Chapter 4 #2
Trampled and buried, the crystal was where it belonged now.
“What was that?” a voice called.
“Go look,” Emerias called back. “I’m pissing.”
I slammed the window shut, lighter already without the aelith’s pull, then I packed quickly.
Two dresses, spare boots, a hairbrush, and what little else I owned.
The most important thing was my memory box: a wooden keepsake stuffed with fragments of who I’d been before all this. I hadn’t opened it in years.
I sat on the edge of my bed and tipped the contents out.
Pressed flowers, painted rocks given to me by Rueren, shells still clinging to sand.
My throat tightened as I sifted through the stones.
Rueren loved gifting them, just like I did when I was little, as if odd shapes and streaks of colour could speak where words never could.
My father had a whole drawer in his room filled with the rocks we’d given him over the years.
He always cherished them. I’d always cherish mine.
A portrait my father had painted of us last winter.
Rueren and I were smiling. Kaydra looked like she’d tried, then thought better of it.
The twins were just as reluctant as I remembered.
Blayren had been proudly beaming, his arms around all of us like we really were his pride and joy.
He’d worn that same pride the night we left for the Stargala.
A pride that vanished the moment he saw me descend without a glowing crystal.
That pang beneath my ribs ached again, the memory, the shame, the fear, gripping me.
No, I wouldn’t think about that. I couldn’t.
I set the painting aside and picked up the white cloth beside it.
Inside was a butterfly-shaped silver comb, its wings cradling a silver gem that never failed to catch the light.
It had been left in the basket with me when I washed ashore.
Many times I’d been tempted to sell it—during brutal winters, when the fields refused to yield. But Blayren always stopped me. The comb was all I had left of wherever I came from. I was glad I’d kept it.
I repacked the box carefully and tucked it into my satchel.
Slinging the strap across my chest, I turned to the oval mirror across my little room.
My reflection startled me. My silver eyes were hollowed, bruised with shadows that hung beneath my lids.
My hair, streaked with blood and leaves, looked like something dragged from a grave.
The dye in my hair had begun to fade; silver strands shimmered defiantly through the black.
A laugh burst out of me as I looked at my reflection. I clapped a hand over my mouth. Had this really only happened in six hours? Or was it three? Time itself felt like it’d been cracked open and was bleeding out between one breath and the next.
I yanked the tie free and let my hair spill down my back, raking my fingers through the knots until my scalp ached.
Then I scrubbed my face with cold water until my skin burned, as if I could wash away the Bloodstone King’s touch, and the taste of him from my lips.
But his presence clung to me, sinking deeper with every breath. It was suffocating.
I shook the leaves from my hair and braided it down my back. My Stargala dress was still blood-stained and ruined, but I saw no reason to change it.
The girl who had worn it no longer existed.
I paused in the doorway and looked back one last time.
I had spent eighteen winters in this tiny attic room. It was my escape from torment, my refuge from hate and the weight of being different. Every secret I had ever hidden had lived and died within these walls.
Now it was only a room again, emptied of the girl who once called it safe.
My chest ached with every step down the stairs. This house held more warmth than cruelty, and I wasn’t ready to leave it, but I had no choice. I couldn’t let them hurt my family.
Kaydra and the twins sat at the kitchen table, steam curling from their herbal teas and fogging the window behind them. Mint thickened the air — the same tea Kaydra made for us before the Stargala.
She held a mug out to me. I took it from her hand with a faint smile. The twins didn’t even glance up as I leaned beside them at the counter. I hadn’t expected warmth, but the ache for it throbbed all the same.
I sipped the tea. It wasn’t mint. It was wild raspberry and sage. My favourite.
“You’ll write to us, won’t you?” Kaydra asked, rising abruptly and crossing the kitchen.
I braced for a hug. Instead, she plunged her hands into the sink. Her back stayed to me, her shoulders trembling, as she washes the dishes. Kaydra never did well with goodbyes. This was her version.
“Yeah,” I managed past the knot in my throat. “If you’ll write back.”
Her hands stilled in the water and she sniffled.
“Deal,” she said, her voice softening, then she shook her head and wiped her cheek on her shoulder.
“Rueren’s outside. She’s waiting for you on the swing.
