Chapter III.33
Chapter Thirty-Three
Three Weeks After the Wedding
One week after Miria ran into her brother by accident, she found her father in the chapel—on purpose.
She’d watched him for several days first, observing the public bouts of piety that Adaline had told her about—this ruse of his to make someone else shoulder the responsibility for his actions, and the institution all too ready to allow it.
He came for the mid-day service, the most crowded one, the best one to attend if someone wanted to be observed attending, which he clearly did.
The priest always met him at the chapel door.
They would converse about pleasantries, exchange a few token words to acknowledge what happened, and they always ended the conversation by carefully placing the full blame for the events on Rosmilda.
After all, if the priest could have been duped, so could have Garulf.
The priest wanted to believe he was not alone in his gullibility, and Garulf needed him to believe it so Adaline’s family would not punish him further.
It was a nice arrangement for them both.
Then the priest would conduct the service, and Garulf would stay a bit after everyone else had left, probably pretending to pray and making sure everyone noticed his penance.
The charade would repeat the next day.
But not today.
By this time, the crowd had left, including the priest, and no one else was in the chapel. Her observations had told Miria that her father would leave soon, as well—it was a small window she had if she preferred not to be seen.
Miria stepped inside, fighting the chill of the stone walls that always seemed to radiate cold, even at the height of summer.
The rooms were filled with dozens of flickering candles that had been lit during the service to send a prayer.
It was beautiful to behold, but all that light was not enough to convince Miria that the building was warm or inviting.
Or maybe it was just the witch in her that disliked being confined in such a place.
Either way, she hurried her steps to the front of the chapel. The soles of her boots made no sound on the stones beneath them nor the hem of her skirts swaying about her ankles, and she kneeled next to Garulf as silent as a ghost. But he’d noticed her. She saw by the way he stiffened.
This close, he looked even older than Miria had thought before. It might have been the shadows or the events of the past few weeks. She rather hoped it was that.
“You.” He narrowed his eyes. “You’re still an unruly beast of a girl, aren’t you? You didn’t change at all.”
“Neither did you, I see.”
“If you want an apology, you won’t get one. I had to protect us.”
“By which you mean yourself and Hans. Not a little girl. Never little girls.”
Garulf turned away. “You were the expendable one, and if you had a lick of sense in your head you would agree that I made a sensible decision. Every farmer knows that you have to cull the herd sometimes to protect its most valuable members. If your mother or grandmother had lived, you could have been their problem, and maybe the extra income could have kept you.”
Miria didn’t deign to respond to that.
Mistaking her silence for interest in what he had to say, her father continued. “If anything, you owe me an apology. You owe your brother. You took from him, too.”
“By your logic, I should apologize for being born.” Miria shook her head. “No, I’m not here to apologize, nor did I come to hear one from you.”
“Then what do you want?”
Miria reached into her purse and pulled out a small red shard, barely larger than a speck of dust. In the chapel’s dim light, it appeared nearly black except for when it caught the touch of one of the candle flames and burst into life. She cupped it in her palm.
“A wise woman once told me that to be a witch was to always be learning and to value education, for it’s only through educating ourselves that we can become better people.
So I’m here to teach you something, or try to.
” Then Miria placed her hand over his and drove the last remaining piece of her rage, the only piece that had been big enough to touch after she’d burned through the charm, into his hand.
She could have let it go, she supposed. She’d considered it, truly.
She’d crushed her father’s and Rosmilda’s social climbing plans, denied him the title and power he’d worked so hard for at her expense.
A better person might have accepted that and vowed to finally put his cruelty out of their head.
Miria wasn’t sure if her inability to do so made her vicious or simply petty, but she did know she was tired of women bearing the brunt of the blame and punishment for actions that men never suffered for.
She would see that her father suffered. But like the witches had offered Rosmilda, she would give him the chance to atone.
Garulf cried out, but the pain could only have lasted a second. The charm slipped into his skin, and the wound healed over before he could climb to his feet.
“What did you do to me?” Anger colored his voice, but his face showed fear.
“I’m giving you the opportunity to learn empathy,” Miria said, also standing.
“From this moment on, anytime you see your family, you will have to feel the anguish you caused your first daughter. I hope that if you experience it enough, one day you’ll become more kind, more pleasant, more deserving of those two sisters of mine.
Or, you could choose to cut them out of your life so that you don’t have to experience my pain at all.
That’s what I expect you’ll do, but I am occasionally wrong. ”
She walked out of the chapel to the sound of him cursing her, and for once the noise didn’t bother her at all.