Chapter 57
OVER THE FOLLOWING days, the shock abates, leaving me with the pieces of everything that’s broken.
I gather those and myself and return to my rooms while Drystan is asleep.
Though his breathing shifts from its sleeping rhythm, so I suspect he knows what I’m doing, which allays any guilt I might feel.
Min visits almost as soon as the sun sets. I can’t bring myself to verbalize all that’s happened. But she stays with me. We eat breakfast and sit in silence that’s only punctuated by the cat’s purrs. He’s glued to me, even following me to the bathroom.
Min reads. I watch the fire. I flick through books and my notebook. The quest for a cure seems so foolish now, when the answer all along was to stop taking poison.
Now I’m no longer replaying the conversation with my parents, other moments come back to me. Bad meat. That creature wasn’t disgusted by my illness, she could smell the iron in my blood: That foul stuff. Here. In the Underworld where it’s forbidden.
Gradually other little moments slot into place. Not boulders but puzzle pieces.
When Min has to go, Asti appears and takes up vigil at my side. I’m not sure how she knows to come, but she’s here and I’m glad of it.
Ginger biscuits appear alongside hearty meals like soup and roasted meats with braised vegetables. Once again, I’m grateful to Min for her care and attention while my mind circles on what to do next.
I’ve earned the right to return to the surface world. But I can’t face my parents and the ugly truth. I will go back. I need to work out the how and where, but not yet.
For now I lose myself in books, reading everything I can about poisons, iron, aconite.
Belladonna is mentioned as a treatment for the symptoms if not the root cause. I chuckle to myself, a mirthless sound almost as hollow as the first laugh I heard from Drystan.
As much as her methods make my skin crawl, I note down what I can remember from the ancient fae’s experiments. Anything to help me understand all that’s been done to me and the lingering effects that I’ll never be without.
There’s a kind of peace in ink. In words. In paragraphs. In page upon page of text and diagrams and botanical drawings.
It helps me start to make sense of everything. Slowly. On a surface level, at least.
After almost a week of quiet, I speak to Min. I ask her to bring Asti—I only want to tell this story once.
Asti doesn’t know I’m ill, but she’s no fool.
She understands something’s wrong and she’s been here every night since I returned.
So when she arrives, I explain it all from the start—the truth, this time, not the lie I’ve been told for half my life.
My poisoning, the deal with Drystan, escaping the labyrinth and my return to the place I can no longer bring myself to call home.
Min listens in horrified silence. Asti tugs on her braids, and when I finish, she’s the one who asks, “What will you do?”
“I don’t know. I can’t go back there. I can’t face them.”
She makes a dark sound, dipping her chin.
“But I don’t have anyone else up there. And I don’t think I can manage on my own.
” There’s Lowen, of course, but he has a life to live.
Now he knows about our parents, I’m sure he’ll leave.
I can get a message to him soon—one that explains I’m safe and recovering.
I rub my chest, heartbeat deceptively solid, even though it’s ready to betray me at any moment.
Since reading about the effects of iron, I’ve been especially cautious with dosing on belladonna.
If my heart is damaged, then those giddy, pounding heights could prove too much for it.
I’m reminded of the occasions it’s felt horribly like my chest was being turned inside out.
What if that was the warning of a heart nearing its limit?
Bringing myself back from my thoughts, I find Asti and Min exchanging a meaningful look.
They’ve been here every night since I returned to my room.
Without fail. I haven’t been left alone for an instant, save for sleep.
And even then, I’ve often woken to find one of them already here, sat by the fireplace.
“You two don’t have to supervise me, you know.”
Min shrugs and smiles. “We know.”
“You could go and…” I wave at the door. “Spend time together.”
“We are spending time together.” Asti gathers her thick braids over one shoulder and shares a lingering grin with Min. “And with our friend.”
Min leans into her, covering her hand. “I’m just glad we knew you were back.”
“Huh.” I sit up, finding the source of a nagging feeling that’s been at the back of my mind for days. “As far as you two knew, I’d gone h—”
I catch myself. The word “home” is a thorn.
“You thought I’d gone back. How did you know I was here?” I saw no one when I moved between Drystan’s suite and my rooms—the whole fortress was asleep.
Min winces, fingertips pressed to her mouth. Eyes wide, she glances a question at Asti.
The warrior sighs and spreads her arms. “His Majesty told us. He said something was wrong and he couldn’t comfort you, but that he didn’t want you left alone.”
“He was worried about you,” Min adds. “Still is, actually.”
“He asks after you each night.” Asti scoffs. “But he’s also ordered me not to betray your confidence.”
“He did… what?”
“He didn’t want me to tell him anything you’d said, only to give him a general idea of how you were, whether you were eating the food he’s had sent here.”
I pause with a biscuit halfway to my lips. “He’s been sending these?”
“Obviously. Who else?”
“I thought… you two.”
As one, they shake their heads.
Alongside the barb still working its way through my chest, something warm sprouts.
Because I’ve been wrong.
I may have lost my family, but I’m not entirely alone. I have friends. I have a cat kneading my thigh.
And I have Drystan.
Who’s somehow been comforting me from afar. Who’s shown compassion. Who tried to protect me from the pain of my parents’ betrayal. Who may have gone about things all wrong, but still managed to end my slow poisoning.
Who has shared his own vulnerabilities with me and who, impossibly, has somehow come to care for me, a weak and imperfect human.
And despite his failings and imperfections, I care for him, too.
There is a solution. Not a perfect one. But it means I don’t have to go back to the family who’s been poisoning me for a lifetime, and it means I don’t have to die alone either.
I turn to Asti and nod. “I think I know what I need to do.”