56
When I wake up, I’m lying in my childhood bedroom. The bed is soft and smells so familiar. The curtains are drawn. A lamp stands in the corner, as does a steaming mug on the nightstand.
I try to remember what happened. I stormed into General Sol’s office and demanded she let Rook go. Skies, what was I thinking? I was furious. Scared. Rightfully so. But I’ve probably done more harm than good.
A noise draws my attention to a chair in the corner, where my mother sits, working on one of her handmade blankets.
The colorful fabric drapes over her knees as I watch her deftly flick her needle and thread, a line of concentration between her brows.
I think of the day I woke up to find Rook mending Teddy, struck by the similarity. So much has changed since then.
“Mom,” I whisper, and she quickly puts her sewing aside and crosses the room, sinking onto the edge of the bed.
“Poet,” she says, touching my cheek and then smoothing my hair back. “How are you feeling?”
I shake my head and squeeze my eyes shut. “I don’t really know. What happened? Why am I here? Why didn’t they arrest me?”
“Your father stepped in,” she says. “Nyxia agreed to let us deal with you ourselves.”
Of course. Always sort of protected by him, but not really. I’ve enjoyed many freedoms because of my father, but instead of gratitude, all I feel is annoyance. I hate it. I don’t want his protection. I would rather have a dad I could trust over any of this.
I should be in a cell. I should be punished for what I did.
I stare at my mom because her answer doesn’t feel completely right.
I’m forgetting something, but my mind is still foggy from whatever they used to knock me out.
“You were hysterical,” she continues. “Screaming about that boy. I don’t want to say I told you so—”
“Then don’t,” I say. “Don’t say something you will regret. Don’t say something that will drive us even further apart. He’s been wrongfully accused, and they shouldn’t have taken him.”
“But he’s dangerous,” she whispers. “Even if he didn’t kill those people, he’s infected. When I think about you alone with him and what might have happened . . .”
I stare at her face. At her wide-eyed worry.
“Mom,” I say. “Do you really not know?”
I watch something shift behind her gaze. Denial. A refusal to believe what’s been in front of her all along. I’m not angry about it, but I am . . . disappointed.
“Know what?” she asks, her voice paper thin.
“That she’s immune to the storms,” says a voice from the door, where my father stands with his hands in his pockets, leaning against the frame.
A few fragmented memories return. His hands reaching for me as he tried to calm me down. Losing it because he touched me.
My mother blinks, her shoulders dropping as she exhales a ragged breath. “I . . .”
“You had to know,” I say. “Please tell me you suspected something.”
I need to believe she saw me at least a little bit.
“Of course I did,” she says. “But I . . . I didn’t want to acknowledge it.”
“Were you so ashamed of me?”
“Oh, darling.” Tears fill her eyes. “Not at all. I could never be ashamed of you. I was terrified. I guess I thought if I ignored it, I could make it go away.”
“You know that isn’t how it works,” I reply, my voice lowering to a whisper. My mom has let me down a lot, but I don’t think I’ve ever been this frustrated with her habit of burying her head in the sand. “And Raine?”
She swallows as she turns to my father, which seems like confirmation enough. He steps into the room and leans against the wall, folding his arms over his chest. “Both of our children were burdened with this, and I did everything I could to protect all of you from it.”
My mom’s focus drops to her hands twisting in her lap.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I shouldn’t have pretended. I should have been braver.” Then, she looks up at my father. “Why didn’t you just tell me? Did you really think me so weak?”
“I hoped you’d never find out,” he answers, ignoring her second question.
It feels like one of the truest things he’s ever said to her.
“So we’ve all been living with our lies,” I say. “One big happy family of deception.”
I sink onto my pillow and stare at the ceiling as we’re all quiet for several moments.
“What happens now?” my mother asks, and I look over at her.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean . . . are you safe? What if someone else finds out?”
Her expression brims with worry, her eyes glassy with tears.
“I don’t think I’m safe here, no,” I say. “Soon, it will be time for me to leave.”
“And go where?”
“I’m not sure yet. There are so many things you don’t know.”
“Tell me,” she whispers. “I’m ready to hear everything.”
