Chapter 25 #2
I set her down in the bed, peeling back the sheets before tucking her underneath. Alina did not look like she was ever disturbed, like she had been in a deep sleep this whole time. I knelt next to the bed, taking the pins out of her hair to let it down so she would not hurt herself in her slumber.
“Was she in the lab?” Phoebe spoke from the doorframe, chewing at her nails.
I nodded. “She was on the floor, just a needle and a bottle beside her.” I refused to take my eyes off my dear nightmare of a woman. “Do you know what she’s been taking?”
Phoebe let out a deep sigh. “Venom.”
My gaze parted from Alina to look at Phoebe. “What did you say?”
She crossed her arms, scowling at me. “I said venom. Vipera venom.”
“And you knew?” I rose slowly, the pressure of my anger threatening to reach the surface as it boiled over.
“Yes, but not until it was too late. I fear I enabled her,” Phoebe spoke more quietly than before. “Come, let her sleep.”
I nodded, stealing one last glance at Alina before I followed my sister out of the room.
When we descended, the talking stopped almost instantly by the time I made it to the bottom floor. The walk from the stairs to the front door was short, but the silence made it even longer. It was hard to tell if it was unwelcoming or just somber.
We went out to the front porch where Phoebe sat on a bench, patting the spot beside her.
I took a seat and stared out into the night. We had a view of the dirt road and the wooded area on the other side. The house was on a slight hill, so we could see the sky and the way the road wound down and disappeared into the darkness.
“I suspect she had been doing it since before she was kidnapped.” Phoebe clutched her wool shawl tighter around her shoulders. “She did not get much better after we left London.”
“You said you enabled her.” I glared at her.
“She was in pain.” Phoebe shot just as deadly a look back.
“What did you do?”
“I fed on her, and some days when she suffered, I bit her without feeding.” She chewed at her lip as she fiddled with her necklace.
“I stopped when it became a weekly, daily, then twice daily occurrence. I was worried for her, and I knew her physical wounds would heal. I did not anticipate she would need pain management for any mental scars.”
I crossed my arms. I expected her to be angry, traumatized possibly, but I did not realize how much pain she would be in after.
“I think she has been stealing venom from the batches we collected.”
“What makes you suspect that?”
“We are always missing a liter. She claims it is because the solution is concentrated and loses mass, but I know that isn’t true. I count the inventory as we take it.”
“How long does a liter last her?”
“I suspect until the next month when we do it all over again,” she mumbled, “but it is worse than you think. She modifies it, adds things to it, concentrates it. I fear she will kill herself with it.”
We sat in silence for a minute, then many. The fact that this was because of anything I had done made me want to disappear in shame, which was not something I was used to. She didn’t deserve that.
“You should not have added those terms,” Phoebe spoke up. “Forcing her hand is the last thing you want to do.”
“Forcing her hand is my favorite thing to do.” I tried to make light of the conversation.
“Silas.” Her expression was grim. “You don’t know what has become of her.”
“What has she become, then?”
“A reaper.”
“You are dramatic.”
“She won’t admit it, but she likes it. Killing them.” Phoebe diverted her attention to her hands. “She has changed. She’s erratic . . . sleepwalking . . . She disappears physically and mentally so often, she may as well be a ghost.”
“I am jealous that you have such experience with her,” I laughed, but I knew she was serious. I only got a taste of it when I made my proposal, but Phoebe had successfully piqued my interest regarding Alina’s new habits.
“Silas.” Phoebe paused, the toe of her slipper scratching at the worn wood while she sat, “What . . . what did you mean back there?”
I leaned back on the bench, crossing my arms as I looked up at the stars. “What do you mean?”
“Is there anything to go back to?” She bit her lip. “In London?”
“Nothing but father’s wrath.”
“We are in danger, then.”
“No, Father isn’t bold enough to waltz into uncharted territory.” I pulled my cigarette holder from my pocket, only to find there were none left. “For now, we live in bliss,” I mumbled.
“For now,” she strained, her eyes landing on me, not in anger, but solemnly.
