Chapter 32
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
“ M eryn!” Mother cries, and my eyes fly open. She stands in the doorframe with warm firelight glowing behind her. Her dark, graying hair is neatly combed and plaited down her back. There’s a healthy glow to her olive-toned skin, her cheeks flushed. She’s wearing a dress that looks freshly washed.
And her eyes—they’re bright and clear. Gone is the vacant stare.
She throws her arms around my neck and pulls me in as I blink in confusion.
“Blessed Goddess, I can’t believe you’re here!” she cries. I don’t know whether to hug her back or pull away and inspect her, so I pat her on the back. “Lee had told me you’d get a day off, but it’s still a wonderful gift to hold you in my arms.”
Eventually she pulls away and I notice she has an apron on, smeared with flour. She’s been baking .
“Mother?” I hear myself say, staring in complete disbelief. “Is that really you?”
She laughs. “Who else would I be?” Her gaze snags behind me and her eyes go wide with wonder.
She’s spotted Anassa.
“Oh,” Mother breathes, stepping past me, “this must be your direwolf.”
“Right, yeah,” I turn and say awkwardly, “Mother, this is Anassa. Anassa, this is my mother.”
I expect the direwolf to be her usual self: aloof, standoffish, maybe even a touch threatening. To my utter astonishment, Anassa turns to face my mother… and bows .
The fuck?
Mother gasps as Anassa goes down on her haunches, lowering her enormous head to rest on her front paws.
“Oh, she’s beautiful , Meryn!” Mother gushes softly, stepping closer. “That fur… and those eyes!” She lifts a hand as though to touch the wolf and then thinks better of it, shaking her head in quiet awe. “She is special, isn’t she? A queen among wolves.”
Anassa just blinks her yellow eyes at my mother in silent agreement.
“That’s all it takes to win you over, huh?” I drawl through the bond. “Flattery? You don’t even bow for the king.”
Anassa’s mind ripples with irritation. “I give respect where respect is due.”
I roll my eyes.
“Speaking of beautiful,” my mother says, turning to me. She lifts one hand to touch my shorn silver-white hair. “This suits you.”
“Oh. Thanks,” I mumble, touched by the pride in her eyes.
“Come, let’s go inside,” Mother says, then glances back at my wolf. “Anassa, I’m sorry you can’t fit in our little house. I’ll bring you a snack later.” She glances at me. “Is that alright? Will she eat human food?”
I look over my shoulder at Anassa, who says nothing—though she seems pleased by my mother’s fussing.
“Probably not,” I say. “She hunts her own food in the mountains outside the castle.”
My mother nods. “Ah. Probably doesn’t want a slice of sourdough, then.”
As we step into the fire-lit warmth of the cottage, I’m struck by a wave of nostalgia. I haven’t seen the house this tidy and bright since before Saela was born.
The floor has been swept, the windows cleaned, every surface dusted. The little fireplace is blazing and the lamps are all lit. The whole place smells like baking bread and Mother’s spiced beef stew—the one she used to make on holidays when Dad was still alive.
“I guess Ki—Lee also told you I’d bonded with Anassa,” I say, following Mother to the living room. “I wasn’t sure you knew I’d become Bonded.”
“Oh, yes!” she says, gesturing for me to sit beside her on the couch. “Lee visits me every week. He’s been such a dear, bringing me food and firewood and anything else I might need. He also brought some tradesmen to fix up the house, did you see?”
“I did,” I say, my throat tightening. “It looks really nice.”
“I don’t ask for anything, mind you!” she hurries to reassure me. “The last thing I want is to put him out. He really is a good one, that Lee.” She leans over to pat my leg, smiling conspiratorially. “Definitely a keeper.”
My cheeks heat as I think yet again about his desire to claim me publicly.
Clearly, my mother doesn’t know yet that “Lee” is the crown prince. What would she think if she knew the truth? Would she be even more excited? Would she warn me off the relationship, worried to see her daughter involved with a royal?
The urge to confess everything rises inside me with startling strength. Mother hasn’t been this lucid for years. I almost forgot how I used to confide in her—how we’d sit by the fire just like this and I’d tell her about my day or whatever else was on my mind.
