Chapter 23 Keira
TWENTY-THREE
KEIRA
Idon't know how many days pass before they let me see Hale.
Three, maybe four. Time folds in on itself when you're confined to one room with nothing but bandages and the dull ache in your palms to keep you company.
Ewan said it would be alarming for Hale to see my hands in their state, but he's letting me go for a visit sooner than I expected.
Maybe he's taken aback by the fact that I haven't been fighting him. Or maybe the staff gossip is all about my depression and how I haven't left my bed in almost a week.
Either way, I don't care. All that matters is I get to see my baby today.
The nurse came in early this morning and removed the bandages. The cuts are healing nicely. There will be scars, but it shouldn't be too bad unless someone's looking for them. I flex my fingers, testing the stiffness, making sure I haven't lost any feeling permanently.
By midafternoon, a staff member knocks twice and cracks the door open just enough to deliver the message: I'm cleared to visit Hale in the library. In exactly thirty minutes.
She leaves before I can ask if there are any conditions.
I stand in front of the mirror for a long time, pulling my sleeves down over my wrists, smoothing the fabric until it sits right.
I look like shit, and no amount of smoothing is going to fix the dark circles under my eyes, but kids don't care about stuff like that anyway.
The walk through the house feels different after days of isolation. I feel more exposed, like I've put a bigger target on my back. There is a reason Ewan is so good at what he does. He excels at breaking people apart from the inside. Feeding the shame you never thought you had.
I hear footsteps behind me, and when I look back, it's that guard again—the one with the mask. When I stop to look at him, he halts and straightens against the wall. His posture is perfect—shoulders back, gaze fixed forward like he's holding a perimeter instead of following me.
It's robotic, and that's what makes it wrong.
Does Ewan think I'm a total fucking idiot?
When I turn and continue toward the library, I hear the soft thud of his boots behind me.
He must have been promoted to prison watch. Or rat.
I don't speak to him, and he doesn't acknowledge me as we make our way to Hale.
The library is quiet when I arrive.
Hale is already there, seated at the low table near the window with his back to the door, bent over something. He's so focused on his task that he doesn't notice me right away. My heart twists so sharply I have to suck in a breath.
I'm so relieved to see him.
Missing him is constant, and I feel guilty because I shouldn't need this as badly as I do.
No one could have prepared me for this need before I became a mother.
The way half your heart lives outside your body—small and vulnerable and entirely out of reach.
Mothers spend their days hoping and praying their children are safe, carrying that gaping hole in their chest like a wound that never closes.
This kind of love is unlike anything else I've ever experienced.
I step closer, careful not to interrupt, and just watch him.
It hasn't been long, but he seems older. Calmer. Adjusted in a way that should comfort me but doesn't, because it means he's learned to be here without me.
Does he think I've abandoned him?
How do I tell a five-year-old that my absence isn't a choice without terrifying him with the truth?
That's another thing I've learned as a mother: how to sacrifice myself to protect his innocence.
He bites the edge of his lower lip as he concentrates, a small unconscious habit he's had for as long as I can remember.
My masked shadow steps into the room carefully, almost like he's in a daze. I think he's coming toward me, but then I realize his eyes are locked on Hale.
He comes to a stop and just stands there, staring at my son like he's looking at a ghost.
This isn't the intensity of a man who's supposed to be on watch or scanning for threats.
Then his demeanor shifts. His hand twitches at his side like he's stopping himself from reaching out, and when he glances over at me, it's abrupt…like he's been caught. He straightens, steps back against the wall near the library doors, and goes still again.
I don't know what that was, and I don't care to find out.
When I finally sit across from Hale, I keep my hands folded in my lap, careful not to reach too much, not to press too hard. My palms still ache if I grip anything too tightly.
We don't get much time, so I soak up every second.
When the nanny comes to take him, Hale cries. He pulls on my shirt, fists tight in the fabric, refusing to let go.
"Please, Mamma. Don't leave again."
The words cut right through me.
I try to hold myself together. Try to smile. Try to tell him something comforting, something brave. Something a mother is supposed to say in moments like this.
Nothing comes out right.
My face collapses before I can stop it. The tears spill anyway, hot and useless, and I hate myself for letting him see them. I hate that I can't be strong for him when it matters most.
My chest feels like it's caving in. Like if I don't get out of this room soon, I'll fold in half and disappear into the floor.
The nanny steps in gently, murmuring reassurances I barely hear. She lifts Hale into her arms, and he starts screaming—arms reaching out to me, confused and terrified in a way no child should ever be.
"It's okay, baby. I promise. I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere," I call out. "I love you so much."
I just stand there while he's carried away, my hands lifting too late, my body locked in place as his cries echo outside the library.
When the door finally closes, the silence is gut-wrenching.
I sink forward, pressing my palms over my mouth, breathing through the sobs so they don't turn loud. So no one hears how completely I'm coming apart.
This is what real loneliness feels like. Not being alone, but being powerless while the only thing you love most is taken from you.
"Madame."
I forgot he was here.
"Leave me alone."
There's a pause. Then he exhales heavily. "I can't."
I turn, and his eyes meet mine. That same furious burn from the other night is there again, like he's trying to hold himself back.
From what? I don't know. Maybe from me. Maybe from the world.
I turn away before he can say anything else.
But Hale's cries follow me all the way back to my room, lodged deep in my chest, where they make a home and stay long after today.
I spend hours in the shower, letting the water beat down on me while I cry. Everything else Ewan does to me I can handle, but when it comes to hurting Hale, I have no armor left.
By the time I finally turn the water off, my eyes are swollen and aching, my body wrung out like I've given up something vital. I step out, wrap myself in a towel, and feel a rush of relief when I realize the room is empty.
Now that we share a room, Ewan can appear whenever he wants. The absence feels like a small victory.
My heart skips a beat when I notice something sitting on my bedside table.
A small bundle of sea asters.
The same purple flowers that grew wild along the salt marshes near my grandmother's house in County Cork.
As I move closer, I realize they're freshly picked.
I didn't even know they grew here in Iceland.
Sea asters have always been my favorite. They're the only flowers stubborn enough to bloom where nothing else can—harsh ground and cliff edges, places where the wind hits hard enough to shove you sideways if you're not careful.
My grandmother always said they were survivors.
They remind me of someone else too…
"Where did you find these?" A small mug of water sits on the rickety table in the cabin. Tristan stands in the kitchen, staring at ingredients like they're written in a language he doesn't speak, completely lost and out of his element.
"Huh?"
"The sea asters."
He glances at me. "Saw them on my walk this morning. They're tough as hell—grow in places that would kill other flowers. Thought you might—"
"I do," I say quickly, smiling. "My grandmother's house was close to the marshes in Cork. I used to run through them as a kid and come home with purple-stained fingers. Sea asters always remind me of home."
When I look up, he's staring at me with an intensity that sends butterflies exploding through my stomach—wild and unfamiliar, like nothing I've ever felt before.
I don't touch the flowers right away.
I lock the door. Cross to the window. Stare out at the cliffs where the wind tears at the grass like it's trying to rip the earth apart.
Then I turn back to the bedside table, thinking about the kind of person who would leave something like this. Who would slip into my room, place them where I'd find them, and disappear without a trace.
The risk that takes inside these walls.
The message it sends is clear. Someone inside this house is watching me.