Chapter 29
Life continued as normal after I killed Madame.
No one spoke to me about it. A few people muttered to themselves when I walked past, and even more stared at me with a new wariness, but nothing more.
It was so anticlimactic that sometimes I wondered if I’d dreamt killing her.
I’d been prepared to be locked up for murder, so to have nothing happen made what I’d done feel less like vengeance and more like fresh, pointless blood on my hands.
Apple showed up the very next day. When she stepped through the door, I froze.
For a long moment, we stared at each other.
She deserved so many explanations and apologies, but none of them made it past my lips.
Finally, she walked toward me and hugged my legs.
Eyes burning, I rested a hand on her blond head.
After a minute, she let go and went straight to the sink and washed her hands like I’d taught her.
Numbly, I returned to what I’d been doing, moving around the clinic like a silent ghost as I worked, but she didn’t seem to mind.
She hovered near me the entire day, quiet and watching, helping with small tasks and bringing me a glass of water every so often.
She watches you. Everything you do. You’re teaching her what to think about herself by how you think about you. Trey’s words stabbed through my head.
I’d planned on being a better person for Apple and the other kids, but mostly I’d wanted to be better for Trey. What was the fucking point? Why try to be a good person when all the best people I knew ended up dead?
I don’t think anythin’ bad can come from being a good person.
I should’ve known that was bullshit.
I’d been afraid, terrified, that this would happen, but I hadn’t realized until now that I’d also been in denial that it could happen.
Trey had seemed so different, like he was somehow exempt from the awful reality I’d seen, like he couldn’t end up dead like everyone else because he was so full of life.
There couldn’t be a time after Trey just like there couldn’t be a time after the sun.
Yet here I found myself, lost in that after with no idea how to keep going.
Apple talked happily to Griz as she leaned against the wall, one foot up and resting on the wall behind her, exactly like how Trey used to stand, and it struck me like a fucking bullet. The glasses of water, the company, the help, they were all her attempts to fill Trey’s shoes for me.
My lungs stopped working. I dropped the bandage I’d been wrapping around a young man’s arm.
“Bones?” Griz’s voice sharpened with alarm.
“Can you finish?” I managed to ask, gesturing to the patient who stared wide-eyed at me, before fleeing outside.
My feet took me to the stables. Violet nickered at me when I slipped inside her stall.
I stroked her, trying to get myself under control, but I lost that battle.
I sank into the straw, my arms wrapped around myself as I sobbed.
Violet sniffed my hair and nudged me with her nose.
When I didn’t respond, she stood beside me like a silent sentry as the pain flattened everything else.
—
By the time I managed to get control over myself, the sun had set. I pulled my hood over my head and shoved my hands in my pockets, hoping nobody would notice me as I trudged back to the clinic. When I pushed the door open, I froze on the threshold.
Sam stood in the middle of the room.
I hadn’t seen him since before Trey and I had left. He looked like a shadow of his former self, thin, still too pale, and pissed.
“Where the fuck have you been?” he snapped, striding toward me.
A sliver of guilt trickled in through the numbness. “I’m—”
He pulled me forward into a hug, interrupting me. I could feel his heart pounding.
“You scared me,” he said, his voice rough. “Gods, I’m so sorry. I shoulda been here sooner. I had a bad spell the last few days. Got laid up with a damn cold like an old man.”
My arms had instinctively wrapped around him, but he felt like a different person. I could feel all his ribs beneath my fingers, and the muscle mass he’d been so vain about had vanished. He felt fragile. I almost asked him why he hadn’t come to the clinic, but then I remembered I couldn’t heal him.
“It’s okay,” I mumbled.
“Everybody’s out lookin’ for you.” He pulled back, studying my face. “Griz said you freaked out in the middle of bandaging someone.”
His scrutiny made me feel far too exposed. “I’m fine,” I said, pulling away and approaching the sink under the pretense of washing my hands. “Sorry I scared you.”
The silence thickened, making me afraid to turn around. When I did, he stood by the exam table, arms crossed and eyes narrowed.
“So we’re back to that bullshit,” he said with a bite. “I didn’t believe Griz when he told me.”
“Sam—”
“I’ll go tell everyone you’re back.” He paused at the door. “I missed you, Shortcake,” he said quietly before he stepped outside.