Suddenly I miss that so much I could cry. I want to lay down with my head in her lap like I did as a child and tell her everything—about the castle, the training, Anassa, Killian. I want her to pet my hair and tell me everything will be alright, like she used to.
But I shove it all back down again. I’m not that little girl anymore. Life forced me to grow up and there’s no turning back the clock.
I grab her hand. “Mother, I’m really glad Lee is taking care of you. I’m sorry I can’t be here.”
When she starts to protest, I cut her off.
“No, please listen,” I say fiercely. “This isn’t for nothing, me being gone. I’m going to fight my way through to the end of the training. Then I’m going to find Saela and bring her home—even if I have to kill every Siphon in Astreona to do it. I swear, I’m going to bring her home.”
Mother’s eyes fill with tears even as her lips curve in a proud, pained smile. She clasps my hand between her own.
“I know you will,” she whispers. “I have so much faith in you, Mer. You’ve been our protector all these years since your father passed. I know you won’t let us down now.” Her face crumples with grief and regret. “I’m so sorry that I haven’t been well—that I couldn’t be the mother you deserved.”
My breath catches in my chest.
Haven’t I wished for that, too? Wasn’t I just thinking I missed that mother, the kind of parent every child should have? One who’s dialed in enough to meet their kid’s basic needs? One who comforts and consoles and cares for their family?
And, yet…
“Don’t say that,” I whisper, eyes prickling with tears as I battle my internal war. I’m pissed about the card Saela and I were dealt, but I can’t be mad at her about it. “It isn’t your fault you’ve been ill. I’m just glad you’re feeling better.” I sniffle and wipe my eyes quickly. “Speaking of that—what’s going on? Did you get new medicine, or…?”
“No, not at all.” She shakes her head, shrugging helplessly. “It’s the strangest thing. I’ve been better for weeks now. I would have gone back to working at the laundry again, but Lee and Igor insist I stay at home.”
“Good,” I say. “Home is where you belong. As long as they’re taking care of you.”
“They are,” she says. “I feel a bit guilty, relying on everyone. But they’ve been so kind. The other neighbors come by to check on me, too.”
Before I can respond, there’s a knock at the door.
“Get that, will you?” Mother says, rising to go to the kitchen, “I have to take the bread out of the oven.”
I nod and cross to the door, already knowing who’s waiting on the other side.
Igor looks me over, eyes widening as he takes in my hair—and then yanks me into a bone-crushing hug.
I’m frozen in his grip for a second, stunned by the show of affection, then I throw my arms around him.
“I’m so damn happy you’re still alive, kid,” he grunts, voice rough with emotion.
I clear my throat awkwardly as he lets me go. “Haven’t found Saela yet, though.”
He clasps my shoulder, his craggy face grim. “You will.”
“At least the Nabbers are under control now, right?” I say, ushering him inside as Mother comes out of the kitchen.
The two of them exchange a confused look.
“Wait. The attacks have stopped,” I say, glancing between them, “…right? No more kids are getting taken?”
Igor’s face darkens. “No, Meryn. The attacks haven’t stopped. In fact, they’ve increased.”
“What?”
Mom steps forward, reaching for me with a worried grimace. “Mer?—”
“Three more children were taken in the past week alone,” says Igor, his face pinched. “What made you think they’d stopped?”
A cold knot of fear and disbelief hardens in my stomach. The Nabber we questioned. The warehouse. It should have stopped their operation.
Did something go wrong? Were Killian’s guards not able to find it?
I wear a new kill mark on my throat for that man, and yet the attacks continue. I’ve failed.
Igor claps me on the shoulder again, snapping me out of my frantic internal spiral.
“Listen, that ain’t your problem right now,” he says in his gruff way. “You need to focus on surviving your training— then you can get back to saving the world.”
“Right,” I mutter, resolving to talk to Killian about the Nabbers later. Right now, I just want to spend time with my family. I muster a wry smile. “It’s not just the training though. Tonight I have to survive a fucking ball .”
“Language, Meryn!” Mother exclaims as Igor barks a laugh.
“Sorry, Mother.”
“A ball, huh?” Igor quips. “Rather fight a damn Siphon, myself.”
“Me, too,” I grunt as we gather in the living room once more.
