Chapter Two
ERABELLA - ELEVEN YEARS AGO
I’d grown accustomed to the burnt, acrid smell that would float throughout our house most days, even if it was a grim reminder of the life I was forced to live.
My mother and father started using in secret at first, though their blown pupils and constant fidgeting were a dead giveaway that something was amiss.
To a young girl like me, I wouldn’t have known the cause of their personality shifts, but the whispering between my sisters told me exactly what was wrong.
Our mother and stepdad were hooked on thiloxal.
Nausea crept over me anytime I witnessed them heating one of their glass pipes, knowing their addiction got worse with every use. But what was better, seeing them passed out on the floor, or the harsh cruelty and agitation before they got their fix?
I suppose it all went hand in hand.
It became more unpleasant over time. My mother would scratch her skin violently, as if her own blood wanted to escape the toxicity. Their ability to function while sober was dwindling with every passing day.
But that wasn’t the worst of it. It was the constant conflict—the yelling, the swinging of fists. If my parents weren’t fighting each other, they were terrorizing us.
Vera had it the worst, my eldest sister. I think it was because she saw through their lies and would constantly quarrel with them, begging them to stop.
Today was no different.
Mabel, my middle sibling, held me tightly, the two of us huddling in a corner just as Mother’s palm cracked against Vera’s face. My teenage sister had reached a breaking point, crying out in rage as she hurled one of their pipes, the material shattering when it struck the wall.
“You ungrateful brat!” my stepfather raged, his light irises swallowed by his pupils. Mother grasped her own hair in frustration, eyes locked on the mess Vera had made, just as Ragnall Maulore roughly grabbed Vera’s golden strands.
We knew how this story would go. Ragnall would drag Vera to his room, just as he always did when she misbehaved. It had been like that for the last three years.
Vera tried with all her might to pull away; she even spat right in his face. But she was only a sixteen-year-old girl. She stood no chance against a grown man.
“Don’t hurt her!” Mabel cried out, but it was no use.
We never spoke about what happened behind those closed doors. I just knew that when Vera would return an hour later, her eyes would be glossed over, no words slipping past her lips for days.
My mother’s dark, frantic eyes soared to us. “Look what you’ve done!” she shrieked. “Now he’s hurting Vera!”
“What we’ve done?!” Mabel howled in rage. “You allow him to hurt us! Just look at yourself!”
I clung to Mabel tighter, knowing that as Mother charged toward us, she’d rip me away from her.
That she’d lock me in that closet.
“NO!” I protested, flailing my limbs as Mother roughly seized my shoulders.
“LEAVE ERA ALONE!” Mabel roared.
Mother struck Mabel with the back of her hand, and the moment crimson began dripping from my sister's nose, I surrendered. Besides, it didn’t matter how much I screamed and cried—didn’t matter how much I begged and pleaded.
I’d remain locked in that closet, tormented by their deafening shouting matches and the shattering of glass, trapped until someone remembered to free me.
Our mother roughly forced Mabel back when she tried to grab me. My sister’s worried, brown eyes and bloodied nose were the last thing I saw before Mother shoved me inside the tiny room, forcefully slamming the door shut.
“Why? Why did you marry him?!” Mabel wailed from the other side of the door, choking for air. “How can you let him do that to Vera?! To your own daughter?”
Mabel’s broken cries were pitiful as Mother hit her. I tugged at the doorknob, but just like every time before, I was locked inside. Unable to help my poor sisters escape the wrath of monsters.
I hated the dark because there was no getaway. Nothing else I could focus on, not just audibly but visually too. I tucked my legs against my chest, my hands shielding my ears.
I despised my stepfather for harming Mabel and Vera. I almost despised my mother more because she let him. Because she, too, found our abuse acceptable. I hated her harsh words and her cold demeanor.
I hated who she’d become after my father had died.
Unable to save them, I rocked back and forth for what felt like an eternity.
Seven years had passed since my father had left this world, and it had been six since Ragnall and the thiloxal took his place.
