Spires and Bones
By the time they reach the manor, Euphemia is just waking.
As she blinks her eyes open, the first thing she notices is the rain dripping from the window.
Outside it sounds torrential. She almost wishes the carriage ride wasn’t ending.
She sits upright and draws her cloak tighter around her shoulders.
As she does, she notices Kelda across from her, that keen gaze fixed upon Euphemia as if Kelda never took her eyes off her.
Everything that happened comes rushing back. The beautiful day. The lovely town. But also the shifty folk down by the pier. A kind woman selling baubles. The same woman uttering her father’s name. The world sweeping out from under her feet.
Euphemia opens her mouth to speak—of what, she is unsure. An apology, perhaps? There they were, enjoying the lovely day, when Euphemia had to go and ruin it.
But Kelda lifts a hand, stopping her. She shakes her head as if to say not yet.
Asvald parks the carriage. As he helps them out, Euphemia and Kelda take turns ducking under their hoods and racing inside where the rain cannot reach them.
The cold still does, though. In the foyer, Euphemia shakes off her mantle, handing it to Asvald to be returned to the closet, just as a breeze blows through her.
As if the manor has breath as chilling as ice.
She trembles, arms wrapping over herself as she thinks only of warm tea, blankets, and a nice fire.
Kelda shrugs off her cloak as well and slips on a pair of slippers that were by the door. “Join me for some tea.”
There is no question in her tone. And though Euphemia would like nothing more than to retreat to the confines of her bedchamber, she cannot refuse.
“Some tea would be nice,” she says, and Kelda leads them from the foyer into the grand sitting room.
Towering windows stretch along the far wall, their panes blurred by the afternoon rain and the grey sea beyond. The room is sparsely furnished, much like the rest of the castle. Empty spaces mark the walls, and faint rings remain where vases and potted plants once stood.
A handful of chairs and a settee cluster around a broad hearth, where a fire crackles warmly despite the dreary weather outside.
Euphemia sinks into one of the seats, grateful for the heat, and watches as Kelda settles nearby.
A few moments later, Asvald returns with a tea tray, setting it carefully upon the table between them before taking up a position near the edge of the room.
Not leaving. Not granting them complete privacy. More like the illusion of one.
Euphemia realizes she does not know what Kelda has told him about what happened. But judging by the way he watches her, Euphemia thinks he knows all of it, and is staying nearby, just in case.
Kelda leans forward and pours the tea. “Care to tell me what happened today?”
She hands a steaming cup to Euphemia, and it’s not until she accepts the saucer that she notices the small biscuit on the side.
Hunger coils like a snake in Euphemia’s belly.
She hadn’t eaten before they left. And now she isn’t sure she can trust her stomach with food either.
But perhaps a bite or two might do wonders for the pounding in her skull.
“There is nothing to tell,” she says, leaning back against the cushions. Her nose twitches from the dust, but she ignores it, nibbling on her biscuit as she waits for the tea to cool.
One of Kelda’s eyebrows crooks from over her cup. “Oh? Was that nothing to you?”
“No, but I—”
Kelda doesn’t let her finish. “Is it common for you to faint mid-conversation like that?”
Euphemia feels the blood in her veins boiling. “No. Not at all. I was only—”
But Kelda is relentless. She interrupts again. “Then I believe it was not simply nothing and there is plenty to tell. And I, for one, would like to hear.”
Euphemia can hold her tongue no longer. “She knew my father, alright? That is all.”
Only the crackling of the fire fills the room for a time, followed by the sound of Kelda setting her teacup back on the tray.
“That much was obvious already, little cloud,” Kelda says, staring at her intently. “Forgive me for saying it, but that was an unusual reaction for one who’s merely lost someone.”
Heat wrenches Euphemia’s chest. She can no longer breathe. Smoke is trapped in her lungs, suffocating her.
Tears fall from her eyes as torrential as the rainstorm outside. The teacup quakes in her hand. Gently, Kelda reaches over, takes it from her, and sets it down on the table.
“You know,” Kelda starts, filling the heavy silence.
“When we lost my Otho, I blamed myself. I thought I didn’t find the right doctor.
Didn’t try enough of the methods to soothe and heal him.
Worse than the blame, I told myself I wasn’t there for him enough in those final days.
We weren’t sure if he was contagious, you see, so Dagfinn and I were advised to keep our distance.
