Of Whispers and Daggers ✓ [TLRQ #2]

Chapter 30.1 - Leavi

"Sorry I'm late." My voice is flat as I slide into the dinner table. "I didn't realize the time."

Elénna waves it away and ladles me out a bowl.

After Jacin's execution, I spent the day wandering through the grand stone hallways, trailing my fingertips against the walls. When I imagined hard enough, I could be lost in the tunnels of Erreliah, not even sixteen yet. My mother hadn't sent me to Karsix. There was no plague, no journey with the Traders, no Man from the East, no war, no senseless execution. When I tired of my excursion, I could go home, back to my city of lights, back to my warm house, back to my family.

But the castle walls are smooth, and the floors are level. Back isn't a direction people are meant to go.

Contemplation furrows Illesiarr's face. I blow on my soup, trying not to look at him.

"Are you alright, m'dear?"

I nod and swallow my spoonful.

He pauses, but I don't offer anything else. He doesn't say anything either, just pats my shoulder as he stands. I wonder if he knows Jacin was the boy who visited the other day. As perceptive as he seems, I can't imagine him not. I am a glass vial—transparent and hollow.

I clean my bowl and go to my room quietly.

When I sit on my bed, all the numbness of today dissolves into sudden rage. I yank my shoes off, and they bounce across the room. I pull at my dress, barely remembering to undo the lacing, and it drops against the floor. I want to strip myself of today. Kicking the dress under the bed, I dig through my bag for my real clothes—leather pants, high-collared shirt, black muffler—and tug them on. There is no comfort in them, though; there is no substance.

Changing clothes doesn't change anything.

I drop onto the bed, arms spread against the comforter. In the dark, I stare at a ceiling I mostly can't see. I didn't think of him like he did me, but I did count him as a friend. And he didn't deserve to die. Even if what he did was wrong, it wasn't worth his life.

Tears I've held back all day stream from my eyes, and I curl onto my side. "I'm sorry," I whisper. "I'm so sorry."

I wish I could make up for all the wrong I've done, all the little mistakes all my life that got people hurt. But I can't change anything.

"Please." My throat chokes on the word. "Please forgive me."

But whether I'm talking to Jacin or Aster or the universe or someone else—I don't know. My sobs shake me to sleep. I dream of the dark and the cold.

I wake up shivering what feels like minutes later.

"Blazes!" a man curses amidst the ruckus of sudden movement. Again he yells, "Blazes, Leavi!"

My eyes snap open. Sean stands on his pallet, presswrite set aside, glaring like a madman. I scramble up. "Sean. Sean, am I really here?"

Anger contorts his features. He steps frighteningly close, and bites, "You're a mockery, a—"