I tried to steady my breathing and mentally go someplace else.
My mother had poked fun at me for my love of fairytales, but the dream of a better life was the only thing that saved me in moments like these.
The hope that one day, a prince would come rescue me.
That one day, someone would keep me safe.
That one day, someone may love me.
But try as I might to dissociate, I heard everything in this closet. Mabel’s soft cries, Vera’s fractured screams. Ragnall’s nauseating grunts and Mother’s deafening silence.
How could she let her children be harmed this way?
My lip curled as I pictured my stepfather’s wretched face.
Ragnall Maulore was a respected noble. Perhaps that’s why Mother had married him.
I was only six at the time, not understanding how wrong it was for her to strip us of our real father’s last name once their marriage ceremony was complete.
Erabella Maulore was the only name I’d ever known, but Vera always told me, “Dreason. Your name is Erabella Dreason. Don’t ever forget that. ”
While Vera would face Ragnall’s wrath, Mother was the cruelest to Mabel. And then there was me…the forgotten one who witnessed it all.
Everyone on the outside viewed us as a perfect family, well put together and successful in all the ways they wished they were.
Money, fancy clothes, a beautiful home. Could they not hear the screams?
Did they not notice our parents’ pupils swallowing their irises, their reddened eyes shining like glass?
We used to be a happy household, but not anymore. Not since Mother married Ragnall. Not since they began using that drug.
Eventually, Mabel’s cries grew distant, just as footsteps sounded from above. It seemed my sister was protesting no longer, allowing our mother to toss her into her bedroom for the evening.
“Don’t hurt her too badly, Ragnall!” I could hear Mother’s gravelly voice through my palms. “She meets with Lord Achard in just a week!”
My stepfather was already planning to marry Vera off to some wealthy noble in Daranois. I had heard her whisper about her fears to Mabel, despite having her own daydreams of escaping this place.
Ragnall didn’t respond, or if he did, I didn’t hear it. My hands were still firmly in place on the sides of my head.
I didn’t want to hear any of the disgusting sounds he made while he was with my sister.
Hours must have passed in the hollow stillness before the knob finally gave a gentle click. My head shot up from where it rested on my knees, my eyes squinting as they adjusted to the dull light coming behind the dark figure.
Their hand reached out, and the moment I grasped it, I knew it was Vera.
“Come on,” she whispered. “They’re sleeping.”
Carefully, I exited the tight space and held my breath as Vera and I padded to the second floor. Each creak of the steps had my pulse racing, my eyes darting to the two limp figures on the living room sofas. Fortunately, we made it to Mabel’s bedroom without waking them.
Vera carefully closed the door behind us, and I let out a sigh. My attention shifted to Mabel instantly, at the bruising on her left temple and the swelling from her busted lip.
“Are you okay?” Vera asked, tilting my chin toward her so she could examine my face.
My tearful eyes tore away from Mabel, and fresh streams spilled over at the sight of Vera’s worried expression. “Am I okay?”
Vera gave me the best smile she could muster and drew me into a hug. The guilt I felt was unbearable…that my sisters were abused and beaten, yet I remained unscathed.
“It’s not fair that they hurt you both and not me,” I wept quietly.
“Era.” Vera drew back. “None of this is fair. You’ve done nothing wrong.” Her pained, blue-eyed gaze traveled to our sister. “It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have provoked them.”
My sisters cared for me more than anything.
In many ways, they were my parents. Vera, being four years my senior, and Mabel just a couple of years younger than her, meant they kept me out of their more “adult” conversations, as they called them.
But I always listened. In my bed at night, in an adjacent room, or in that closet, I listened.
I might’ve only been twelve years old, but I was more aware than most realized.
And this time, it appeared my sisters realized it.
I opened my mouth to assure Vera that their mistreatment was not her responsibility, but Mabel spoke first. “I have a plan,” she whispered.
Vera stilled, her brows tightening. “What is it?”
I drew a bracing breath, and nothing could’ve prepared me for the words that followed.