Chapter 3 #2
And yet, as she approached the waiting carriage, the blade protested in her hand. Lord Veylen stood at the open door, one hand resting against the frame.
“Good girl,” he awarded with mock sincerity.
She stepped past him without a word, propelled by her palpable, indisputable divinity.
Ilys opened her eyes, face down in the water.
The bath had cooled long ago, but she remained, forehead pressed against the porcelain lip, watching her breath ripple against the surface.
The room lingered in half-light, lit only by the dying embers in the hearth, their glow too faint to warm the chill clinging to her skin.
Breaking the surface, she breathed in. Reflected on the breaths she had stolen. The ones that would never rise again.
Eyes were such telling features. She pondered on the fear she had glimpsed in the man’s eyes. The crinkle of that wary gaze, realizing the path before him had ended unexpectedly, violently. Shamed tears threatened to fall as Ilys shoved the image from her mind.
Hush, she urged, you are a Veilwalker. Act like one.
The tub’s deep, tepid waters lulled against the edges. Wisps of steam had long since abandoned it. The scent of lavender oil clung faintly to the surface, delicate and misplaced. Her arms were numb where they rested along the rim.
Death is cruel, she thought, to ask this of me.
When the water grew well and truly frigid, she moved, the slow creak of her limbs protesting in soft cracks and tremors.
Droplets trailed down her skin as she rose, unsteady, and wrapped herself in a fresh robe.
Her dark hair clung to her neck, heavy and dripping as she staggered toward the mattress.
She collapsed onto it, trembling. She could have rung the bell, could have called for a fire, but she stayed still. The cold pressed deep into her bones, and she welcomed it, letting it seep through every inch of her, as though ice might preserve what she could not bear to lose.
She thought of her gloves. The black silk that had hidden the blood.
She thought of Grim.
Grim, who was somewhere multiplying their efforts.
A knock at the door came steadily, a quiet insistence that left no room to be ignored.
Ilys suspended, hands loosely folded in her lap, and allowed the knock to come again before she stood, pulling her veil into place. When she opened the door, Baron stood in the dim light of the corridor, a folded parchment in his hand.
“This is for you,” he said, holding it out to her.
Her fingers tightened on the doorframe as she glanced at the letter. “From Grim?”
He nodded, confirming.
Ilys’ gaze lingered on the parchment as she reached for it, hesitant. “He doesn’t write.”
“He did this time,” Baron replied, a smile in his voice.
Forgoing a response she turned to place the letter on her desk. She didn’t open it, instead letting her hand rest on the wood before stepping back. Baron stood in the doorway, watching her patiently before stepping inside.
“Do you plan to read it?” he asked, his voice calm and without expectation.
“Later,” she noted.
His eyes flicked to the small table by the window, where the pieces of a Fox and Geese board lay scattered, remnants of a previous game. “You’ve been keeping to yourself. Usually I see you more when Grim is away.”
She shrugged, her hands brushing against the sleeves of her robe.
Baron walked over to the table, picking up one of the wooden game pieces. He turned it over in his hand, unhurried. “Not chess, then?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Too slow,” she explained. “And the rules are too… many.”
His lips twitched. “And Fox and Geese?”
“The fox always wins, if it plays well,” she instructed, her tone quiet but certain. “It is simpler. More fair.”
“You are often the fox, I assume?”
She nodded, smirking.
Baron set the silver fox back down gingerly, his gaze moving from the board to her. “We could train tomorrow. Out in the courtyard.”
Her gaze flicked to him, her expression veiled, both literally and figuratively. “Train?”
“You’ve worked with Grim,” he voiced. “I could help you keep sharp.”
She peered at her hands, fingers loosely clasped. “I see to that already.”
“I know,” he replied, his voice gentle. “But it may be nice to have additional guidance.”
Ilys’s eyes lingered on the letter where it sat unopened.
Baron turned back to her, his expression curious and voice self-conscious. “You do not have to decide now. About the training. But think on it.”
He stepped toward the door, pausing as his hand brushed the frame. “Good night, Ilys. Be kind to yourself,” he said in farewell, his tone summery.
“Good night,” she replied, her eyes fixed on the desk.
Baron left discreetly, door closing with a soft click behind him.
Ilys hovered over the letter as she tenderly unfolded it, focus shifting to the familiar scrawl of messy handwriting on the parchment. She was used to receiving notes from him late at night, detailing their schedules for the day to come. Not receiving one while he tended to duties away from her.
She moved to the bed, running her fingers over the twine before unraveling it. The parchment cooled her fingertips as she freed it.
A blade is made for cutting, child,
Not pondering its weight,
The whetstone does not ask the knife
If it regrets its fate.
The fox is trained to track the geese,
And when the chase is through,
No prayer nor hymn will call it back,
It does what it must do.
The crow does not lament the feast,
Nor question why it caws,
The hangman does not braid the noose
To meditate the laws.
Yet here you sit, with steady hands,
And wonder at the deed,
As if the fruit might bloom again
Once severed from the seed.
The wheel turns, the blade falls, and the world remains unchanged. Waste no thought on what was never yours to keep.
-Grim
She marveled at his detachment, yet held the parchment close, yearning to smell where he resided. Where was he now?
It reeked of woodsmoke, of old leather, of the cold wind that clung to him like a second skin and creased where his hands had folded it.
She imagined him somewhere far from her, boots cutting through frost, cloak drawn tight against the gales.
Perhaps he sat by a dying fire, writing with bare fingers, wind-chapped and unfeeling.
She pressed the letter to her chest, imploring it to answer her.
She wanted to hate him for it. She wanted to let the words slip from her hands, let them flutter to the cold floor beside her discarded veil.
He thought she would take comfort in this, in knowing she had done what had been asked of her, and that her grief, or what small, strange thing remained of it, was irrelevant.
Day in and day out, Grim had pressed the truth into her, and the priestess had religiously reiterated the message. Ilys should be seasoned to agree.
And maybe tomorrow she would be.
She folded the letter carefully, setting it on the bedside table, smoothing its edges like a relic of something that had mattered. Then she turned onto her side, staring at the ceiling, counting her breaths.
One after another.
Like they would never run out.