Chapter 13 Avalynne
AVALYNNE
Iawake to suffocating darkness and the memory of Reverend Mother's condemnations.
"Your aunt was a troubled young woman, just like yourself," she had said before they forced me beneath the holy water.
Her words suffocate me now just like the water did weeks ago. It's the nightmarish plague that kills my dreams every night.
I've heard the nuns who deliver my meals whisper about my distant blood relative. The stories say I look like her. Blue eyes and strawberry-blonde hair, just like me.
But she was hysterical.
Deranged.
Mad.
Does it matter? I feel like I'm going crazy, too.
The thick void of my room weighs on me as I lay in bed and trace the yellowing bruises on my arms, souvenirs from when the nuns baptized me by force.
I could get up and turn on the light, but it's almost worse if I do. With nothing to occupy my mind, the walls will inch closer.
As I blink into nothingness, I feel yet another pang of regret for having called my grandfather. I could have gotten Professor Thatcher, despite the asshole he is, in trouble.
Was he punished too? I doubt it—I stole his phone, after all—but it was a risk, nevertheless.
I should have known better than to ask Grandpapa for forgiveness.
I should have vowed to serve my year in perdition to protect Isabella.
The bruises are an enduring reminder of the price of my actions. I continue to trace them in the dark, feeling the pain spread as I press and prod them.
I'm not sure how long I lay in my bed until the door to my room creaks open, revealing the nun the others call Sister EllaMae.
With an ever-present frown, she turns on the light, temporarily blinding me, before she instructs me to dress and leaves the room.
As the door shuts behind her, I climb out of bed and prepare myself, washing my face and brushing my unruly hair before tucking it beneath the white veil.
Sister EllaMae takes me to prayer this morning, where we join the other nuns in the cathedral.
Smoke curls from the votive candles burning on the candelabras near the altar, and the flames cast an ethereal glow in the early morning darkness, sending shimmering light stretching across the aged wooden pews.
The soft rustle of habits blends with the crackle of wax-fed flames, and I watch as the sisters sit, gathering in neat rows on the pews, before they fall to their knees to the stone floor and begin their morning prayer. As required, I join them.
"O Lord, open my lips," the nuns say in unison, "and my mouth shall proclaim your praise. God, come to my assistance. Lord, make haste to help me. Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, it is now and forever will be. Amen."
The sisters' voices rise and fall in a rhythmic cadence, their words reverberating off the stone as the morning prayer continues.
Cold leeches from the stone floor across my knees as we kneel, and many minutes later, when prayer is finally finished, I dare raise my head and search the room for Father Ezra, but I don't find him.
After morning prayer, I follow the nuns to the dining hall.
The room is empty, save for long wooden tables, each lined with matching wooden chairs, and a large cross nailed to the wall.
Sister EllaMae leads me to a chair at the end of a table, and I take a seat as the scent of porridge and freshly baked bread fills the air.
She delivers a tray a minute later and claims the seat next to mine, blessing her food as I begin to eat the meal of porridge, bread, and water placed before me.
The other nuns join us, all eating in silence, their eyes downcast. The quiet is broken only by the occasional clink of a spoon against a bowl or the soft rustle of fabric.
I scrape my spoon across the porcelain bowl, gathering a spoonful of porridge. I choke it down, the texture thick and chunky, but I force myself to swallow, the lumpy liquid slathering my throat like sludge. Each mouthful is a struggle, but at least the water is cold.
Even in a room full of people, though, the meal does little to wash away the loneliness that clings to me.
I have no friends here.
Only solitude.
Every prayer, meal, and day reminds me of that.
Once I finish my breakfast, Sister EllaMae escorts me to class. The corridors sound with the claps of our footsteps, and as we approach the classroom, anticipation and dread churn in my chest.
Professor Thatcher is an asshole, but at least he talks to me, which is better than most around here.
Sister EllaMae opens the door for me, gently guiding me by the elbow inside the classroom.
As she wordlessly shuts the door behind me, my gaze scrolls to find Professor Thatcher already seated at the desk at the front of the room.
"Good morning, troublemaker," he says, his gaze rising from the book he's reading and landing on me.