Last time I was in this apartment, my father tried to stop me from talking within these walls, worried someone might overhear.
I wait for him to object, but he just nods.
Maybe I get it because now he’s regarding me with the tentative caution of someone who understands that things are about to change forever.
Maybe it doesn’t matter who hears us anymore.
So I lay it all out. Cards on the table. Almost nothing held back.
I tell my mom everything, including what I saw in the Veil and about the cure. I tell her what I really am. Everything she didn’t know, plus some things my father didn’t know as well. The only thing I don’t share is what I know about the Fog.
When I’m done, they both study me warily, as though they’re recognizing me for the very first time.
“I see,” my mother says, though I’m not sure if that’s true. Still, she’s handling it all better than I expected. “You lied to The Shield?” she asks my father. “To protect our children?”
“I did,” he says. “And I would do it a hundred times again.”
She watches him, something flitting across her expression that tells me she really did love him at one point.
I realize that we’ve both been hoping. Waiting for him to become the man we needed and wanted.
I’ve long since accepted that he could never become that for me, but I think a small part of her is still hanging on.
“This is . . .” she says, again staring at her hands. “I’m not sure what to do with any of this information.”
“They’re coming,” I say, sitting up, relieved to find my head has stopped spinning. “The army of the Veil is headed toward the city. They should be here in a matter of days.”
At that, my father’s brows climb. “What? Why?”
“The Shield attacked a Whisper Sanctum. Killed everyone, and now they’re retaliating.”
“Skies,” my father says, running a hand through his hair. “How many?”
I shrug. “I don’t know. Hundreds? All of them? They’re angry. They killed High Commander Athira’s son, and they will answer for it.”
My father crosses the room, sinking into a chair in the corner, where he leans forward with his elbows on his knees. “We have to alert the Patrol. The Shield. Everyone.”
I nod. “I’m telling you this to do with what you will. I believe the Veil is justified in their anger and their retaliation, but there are innocent people here, and they don’t deserve to die for the actions of The Shield.”
Neither of my parents responds to that.
“I need to leave,” I say. “Thank you for taking care of me, but I have to find Rook.”
My father glances up. “Where will you go?” he asks. It almost sounds like he’s concerned.
I plan to head to the Fog, but I can’t tell him that.
I think he suspects that I’m keeping things from him.
“Do you know where Rook is?” I ask, choosing to deflect his question.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t.”
“Then his family will help me. When we find the cure, they’ll take it back to the Tiera Frais.
This information should never have been kept a secret.
” I scoot to the edge of the bed. “General Sol said she needed me, but I think she was lying. She obviously wants something, and I need to understand what.” I inhale a sharp breath.
“I started this, and now I have to finish it. I won’t leave Rook in their hands. ”
“There will be nothing left for you here,” my father says, his voice uncharacteristically raw with emotion.
I swallow over the swelling knot in my throat. “I know.”
“Poet,” my mother whispers, tears filling her eyes. “You can’t do this. I can’t lose you, too.”
I told myself I could never leave her.
She’ll have my father, which isn’t saying much, but I don’t think I have a choice.
At least we had this last moment together. It has to be enough.
“I’m sorry. But this is so much bigger than me now.”
I swing my feet to the floor and push myself up to discover that my knees are still a little loose.
My father stands from his seat, stretching himself to his full height. “I could stop you from leaving.”
I lift my chin, throwing my shoulders back. “I suppose you could.”
We watch each other, the silence stretching into infinite space.
Maybe in that moment, we both understand that I’m no longer his daughter, born of his flesh and blood, his to be manipulated and used in whatever way he sees fit.
Somewhere along the way, he forced me to become my own person.
Forged from the ashes of his anger, I became someone else.
Someone different from him.
Someone I can face when I look in the mirror.
Someone I’m trying to be proud of.
When he doesn’t move, I head for the door.
“Will we see you again?” my mother asks, her voice fading to a pained whisper.
I walk over and kiss her on the cheek, then glance at my father, who watches us both with an expression I’ll never understand.
“I truly don’t know, Mom. If not, please take care of yourself.”
And then I’m gone.