” As if already knowing where my thoughts were, or perhaps she saw the worry on my face, she continued, “She asked to go feed Pennywig her dinner. Father told her I’d done it for her, which of course set her off like he knew it would.
Told me I didn’t know how to feed her right and to not do it again.
Not sure what we’ll tell her when she goes to feed that chicken its breakfast… but I’ll think on it later.”
The surge of emotions lodged in my throat made any sort of response impossible. So I simply nodded.
Kaydra peeked through the kitchen window. “Looks like a storm.”
Through the window, Blayren chopped wood — his old ritual when his thoughts were too loud.
He did it a lot when he was married. There would be no more trees left after the day we all had.
At this rate, the trees wouldn’t last the week.
Across the garden, Rueren sat on the swing he’d built for her second winter.
Her legs dragged slowly as she watched the sky.
I drained my tea and stepped out. The twins’ whispers nipped at my heels before the door even clicked shut. I wouldn’t miss that. Kaydra and I had always been a team, even when we warred. Now she’d face them alone. But she would. She loved nothing more than putting them in their place.
The first rays of sunlight bled into the sky. Dawn clawed toward the auburn clouds, and I still hadn’t said my goodbyes. I didn’t want to—because that would make it real. That I was leaving. That I was gone. My insides twisted as I reached the swing.
“Ruebear,” I whispered, my voice cracking.
She didn’t look down. Just kept swinging slowly, her head tilted back. Goodbyes were hard for her too. I reached out and stilled the swing, crouching before her as her eyes finally lowered to meet mine.
“Papa says you’re leaving,” she whispered. “Please don’t go. Please don’t leave us. I don’t want you to go.”
It almost broke me.
I thought I’d cried myself dry that day, but that same jagged lump returned, slicing up my throat like a regurgitated blade.
In the corner of my eye, Blayren stopped chopping wood and leaned against his axe.
One of the Bloodstone warriors lingered nearby.
I didn’t meet his gaze, though I felt it burning into the side of my head.
“I have to,” I murmured, brushing her pigtails over her shoulders. “I don’t want to go, but I have to. The gods have given me a new home now. But no matter where they send me, you’ll always be my Ruebear, and I’ll always be your biggest sister.”
Rueren shook her head. “But Eveldra—”
“Oh, what did that little toad say now?”
That usually made her laugh.
Instead more tears fell and she began to sob.
“Sh-she she said those C-Corn-aliens are going to eat you, and I don’t wuh-want them to eat you!” Tears streamed down her little face as she rubbed her eyes and snot ran from her nose. “Pl-please don’t go with them! I’ll be good. I’ll stay out your room. Please don’t leave me!”
“Oh, sweetheart, come here.”
I took her into my arms and shushed her the same way I did when she had nightmares and crawled into my bed.
“It’s okay. I’ve got you,” I whispered, kissing the top of her head. “It’s okay, baby.”
I soothed her until her sobs lessened and she could breathe again. I didn’t speak at first—afraid anything I said might be wrong. What comfort could I offer her, when I was breaking too? From the garden, the sound of Blayren’s axe resumed. I thought, maybe, I heard him sniffle.
“Will…will you come back?” Rueren asked me, her breath hitching mid-sentence.
I hesitated. After the altar...I doubted the village would welcome me back without torches. But I couldn’t tell her that. So I bent the truth instead.
“I’ll try, okay? And I promise—I won’t let the Carnelians eat me.” I reached into my pocket and pulled out the little shell bracelet she’d made me months ago for luck. “Remember this?”
She nodded. “It was for g-good luck. This one still had a crab in it when we found it,” she said, pointing to the twisted little shell.
I smiled. “We sure did. I want you to wear this and keep it safe until I get back. Think you can do that for me?” She nodded again and I hugged her tightly, my tears soaking into her hair. “Don’t forget me.”
Her small hand patted my back. “I won’t forget. You’re my big sister!”
“Yeah,” I whispered, my voice cracking, “and I always will be. I love you.”
“I love you too!” She pulled back, stretching her arms as wide as they’d go. “I love you thiiiiiis much.”
I laughed through tears. That was my line—what I’d whisper when I tucked her in at night. To think I’d never get that again made something inside me rip apart.
“Come on,” I said, lifting her gently off the swing. “Let’s go inside. I think I smell Kaydra’s chocolate muffins.”