Named After the Old Gods #4
One night of surrender until it becomes her new normal.
She can do this.
A heavy thud brings Euphemia back into the tower.
Kelda steps back, hand still on the key in the doorknob, and slams her shoulder against the door again. And again. For the first time, Euphemia notices her contorted expression, emotion twisting her sharp features with something akin to hope and dread.
And on the final blow, when Kelda’s shoulder bursts the door wide like a battering ram, Euphemia remembers something else. Ceremonial words uttered by Asvald. Something about bringing an end to that which binds him.
Kelda stumbles inside.
Moonlight and a cold draft spill into the stairwell.
Euphemia cannot see into the room from where she stands. The veil on the deception remains unlifted. If she were a different woman, she might turn back around.
In the deep crevices of her mind, she hears the nightmare’s whinny. She has yet to learn how to ignore its call.
Euphemia steps into the room.
From behind Kelda, there is not much to see.
A fire glows dimly in one corner of the room.
Two large windows are responsible for the ample moonlight.
A few bundles of twigs are arranged in clusters that hang from the walls like strange decorations.
And centered on the wall opposite the hearth is a bed, a supine figure stretched beneath the furs.
All she can spot is a tuft of autumn hair spilled across the pillows.
Heart thumping in her chest, Euphemia takes a step forward, wanting a better look.
But Kelda pushes past her, frantic.
“No. No. No! That was supposed to work.” Kelda falls to her knees at Dagfinn’s bedside, searching his face this way and that.
Seeing her like this, hearing the desperation in her tone, gives Euphemia pause.
“Why didn’t it work!” Kelda bellows so loudly, Euphemia staggers back.
This feels like a moment she should not be present for. Something private shared between family.
Then she remembers, Euphemia is family now.
Dagfinn is her husband, and she has every right to know what’s wrong with him.
Euphemia dares a step forward. “What didn’t work?”
But before she can finish asking, the thud of her boots makes Kelda’s head snap toward her.
In this moment, with her eyes bloodshot and her pale hair frazzled, Kelda appears more like a cornered animal as she charges Euphemia. Hands grip her shoulders and shove her against the cold wall.
“You were supposed to fix him!” she screams, spittle flying. “It was your name he called out for! You!”
Kelda slams her shoulders again and again, each word a new beating on Euphemia’s spine and skull.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Euphemia cries out, head aching. Cracking.
But nowhere near as much as her heart does—for the frenzied look burning through Kelda’s eyes is the exact one her mother had the night she told her she killed her father.
Each pounding blow, Euphemia wishes she would simply melt into the walls. Become a ghost. Disappear forever.
Distantly, through the roaring of her ears and Kelda’s strangled sobs, the thudding of heavy boots bound from the stairwell.
A dark shadow crashes into Kelda and Euphemia collapses.
Becomes a puddle on the floor, unable to do anything but rest. Listen to the warbled argument unleashed across from her as Asvald keeps the wild widow at bay.
Euphemia isn’t sure how long she sits there.
How many minutes or hours it takes for Kelda to finally settle.
Long enough that Euphemia’s ears stop ringing. The throb in the back of her skull becomes a distant, nearly forgotten thing. But the furious look of blame Kelda wielded at her like a mace does not. It is seared into her mind like a fresh scar, the edges crisp.
And as Euphemia slowly starts to pull herself up again, she remembers the bed in the room with them. Realizes that the figure inside it did not move once. Not to cry out and tell Kelda to stop. Not to flinch as Euphemia was attacked. Not so much as a whisper.
Euphemia stands, looking from the bed to Kelda and Asvald.
“Are you good?” he says like a soldier to his men.
Kelda straightens her kirtle, shoulders rolling. “Yes. I am good.”
He backs up a step. Waits. Watches. Before turning and heading for the door, flashing Euphemia one final, apologetic look before he goes.
And then it’s just her and Kelda again, and the husband who may as well be a ghost.
Euphemia stands stiff as a rod, some primal part of her brain telling her that if she doesn’t move, she will not be seen.
But it does not work, for Kelda slowly approaches, hands held up in surrender.
“I should not have behaved that way. Please accept my sincerest apologies. It has been…a trying few months.”
Kelda gives Euphemia time to respond. All she does it take a large step back, trying to put distance between her and her mauler.
Kelda does not advance further.
“Allow me to try again. This is my son, Dagfinn.” With a long-suffering sigh, she gestures toward the bed. She swallows thickly like shattered stained glass is lodged in her throat. “He is cursed.”