I can't tell if his words are an insult or if he's actually being nice to me this morning, so I say nothing as I take my seat in the front row.
"Finish the course credit paperwork first," Professor Thatcher instructs, looking back at his book. "The university requires more information."
I hear his eye roll rather than see it and look down at the transfer of credit forms.
"This sheet says I need an arts credit," I tell him, blinking down at the paper.
I don't know what I expect him to respond with.
Maybe for him to agree?
To offer a suggestion for a class?
To say anything remotely helpful?
True to his demeanor, however, Professor Thatcher just sighs, glances up from the book he's been reading, and then at me.
He blinks, his lips pursed as though he's ambivalent to my existence.
Am I so starved for human interaction I want to talk to Professor Asshole?
Apparently.
"Choose one then." He sounds bored.
"What?" I ask stupidly.
"Choose one," he shrugs, the fabric of his dress shirt bunching with the movement. "I have no preference."
He can't be serious. I know nothing about art.
"What?" I repeat.
There goes his infuriating eye roll again. I hope his eyes get caught that way, so he's forever stuck looking in the wrong direction. It would serve him right.
"Good God, Immorier," he drops his book to his desk. "Let me break it down for you. I don't care what you choose for an arts credit—or any credit, really—as long as it requires you to be silent and still. No talking. No moving. No, well … anything you."
He frowns, annoyance flitting over his features, and I briefly wonder why he's being even more mercurial than ever.
I shake my head at him. "Grandpapa wouldn't like it if …"
Professor's exasperated sigh splits the air again.
"I very much doubt your grandfather cares about that part of your curriculum.
If he had, he would have given me explicit instructions like he did with the other subjects he deemed worthwhile.
He would have required me to send him the texts and source material to him for approval. He. Does. Not. Care."
"But …" I say.
He closes his eyes in frustration and massages his temples. "For Christ's sake, stop overthinking it. I said it was fine. It is fine. Let it go."
I glance down at the form and the lengthy bullet-point list of requirements.
"It's just that this page says …" I start.
Professor raises his index and middle finger at me. "Stop talking, Immorier."
I look down at the list again.
He pinches the bridge of his nose, his eyes still shut. "Stop. It."
"I didn't say anything."
"Your anxiety-riddled breathing said enough."
Could he at least look at me again? I swallow, blinking across the room at him. I'd really like to talk about it before I mess up these forms.
"What if I …?" I begin.
"I don't care," he interrupts.
"I could put that …"
"Don't care."
"I'm just trying to …"
"Still don't care."
"I'm just …"
"Avalynne!" His gaze pops back open and fires at me. A gunshot tears through my gossamer heart.
I choke on silence.
"Were you sheltered as a child?" he demands. "Locked in a broom closet for a few years and forced to make friends with the shadows on the wall?" He raises his palm. "Don't answer that. It was rhetorical."
Okay, ouch.
I take a long look at the form again and steel myself for more of this battle. In the name of Saint Margaret of Castello herself, I just need him to answer my damn questions!
"Professor …" I try again.
"For the love of God …" he calls, and I think he's turning colors. Even from the distance, it looks like he might actually reach a boil soon.
"I could put down that it's a self-study course on all forms of tangible media," I blurt.
"Fine," he hurriedly picks up his book and glares at it, pointedly ignoring me. Is that a vein bulging at the base of his temple? I'm weirdly fascinated by it. He inhales sharply through his nose. "Whatever you want to put down is fine. Just for the love of God, do it quietly."
"Sir, yes, sir," I mutter under my breath, not sparing the sarcasm.
"What did you just say?"
How did he hear that?
Wide-eyed, I gape at him, but he doesn't even blink. He just sits there, white-knuckling his book between his fingers.
Oh, look, my desk is super interesting right now. Did he stop breathing, too, or is it just me? His stare singes me from across the room.
"Careful, little troublemaker," he warns, an edge to his words that ignites a sizzling in my middle. "Keep toeing that line, and we'll both find out what happens when it breaks."
I can't move, breathe, or focus until finally, at last, I feel his stare return to his book.