“Oh, stop, you two,” Mother says, her eyes glimmering with wistful excitement. “A ball at the castle sounds wonderful .”
“Not when you’re a podunk nobody commoner,” I mutter. “One of only two, out of all the Rawbonds this year, I might add. All the others come from Bonded families. One of the fancy gowns they wear to things like this could buy us food for a whole year.”
Igor chuckles. “Bet you just love getting all dolled up for those blowhards.”
Mother swats at him. “You leave her be. Every girl deserves to wear fancy things now and then.”
I huff out a breath. “Yeah, sure. Except I don’t have fancy things.”
Mother brightens. “Oh, but you do! Come with me—come, come!”
I cast Igor a bewildered look as I follow mom into her bedroom. He just gives me a lopsided grin.
Everything else aside, it’s really good to see him smile. To see both of them smile.
Mother is already lifting the threadbare rug and bending to the loose board where she hides all her most precious possessions. While she digs her treasures out with purposeful intensity, I take in the familiar room.
Like everything else, it seems much smaller and dingier after weeks in the castle. It’s clean, though, and the bed is made. Another sign of my mother’s improved health.
“Here,” she says, straightening with a familiar pendant in her hand. Sunlight catches on the opal as she holds it out to me, little shards of rainbow light glimmering from deep within the stone.
I open my mouth to protest, but something in my mother’s eyes stops me. I’ve never seen her gaze so clear—so insistent. Her hands tremble slightly as she holds the opal out to me.
“Wear it tonight at the ball,” she says. “It needs to be seen.”
“Needs to be seen?” I repeat, bewildered. “What do you?—?”
The words die in my throat as my mother’s eyes glaze over. My heart drops—I know that vacant stare all too well. But in another instant, it’s gone. Her eyes clear once more.
“Here, let me put it on you.”
My gaze is drawn to the pendant as she lifts it. It’s light against my skin, despite the stone’s size and the intricate gold work into which the opal is set. It’s clearly very old, tarnished with age and disuse.
It’s beautiful, and far nicer than anything else I own, but I know it will look antiquated next to whatever glittering jewels the other Rawbonds wear tonight.
When Mother places it around my neck and the opal settles over my sternum, I realize the stone is unnaturally warm.
It feels almost…alive.
My mother’s hands linger on the clasp, and I catch a rapid series of expressions crossing her face.
Relief, fear, and something that looks almost like triumph.
At the same moment, Anassa’s attention focuses on what we’re doing. Her sudden interest pulses through the bond.
“What do you care about a necklace?” I ask.
No answer. Just that sense of Anassa listening, watching.
Whatever. I don’t have time to question the wolf. The daylight filtering through the window says it’s already afternoon. I’ll need to return to the castle before long.
I set all other thoughts aside while Mom, Igor, and I sit down to a wonderful meal. It’s bittersweet without Saela there, but I tell myself that it’s only temporary. Soon enough, we’ll all be back together again, safe and sound.
When dusk begins to darken the sky outside, I make my goodbyes. Mother gets a little teary. Me, too, if I’m honest. Even Igor’s eyes hold a faint gleam of wetness, though he smiles and tells me, “Don’t get soft sleepin’ on those fancy castle sheets, eh?”
“Eat shit,” I say, laughing through my tears.
“Meryn!” my mother scolds.
Igor thumps me on the back and pushes me toward Anassa. “Get lost, kid.”
“I love you both,” I say with a final wave. “I’ll be in touch soon.”
I mount Anassa quickly, turning to look back at my childhood home one last time as we go.
Mother stands in the open doorway, one hand raised in parting. A piece of her hair has come out of her neat braid and is whipping around her face in the cold winds.
Nostalgia strikes me again like a slow wave, but it’s different now. It comes with a sense of mourning. Of something truly lost. My life has taken an unexpected path—one I never dreamed of, never wanted.
I’m not the person I was the last time I left. I’ve moved on, whether I like it or not.
And when I graduate, I’ll be given housing in the Bonded City, in the Strategos neighborhood. I’ll be expected to live there whenever I’m not at the front. It’s still unclear to me whether I’ll be able to bring my mom—and Saela—to live with me.
Maybe that’s why I get the overwhelming feeling that this it—the final goodbye.
This place will never truly be my home again.