Chapter 14
Silence
THE REQUIEM | Present
The rain beats against the high, arched windows of the study, matching the knot in my chest.
I don’t understand why this is happening.
“Look at me when I am speaking to you, Hannah.” Papa’s voice is deceptively smooth as he stands by the desk, swirling the amber liquid in his glass.
Whenever he drinks, things happen.
I press my back harder against the curtains, squeezing my sketchpad against my chest until the cardboard edges bruise my ribs.
My pulse won’t slow down, no matter how many times I tell myself to breathe.
I know I shouldn’t be here. I know that when Papa’s voice drops to that freezing register, bad things happen.
But I can’t leave Mama alone in the room with him. I can’t.
Mama stands near the door, her shoulders hunched, her eyes fixed rigidly on the floor. “I only asked for the ledgers, George. I am your wife; I deserve to know where the money you earn goes—”
Smash.
The sound of the glass shattering against the wall makes me jump. Mama flinches violently.
“You do not ask me for anything,” Papa snarls.
The calm facade I love so much instantly evaporates, replaced by something feral.
He bridges the distance between them in two terrifying strides.
His hand wraps brutally into Mama’s hair, forcing her face upward.
“I provide for you. I give you a life women in the old country would starve for. And you dare question where my money goes?”
“George, please—” Mama whispers.
“Don’t you dare hide behind my daughter,” he spits, and then he shoves her.
Mama loses her footing. She crashes hard against the edge of the console table before sliding down onto the floor, clutching her ribs, letting out a muffled, breathless sob.
I can’t stop myself. Mama crumpled on the floor breaks the fear holding me back. I drop my sketchpad and run across the room, throwing my small body directly between them.
“Papa, no! Stop it! Please don’t hurt Mama!
” I cry, tears instantly blinding me. I bury my face against his trousers, my tiny fingers gripping his coat.
I love him. God, I love him so much it hurts.
He is my Papa. He is the man who carries me on his shoulders, who buys me the finest pastel paints, who calls me his little princess.
I just want the good version of him back. I want the monster to go away.
The terrifying storm in Papa’s expression melts. He drops to one knee, completely ignoring Mama on the floor, and gathers me into a fierce embrace.
“Oh, my sweet, sweet girl,” Papa murmurs and lifts me, settling me onto his knee, and brushes the wet curls away from my face with terrible tenderness. His hands are so large, so gentle. “Look at you, shaking. I’m so sorry, princess. Papa didn’t mean to scare you.”
“Don’t hurt her, Papa,” I sob into his shoulder, locking my arms tightly around his neck. “Please don’t be mad.”
Papa sighs heavily as he looks over my shoulder at Mama, who is still on the floor weeping silently into her hands.
“I don’t want to be mad, Selene,” he says softly, his thumb gently wiping a tear from my cheek.
He leans back so he can look straight into my eyes, his face full of sorrow.
“But you see how your Mother acts, don’t you?
She doesn’t appreciate anything I do for this family.
She pushes me, and she provokes me, and then she makes me lose my temper.
She did this, sweetheart. She brought this ugliness into our beautiful home. ”
I blink through my tears. A horrible, confusing guilt pulls at my chest. I love Mama, but Papa is my hero. He’s the sun. If Papa says Mama caused it… if he says she made him do it… it must be true. Mama must have broken a rule. Mama must have been bad.
“George… don’t tell her that. Don’t do this to her…”
“Hush, Hannah,” Papa cuts her off, his voice a freezing edge for a moment before it softens again as he looks back at me. “You’re my good girl, aren’t you, Selene? You understand how hard Papa works to keep you safe? To buy you your paints? To give you everything you ever dream of?”
I nod quickly, desperate to keep the warmth in his eyes, desperate to stay safe in his arms where the storm can’t touch me. “Yes, Papa. I love you.”
“I love you too, my beautiful angel. More than life itself,” Papa whispers, pressing a long kiss to my forehead.
He holds me tight, burying his face in my hair, but as he does, his eyes lock onto Mama over my shoulder. The warmth is completely gone from his gaze. It’s cold, dead, and flashing with a terrifying, triumphant malice.
“You’re the only one in this house who truly loves me,” he whispers into my hair. “We don’t need anyone else, do we? Just you and me, princess.”
I want to go to Mama, but Papa’s arms are too tight, and I am too afraid to let go of the only man who can protect me from himself.
This house is lifeless. It will never find life again.