—
The days slid by, thick and slippery as mud.
Nemo didn’t waste any time. He exiled any remaining assholes who liked the way Madame ran things.
He opened the canteen up to everyone, regardless of whether they worked or not, but improving housing for everyone remained his top project.
With about half the hold dead or gone, there wasn’t a housing shortage anymore, so he started moving the rusters out of the slums and into the empty houses.
A few of Madame’s top people were unaccounted for, including Sax and Zana. After a few days of combing through the hold, the consensus was that they had fled during the fight.
Griz and Sam took over guard duties again.
Raven came almost every day and bossed Sky and Apple around, but her eyes looked as hollow as mine.
Jax still didn’t say much around me, but he came by the clinic every day and did odd jobs for me like chopping firewood or wrapping rolls of bandages.
Mac worked closely with Nemo, but he made an effort to come by the clinic almost every day.
I didn’t say much to any of them. I wasn’t trying to shut them out; I was just so damn tired.
I had to use every ounce of my energy to get through each day.
Once in a while the crew would get into a stupid argument, and for a second, things almost felt normal.
In those moments, I found myself looking for Trey, expecting to see him teasing Griz, wrestling Sam, or throwing his arm around Jax.
A thousand tiny moments of realizing he was gone hadn’t done a damn thing to dull the pain.
—
The first time Mac showed up and announced that Nemo had summoned me, anxiety spiked so sharply through the numbness that I had to dart outside the clinic to be sick.
“You okay?” Mac asked, following me outside.
I dragged in another desperate breath through my nose, hands resting on my knees. What would I do if Nemo wanted me to help him torture someone?
“Hey.” Mac crouched in front of me. “Are you sick? I can tell Nemo you can’t make it tonight.”
“I’m fine,” I whispered.
His eyes narrowed into a glare. “Bones.”
I forced myself to straighten, smoothing the front of my shirt with trembling fingers. “Are we…are we going to the dungeon?”
He stood with me, and his brow furrowed in confusion for a second before realization dawned on his face. “Oh, shit. No. He wants to talk at his place. He’s not usin’ the dungeon.”
“Ever?”
His face darkened, and he stepped into my space to grasp my shoulders. “Bones, you never have to help torture people ever again.” His voice was firm. “And if anybody tries, they’ll have to answer to me.”
I shuddered, and he squeezed my shoulders gently.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I shoulda realized what that sounded like.”
I stepped back, and his hands fell to his sides.
“You ready?” he asked after I didn’t say anything.
I nodded, but my anxiety followed me the entire way to Nemo’s house.
Nemo lived in one of the nicer homes built close to the tower.
I’d been there once before to heal him during the sickness, but it looked completely different.
Some of the walls had been removed, opening up the room.
People stood around tables, poring over maps, talking about crops, and discussing the best material to use for new roofs.
“Nemo’s turning his house into his headquarters. Less intimidating than the watchtower,” Mac explained quietly.
We went up to the second floor and Mac rapped on one of the doors in the long hallway, entering when Nemo beckoned us inside.
Nemo sat behind a desk, and I studied him out of habit.
His face had filled out a little and his color was back.
Shame cut through me as I realized he never came for healing after his imprisonment.
I couldn’t blame him if he didn’t want anything to do with my healing powers anymore.
“Howdy, Bones, Mac,” he said, gesturing at the chairs in front of his desk. “Please, both of you, take a seat.” He eyed me as I sat, making me uncomfortable. “How are you doing, Bones?”
“I’m fine,” I said, ignoring the annoyed huff from Mac.
“I’m not gonna beat around the bush. I’m sorry for what Madame did to you.
” He leaned forward on the desk, his gaze earnest. “I know that might not seem like much, but I am terribly sorry for all of it. We’ve been working on taking over for a long time, but I hate that so many innocent people got hurt before we could stop her. ”
I fidgeted under the table, unsure of what to say.
“I wanted to let you in on what’s been going on.
This uprising has been brewing for years, but Madame took out the initial wave so brutally that people were scared.
” Nemo glanced at Mac, and I realized he was talking about Mac’s dad.
“She wanted to intimidate the people, and it worked. The hold offered them security, and they were terrified of losing that. It took a long time to rebuild the resistance, and as you know all too well, Madame got wind of it somehow.”