Chapter Twenty-Four Mother
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
MOTHER
T HE H OME FOR Temporarily Embarrassed Highborns was eerily quiet as Lythlet trekked through its dusty corridors and unpolished marble stairs to the uppermost floor. The attic door was open, watery light spilling from the dormer window.
Lythlet stepped inside, eyes adjusting to the dimness. A cough caught her attention. Father was asleep on the mattress, curled toward the wall. His shoulders heaved with yet another cough, but he returned to a restless doze.
Mother was closer to Lythlet, sitting upright on the mattress, rail-thin knees hooked over the edge, still as a stone guardian. Her face was void of any expression as she registered Lythlet’s presence.
Lythlet’s heart sank, recognizing this familiar sight.
“Today?” she whispered tepidly, already knowing the answer.
Silence.
Mother’s eyes flitted left to right in an aimless gaze, the way they always did when her mind was overrun with ill spirits.
She lingered like a ghost in her own bed, hidden in the shadows with a demon spirit whispering in her skull.
Breathing without living, looking without seeing—she was without being .
Lythlet lowered her head, already exhausted by the visit.
“I’ve come to give my Harvest greetings, Mother,” she murmured.
She went on her knees before the blank-faced creature and performed the ritual of filial piety, a complex series of bows punctuated by verbose well-wishes for the wellbeing and prosperity of her elders.
There was one final act to this greeting. She was to take her mother’s hand in hers, press it to her forehead, then kiss it before uttering her final wish for Mother’s good health.
Don’t , warned a voice inside just as she reached for Mother. Her fingers brushed Mother’s bony hand, hoping to feel her warmth—the warmth of a loved one, any loved one.
She did, a soft spark that made her feel some semblance of home, a dash of golden honey on the sparse canvas.
Then Mother slapped her hand, eyes flitting around nervously, not seeing anything Lythlet could. She began chanting a slurred incantation under her breath with a tinge of irate frustration, drawing the rite of exorcism with harried hands.
“Sorry,” Lythlet stammered, withdrawing her stinging hand in a panic.
“I’m sorry, so sorry.” She fled backward with her head bowed, like a crab scuttling away for cover.
She shut her eyes, tears spilling out. Memories rippled across the red undersides of her eyelids of every single time this had happened before.
She shouldn’t have hoped for anything different this time. But she craved a loving touch so much, her better judgment had been subdued.
After a moment, she raised her head to gaze upon her mother, blank-faced as ever, completely unaware of how much she had just wounded her daughter. A fleet of conflicted emotions sailed right through her—disappointment, anger, frustration, contrition—before she settled on resignation.
“It’s not your fault you’re like this. I’m sorry for crossing the line,” she said, hushed, words falling in vain on the ears of a possessed woman. Then she realized this was a blessing—she could say anything then, and nothing would matter.
“I’ve made the terrible mistake of trusting someone I shouldn’t have, Mother,” she admitted. “And now I’ve endangered you and Father. I fear there’s no way for me to unmake my mistake.”
Not a single reaction.
In that room defined by negative space, in that moment defined by what was unsaid, Lythlet reached deep into the silence of her soul, and something reached back. A brand-new idea, one final scheme. A desperate gambit she could employ, the only one that would guarantee Father and Mother’s safety.
She let out a deep exhalation, trying to gather her courage before this woman she loved. She forced a grim smile onto her lips as she rose from the floor. “But don’t worry, Mother. I won’t let anyone hurt you.”
Before leaving, she tiptoed around the head of the mattress to tuck Father in, pulling the blanket up to his shoulders.
He coughed once more, his breath warm on her hand, and she felt pity for him.
He must be weary from the construction. His forehead didn’t burn with a fever, but his persistent cough made her wonder if he’d caught the season’s flu.
A faint smell wafted from him, familiar, yet one she could not place.
It was pleasant, a scent that once again drew to her mind the bucolic, far-off fields of harvest, yet discomfort stirred in her, the hair on her arms rising.
I’m certain I’ve breathed that scent before.
He stirred then, on the brink of waking, and she backed away, not wanting to disturb him further.
· · ·
L YTHLET ARRIVED AT the kataka flats long after sunfall, stars blinking overhead, cresting a full moon.
All her neighbors were out on their ledges to enjoy the fireworks that would begin on the dot of midnight.
She watched enviously as families and friends jostled on their ledges, yelling at one another to make space.
Her ledge was almost empty except for her and her hive-lantern in its glass casing. She stared at the lightning-bees with quiet affection.
She lifted the lid and reached in to gently stroke the fuzzy bees.
“Thank you for your companionship, Rentavos, Beracani, Truvelio, Nuneca. You, too, Yoshifero. Don’t bully the others so much when I’m gone.
” They scuttled over her hand, familiar with her touch, their bright bioluminescent flesh limning her fingers red.
She withdrew her hand and was about to shut the lid when she paused. Perhaps not , she thought, leaving the lid tipped upwards. Desil might not return soon. Best I give the little bumbles a chance to fly off once their hive begins rotting.
The first firework of the Harvest whistled into the air, bursting into hundreds of orange flowers, marking the midnight hour. A second explosion followed, erupting into white snow that flaked into vanishment. One by one, the Oraanu pyrotechnists painted the midnight with their fireworks.
It was beauty beyond measure. She lifted her gaze to the looming darkness of night, to the terrific bursts of fire-flowers erupting in the sky, breaking the stretch of Dirantas’s might.
She watched on the brink of tears that would not come, understanding this would be the last Harvest fireworks she’d ever witness.
But weeping would require an energy she no longer had.
She felt truly, utterly, irredeemably empty, like a cask that had been tipped over for days until every drop of wine had leaked out and evaporated into thin air.
The fireworks were far from over, but she decided to turn in—there was no point wasting her time watching a show she was not enjoying. She left the hive-lantern outside, little Rentavos and Yoshifero squabbling in buzzing staccato beats, lid left tilted vertically.