***
It is huge and airless. It does not breathe like a living place; these cold artificial lights splattering through the corridors offer no warmth whatsoever. The entire environment feels entombed, less a home than a mausoleum.
Low voices carry from below. It’s a civilized sound, yet it makes the hair on my arms stand up. I wonder who inhabits this purgatory with her. Was that the voice I heard earlier waiting down there? Is Corvin here?
I follow the sound, my hand trailing on the banister. The wood is cold.
Everything is cold.
Unlike the blood rushing through my veins.
It’s thrumming.
I reach the threshold of the dining hall. The room is cavernous, dominated by a long table. My Mother isn’t there yet. But the others are.
I stop and count them.
Eight.
Eight silhouettes against the candlelight. The lights are dim.
There’s a faint scent of lemon and butter in the air.
Along with the tangy scent of alcohol.
Everything in me tells me to stop, turn back, and run. Until I reach the cliff and jump from there.
My skin prickles.
As if they knew me, but I have no name for any of them.
It’s a physical pressure.
Like a localized gravity that makes it hard to draw breath. I am my Mother’s greatest achievement, as she has said many times, and they’ve been waiting to inspect me.
One woman, seated near the head of the table, looks up. She wears a fur coat over a sharp charcoal suit. She looks older than my Mother, with wrinkles on her face and grey hair, yet her red lips put her at no more than fifty.
Her eyes are not kind as they hold mine.
They are analytical, measuring the dilation of my pupils and the steadiness of my gait.
I swallow and look to her right. Cold runs down my spine.
Corvin.
He sits to her right, a glass of whiskey in his hand. He doesn’t look like the man who dragged me through the woods. He looks tired.
He looks like a man who sold his soul and realized the currency was counterfeit.
When our eyes meet, he looks away.
Guilt is a heavy coat, and he is shivering underneath it.
The other six are men and women I don’t recognize, but their suits are tailored to hide the bulge of holsters. They are the bad men’s muscle, or perhaps my Mother’s new praetorian guard.
“She’s here,” the woman at the head seat says.
The eight of them stare.
A man is a small thing in the face of the law; standing before this table, I am a butterfly pinned to a board.
“Don’t just stand there, Selene,” my Mother’s voice rings out from behind me.
She glides past me, her red silk dress a splash of arterial blood against the grey stone of the room. She takes my hand, pulls me with her, and I let her, because I can’t trust my legs.
“Sit, darling, with Aris,” she commands, gesturing to the empty chair. “We were just discussing your future.”
She takes the head seat at the other end of the table.
Every muscle is screaming run, but I anchor myself to the performance. I sit. The velvet of the chair is soft, but the atmosphere is rough.
To my right, the woman named Aris continues to dissect me with her eyes, her red lips curved into a smile that doesn’t reach the weathered skin of her face.
The six strangers resume their low murmurs, but their attention remains anchored to me, a collective weight that makes the room feel pressurized.
“You look pale, Selene,” Aris says, her voice a polished stone. “But the dress… it suits the fragility we’re cultivating. Doesn’t it, Hannah?”
I keep my eyes on the white linen, on a stray thread fraying at the edge. I try to tune them out, to retreat into the dark, iron-wrought corners of my mind where strangely Zagreus still lives, but their voices are oily, slipping through my defenses like venom.
“She certainly has the Vitale look about the eyes,” one of the men remarks, his gaze lingering on the curve of my neck. “That haunted, high-bred stare. It’ll fetch a premium from the right buyer. Or perhaps a very effective peace offering.”
“She’s grown into quite the masterpiece, hasn’t she, Vane?” Aris purrs, her voice like sandpaper on silk. She reaches out, her cold fingers grazing my fingers on the table. I stiffen, but I don’t move.
“The bone structure is exquisite. She has that… pliable quality now. Like wet clay. You’ve done wonders with her, Hannah. The girl we saw years ago was a feral cat. This? This is a… well-behaved kitten.” Aris continues as shivers run down my spine.
A ripple of low, cruel laughter circles the table. It feels like hands crawling all over me.
I don’t understand why they’re talking about me like I’m not sitting here.
“A kitten with a very expensive pedigree,” Vane adds.
He leans back, his eyes roaming down the length of my blue silk dress, lingering where the fabric clings to my hips.
“I wouldn’t mind being the one to hold the leash for a few nights.
Teach her some real manners. She’s got that look…
and I love girls with that look. You know I’ve always wanted her in my house. As daughter-in-law or my own mistress.”
The bile rises in my throat. I want to scream.