A Dark and Starless Night

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Eve

Eve's hands shook as she gripped the tea cup in her hand. She could feel the eyes of her friends on her, even Fin watching her from over his newspaper. She hated it, hated the feeling that they were worried about her. But more than that, she hated herself.

It was her fault that a man had been butchered in the streets. Her fault that he had died there, decades before he should have. Her fault that Don would hang from a scaffold outside the palace.

It took all her concentration not to scream or cry. It didn't matter what she did, she had come to realise. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't change what was going to happen. She knew that now, wished she had learned it sooner. Before her hands had become slick and sticky with the flow of Lee's blood.

She eased the mug back on to the table, placing her trembling hands in her lap.

"We'll be leaving soon," Rik said, his voice strained. "You should try to eat something."

She nodded, but she wasn't hungry. She picked up a bread roll and tore it apart. That seemed to stop the shaking at least.

Rik pushed out of his chair and walked outside, Fin close behind. Eve didn't even look up.

"You haven't eaten since yesterday morning, and even then you barely ate," Ali said, taking Eve's hand.

Eve picked up a piece of the bread roll and placed it in her mouth. It was like ash on her tongue, but she dutifully chewed it until she could manage to swallow.

"Thank you," Ali said, squeezing her fingers. "We'll take some for you to eat on the way."

She spoke to the inn keeper, requesting the food to be wrapped for them. It was done quickly and methodically, and it was placed in Eve's saddlebag before they set off into the desert. She barely drank or ate or spoke as they made their way across the desert, only doing any of those activities when her friends expressed concern. Even Fin occasionally prodded her to drink something.

In the back of her mind, she knew this wasn't normal. Or maybe it was normal for someone who had had all hope ripped away from them as they watched a man die because of them. But whichever it was, she couldn't muster the energy to care. Not even when her three companions whispered to each other as they watched her. Not even when they all bundled into the carriage after a sleepless night. Not even as they rolled into the city.

"I should go tell Don what happened," she said, her voice flat.

"I can do it," Rik said, helping her out of the carriage.

"No. I can manage," she said, meeting his eyes for the first time in days. What she saw there made her turn away, the worry and fear in his brown eyes too much to look at.

"Then let me come with you."

She shook her head. "I can manage."

She walked away from him, making the short walk from the palace square to the jail with a guard trailing her. No doubt her friends had agreed she should be watched. She didn't know why they bothered to care.

She was allowed in to see her uncle without much fuss and she stood by the door as he fussed around his room, trying to make it look better. As he nattered about this and that, she watched him, tears pricking her eyes.

"Lee is dead," she said, cutting him off midsentence.

"What?" he asked, pausing and turning to look at her.

"Lee. The courtesan you were seeing. He was killed."

"No. How? Why?"

"It's my fault," she said, her voice cracking. "I needed him to come home to testify that he'd been with you, but-"

"I told you," Don roared, his face twisting in a way she'd never seen. "I told you to leave it alone. But you couldn't. You couldn't do what you were told. Just for once."

His voice broke on the words.

"If you had left things alone he would still be alive there. Still be living the life he wanted."

As Don raged and cried, she realised absently that, while Don may have originally been upset that Lee had left the city, he'd come to see it as a boon. That at least Ned or whoever he was working for or with couldn't reach him. And Eve had led them right to him.

"Guard," Don called, banging on the door. "Guard, this visit is over."

Eve didn't argue. As the surprised guard came back and opened the door, Eve looked over her shoulder as Don crumpled onto the bed and sobbed, his shoulders sagging. She burned that image into her mind, likely to be the last one of her uncle she'd ever see.

You did this, the voice inside her whispered, and she couldn't argue with it.

She walked through the streets of Teryon,feeling cold despite the sun above. Her new guard stayed close behind her asshe reached her home. She unlocked the door, greeted by a weighty silence. Nosounds of Fan humming as she worked. No sounds of pages turning while Don read.She climbed the stairs, each step harder than the last, and walked into herroom. She dropped her things on the ground and didn't bother to change or bathebefore she crawled under the covers in her bed and gave in to the oblivion ofsleep.