Chapter Twenty-Nine #2
To Slay, Eamon looked much the same when the door widened enough to allow them to slip inside.
Quickly, the other man shut and fastened the chain behind them, though he didn’t turn all the bolts.
The apartment was exactly as Slay recalled with all the windows covered and paintings lined up all over the place in various stages of completion.
“You’re an artist,” Ro said, kneeling to examine a portrait near the door.
She was careful not to touch anything, Slay noticed, and she straightened without making any sudden movements.
Eamon didn’t approach either of them or offer a handshake; Slay knew better than to hug the guy.
Like Ro, Eamon didn’t do casual contact, and now that Slay had walked a mile in the other man’s shoes, he could relate to his issues better.
Before, he hadn’t been great at seeing shit from someone else’s point of view.
I was kinda an asshole, honestly.
“I don’t have any training,” Eamon said, “but it helps me process.”
Rowena indicated a work across the room. “I love the colors in that one.”
“Thanks.” Eamon gave the right response in abstraction, eyes locked on her. “You don’t have to answer if you prefer not to, but…you’re not Animari, are you?”
Slay read Ro’s tension; she didn’t enjoy being singled out and she didn’t like talking about her heritage. Normally, he wouldn’t ask her to either, but Eamon had to know, or her words wouldn’t reach him. Assuming they even could.
“My mother was Eldritch,” she said quietly. “She told me that my father was a Golgoth guard in the undercity.”
Eamon flinched at the mere mention of the word, his eyes widening. He even took a step back, trembling visibly. Ro didn’t stir or try to reassure him. Maybe she knew instinctively how to respond because she lived with similar trauma.
“How long were you there?” Eamon’s question came in a whisper.
Slay realized he might be superfluous but leaving would distract the other two. He hoped that his familiarity could serve as a buffer and would keep Eamon calm, hopefully long enough for Ro and Eamon to talk. Best I can do is stay still and quiet, try not to ruin the moment.
“My entire life,” Ro said softly. “Until I participated in a failed rebellion. I was about to be executed when Alastor saved me. At that point, I joined his honor guard, and we eventually fought beside him in the war under the banner of the Exiles.”
Closing his eyes, Eamon visibly wrestled a horde of terrible memories. “I can’t forget what happened to me there.”
“They experimented on you,” Ro said, a statement, not a question.
Eamon snapped alert; he seemed startled by her surety, even taking a step toward her. “How do you know?”
“They were obsessed with taking Animari hostages, trying to develop a serum that would allow Golgoth soldiers to heal like the Animari do. They never got it right, and now the program is no more. You may not have heard, but the undercity was flooded, and there are no more prisoners in Golgerra. My friend Chantisse has been elected as prime minister in the first democratic election. The old ways are no more.”
“No prisoners. No experiments. No torture. No work detail.” Eamon let out a ragged sigh, tipping his face toward the dusty ceiling. “Weren’t you scared when you left? If you spent your whole life down there.”
“Terrified,” Ro admitted. “I sobbed and shook the first week after we left the city. I couldn’t get used to the open spaces, and the sky terrified me.
The sun was something I’d heard of, but it scared me too.
Pretty much everything was horrifying to me.
Until it wasn’t. I kept telling myself that I had no choice, I had to cope to repay Alastor for my life.
I didn’t have the option of hiding, so I did what I had to, one minute at a time. ”
“I feel like you’re judging me,” Eamon said, after a brief silence.
Slay bristled. He hadn’t taken it that way but he managed to keep quiet. Ro could handle herself, and if he snapped, Eamon would kick them both out.
Ro waved both hands in a negating gesture. “I’m sorry for sounding like that. I’m conveying my experiences. If I’d had a safe place to go, maybe I would still be holed up like a badger. Heal at your own pace, and don’t let anyone tell you when is long enough.”
Eamon took another step toward Ro, his voice soft. “Thank you.”
She added, “I will say this, though. If you don’t try to move on, you’re the one who will suffer for it.”
“What do you suggest?” Eamon asked.
Rowena seemed to consider, then replied, “Maybe…think of one thing you want to do more than you wish to hide. Then try.”
Slay held his breath, because already Ro had gotten further with Eamon than anyone else. Everything hinged on Eamon’s response, though.
“What if I fail?” the other man asked.
Ro answered immediately, “Try again. Failure is the step before success, right? And incremental progress is still progress. If you keep at it, one day you might find that you’ve gone further than you imagined you could. I believe in you.”
“Would it be okay if I hugged you?” Eamon asked Rowena.
In answer, she opened her arms. It was a ginger, tentative embrace on both sides, and Eamon scrambled away afterward like a skittish cat. Slay didn’t even feel jealous.
“Good talk,” Slay said. “We shouldn’t outstay our welcome, though.”
Eamon held up a hand. “Stay a moment longer, please?”
“As you like,” Ro agreed.
Slay stared in disbelief. For the first time in forever, Eamon pulled the blackout shade from one of the windows.
“This is the first step,” he said to Ro. “I want to see the sunrise.”