” Catching Euphemia’s abrupt look, she answers the unspoken question.
“St. Anthony’s Fire took him in the end. ”
Euphemia swallows the lump of grief in her throat. But it barely budges. The rock-ish thing, lodged in there tightly like a rock of coal, one for each of the men lost between them.
She had heard it was illness that claimed Otho’s life, but had not known which one. And from what Euphemia’s heard in passing, St. Anthony’s Fire is as horrific as the worst of them. A scorching fever that tears through the body, their limbs blackening as delirium takes them.
Euphemia’s heart aches for the woman. To have to watch someone she loves go through such a painful end, it’s heartbreaking.
Kelda’s gaze settles on the hearth as she grabs her tea again. Quietly, she sips. “When I found Dagfinn ill, I blamed myself for him as well. I thought, why did I even go in town that day? Why hadn’t I checked on him first? Made sure he was alright?”
Euphemia knows what she’s doing.
It’s the same rationalization Euphemia herself has attempted ever since her father’s passing.
Late at night when no one else is around, Euphemia has sobbed. Told herself it wasn’t her fault. She hadn’t meant to. She would never have gone there if she had known—
None of her pleading had ever soothed the pain.
But there is something about it coming from someone else that does. Not a complete healing of a wound—this pain is too festering for that. But a comforting caress. A cleaning before the bandage is wrapped, giving the new skin a chance to mend.
“It is not your fault no more than it was mine.” Kelda’s words drip with barely contained emotion.
And perhaps it’s for that reason that Euphemia feels inclined to be vulnerable.
To be honest.
“You’re wrong though.” Euphemia stands from the settee, fists clenched. “It was my fault. Wholly. Completely. My fault. And there is nothing I can do to change that.”
Euphemia starts to march from the room, and Asvald steps in her path.
“Let her go,” Kelda says. “It has been a long day.”
Asvald moves, and Euphemia tries her best not to run but to only walk briskly from the sitting room.
As she does, she hears Kelda shifting the conversation to Percival, and for a moment, she almost turns back.
Not only is she eager to hear what news Asvald might share about him, but Euphemia also remembers she meant to question Kelda about the leather bundle Maryam had provided.
Perhaps those questions will be better answered tomorrow though, after she’s able to rest her weary head.
As Euphemia retreats to her bedchamber, she remembers the sorry state of her linens. Sighing to herself, she realizes she’ll need to head back down to the washroom before she can isolate herself fully.
But as she enters the bedchamber, Euphemia finds a fresh set of linens already resting atop her mattress.
“But—how?” Euphemia asks the empty room, but she knows only Asvald could have done such a thing. She’ll add it to the growing list of things she needs to thank him for, whenever she has the chance.
For the time being, she hastily makes her bed before collapsing atop it.
She should not be so tired already; it’s hardly the middle of the afternoon, and she slept for most of the carriage ride back.
But weariness has settled into her bones ever since she arrived at Thorfell. Perhaps it’s the altitude. Perhaps it’s the chill in the air. Whatever the reason, Euphemia sinks into sleep, wondering if Ash and the nightmare will be waiting for her on the other side of slumber.
This time, sleep is surrender.
An utter and complete loss of control.
And as she descends into an uncontrollable darkness, the purplish light emerges once more. The meadow. The babbling brook. The familiar horse.
With an unknowing smile on her face, Euphemia spins around, eager to greet the mysterious man of her dreaming world.
Only, he is not there.
A cloud of dense fog creeps beneath the purple sky.
Euphemia opens her mouth to call out to him. But she hesitates. There are creatures in this place that even he is fearful of. The last thing Euphemia wants is to draw them to her, especially while her protective dream champion is not with her.
Still, she can’t help but worry.
What does it mean for him that he is not here?
Perhaps she has merely eroded from his mind. Perhaps he is traversing the expansive lands, lost to her forever now.
A gust of wind blows through the fog, an eerily crisp path emerging.
Beyond it, spires of bone jut through the clearing.
The bone palace presents itself to her.
Nástrond, he had called it.
A place so dreadful, even Ash would not enter.
Euphemia cannot see a door, only the hole where one should be. Either removed from its hinges or cracked wide open. Either possibility fills her with a sense of wrongness.
But light glows from inside the bone palace, like the beckoning of an upturned hand.
She’s being welcomed.
Lured.