When I didn’t return the look, her jaw twitched, and she crossed her arms, turning back to look out into the dark.
“Damn it, Silas. Kin killing is no easy stain to brush out. Out of all the ways you could have lashed out, did it have to be something so gratuitous?”
“Would you rather me leave more heads to hunt when they come for her?” I finally looked her way, her cheeks bright red, angry with the insinuation.
“Why did you come back?” she snapped. I could see her jaw tensing and relaxing, like she was working out the tension emanating from her rage.
“I came for her.”
“No, the first time.”
The first time?
“Seven years,” she laughed, “you didn’t visit me for seven years, after so many routine reunions.
You just up and left, gone, not even a letter, a telegram, nothing.
” Her eyes were glassy, despite her blinking away the emotion, “My year without Alina was my loneliest. I hoped you would at least show up with a half-decent excuse.”
“I couldn’t bear it anymore.” I kept my answers steady.
“Oh! Right, let me guess. Father, the Nest, the pressure.” Her laugh was comical this time, steeped in sarcasm.
“What? Is imagining any responsibility to your Nest—to your family—too much for you? Did you find what you were looking for out there? Your purpose? Do you really lament any sort of responsibility to anyone besides your appetite?”
“Phoebe . . .”
“No, I want to hear it! What, pray tell, called the oh-so-independent Silas Forbes back to civilization?”
“He didn’t tell you, did he?” I winced. Her words were always sharp, I knew that, but something about how she spoke to me was just critical.
“Let me guess, another thing you assume I don’t know.”
“Your engagement. I feared it was too late.”
“Pardon?” She laughed but didn’t continue after I showed no humor. “I am not engaged.”
“Well,” I took a deep inhale. “That was Father’s reason for returning home.”
“He wouldn’t do that.”
“Why else would he request you return to the Nest so suddenly? I am not the only man in your life who was absent, dear sister.”
“Don’t change the subject.”
“Did you think you would be different from any of the others?”
“I’m his favorite; he said so,” she said, though not with the same confident edge.
“I was his favorite too,” I said softly, reaching out for her hand. “We all are until he wants something new.”
“That doesn’t make sense; you’re not married.”
“That is because I was born a son, Phoebe.”
“Are you really implying that Father sold our sisters for some sick game of power and estates?”
I took a deep breath, lowering my eyes.
“I don’t believe you,” she scoffed.
“I wasn’t going to continue his sick game,” I snapped. “It has left too many motherless children. Just like you.”
“That is not his fault!” Her voice cracked. “My mother passed in childbirth; so did the others.”
“Is that what he told you?”
“I have no reason to distrust it!”
“He killed her, Phoebe. Same as all the women before her.”
“That’s an absurd claim. Your mother had five daughters after you.”
“My mother was bred to death.”
“He wouldn’t do that!”
“Your mother, and all the others after mine, were killed for having one too many daughters,” I hissed.
“That’s not true—”
“Phoebe!” I raised my voice at her. “One after the other, he killed them if it wasn’t a son. He had an obsession with having a spare. He was driven mad from the obsession born of my mother’s death.”
She didn’t speak, and there was a deafening silence between us. Something clicked, and it was like we were seeing eye to eye, even if it was reluctant.
“Why are you here, then?” she spoke softly.
“You already know.”
“Are you here for Alina or for your Nest?”
“Both. I do it for her.”
“All of it?” She raised her brow at me.
“Of course. I need her. She will realize she needs me too. Sooner with pressure.”
“Why wouldn’t you let her choose you, then?” She crossed her arms. “Are you afraid she won’t?”
“We don’t have the luxury of waiting to find out, not this time.” I glared at her.
“That is your fault. You are the one who turned to kin killing.”
“You know very well the offer is the best you will get,” I droned. “What is the rule again? Utilitarianism?”
“Silas, trust me when I say you do not want it to come to that. She will hate you for it.”
“Our bond was born of hate; she will come around.” I stood from my seat. “Have a good evening, sister; extend my well wishes to the girls.”