and we are creatures who do not bend to the will of time. We continue on, despite it all, and we live.” His eyes meet mine, and I dare not look away.
“That is all I want from you. That is what makes me proud. I want you to live this second life to its fullest, with all the messy in-betweens, because the gift you bring to this world makes it all the more worthy of living in.”
Then he smiles at me and presses a kiss to the scars on my wrist, stitching up the gaping wound that has been rotting away inside me since I tore my heart out and offered it to the world nearly two years ago now.
For a moment, I catch a glimpse of the painting behind him, and I watch as the trees billow and bend in the breeze, arching over Theodore’s image like a blanket of protection.
“It is said le bois égaré calls to those who are lost and shows them the path to their truest heart,” my father had said, and I think perhaps the stories might be true.
Because for the first time in my life, I do not feel the desperate need for approval, or the clawing want of acceptance. I have them already—in my father’s blood-stained eyes and my brother’s distant laughter, in Theodore’s open mouth and Kolfina’s trusting hands.
I lost direction of the path I’d set out to carve myself, but now, here—in this strange little house in this strange little forest—I have found something so much better.